Archive of Our Own

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Chapter One: Prelude

July 10th, 2025
The open skies above – once, seeing them had been but a dream, obfuscated by Aincrad's slate-grey ceilings and the dozens of floors above, far out of reach of any of the steel castle's denizens. The only place from where they could truly be seen was the very pinnacle of the floating castle, the Ruby Palace atop its one-hundredth floor. It was a place shrouded in legend, guarded by the very incarnation of Aincrad made flesh, inaccessible to all but the most powerful, the most courageous, and the most foolhardy. And yet, there was one born from that very world who had stood at the very apex of the floating castle, seen its unmarred, unobstructed skies, and gazed out into the vast, seemingly infinite expanse beyond.Not just once, but twice.Of course, with our fairy wings, we can now come and go as we please, and the steel castle is less of a prison and more of a tourist attraction, Kizmel couldn't help but think as an amused rumble escaped her throat. As the sole native of Aincrad who had borne witness to the very top of that world and lived to tell the tale – her own mother Cardinal aside, of course, but Cardinal was far more akin to a goddess in that respect – the feeling of the open skies of Alfheim and the sheer freedom that the ability to fly gave her would likely never get old.And even though the Aincrad that now hung suspended in Alfheim's skies was but a mere recreation, it was still similar enough to the world she had once called her home to feel nostalgic over; places she'd been, things she'd seen alongside her friends and the family she'd found after losing her sister, all of them were familiar in a way, and yet different in others.It is hard to believe that it has been over half a year already . Kizmel's musings were interrupted briefly by the players and NPCs that milled about, giving the Town of Beginnings a far more lively appearance than it ever had during Sword Art Online. Once, the place had been the site where the swordmasters' imprisonment had begun, where tragedy had struck for many of them, and where many had lost their lives in the days following the severance of their own world. Now, however, it held a somewhat different atmosphere – the kind of atmosphere it should have had from the very beginning.One of new beginnings, of excitement and adventure to be had.She smiled back at some of the players in passing – now, they were no longer swordmasters, heroes of old sent forth to liberate Aincrad, but fairies come to visit from the world of Alfheim below. Half a year since our victory over the sorcerer Kayaba, and the end of the steel castle...and yet it feels as though almost no time has passed, at all.Idly toying with her braid of lilac hair, her hand paused when a quiet chime called her attention to a new message; among the things that had changed in this realm of hers was the fact that she was no longer isolated from her husband's world outside, able to send messages and call him across the vast gulf that separated them. A small smile curled at the former dark elf's rosy lips as she read the brief message, and soon after her left hand swiped through the air to call up the menu and eagerly activated the "call" function.A glowing window appeared in front of her, visible only to Kizmel, and a low ring echoed in her ears for a few seconds, until it was answered with a quiet click."Kizmel?" her husband's voice was audible only to her, sounding a little breathless."Kirito. Are you all right?" she asked, somewhat concerned at how he seemed to be struggling for air. Her own voice was audible to no one except him; one of the quirks of her existence as a being of this world, where her thoughts could be translated to words meant to be sent across the gulf separating them."It's pretty hot and humid outside. I just got in the door and ran upstairs," came the response, accompanied by a quiet rustle, before Kirito's voice returned, a little muffled. "Give me a moment to turn on the projector, I need to put my stuff away."Kizmel nodded, even though he couldn't see her. "Of course."It took only a few seconds before his voice returned, this time clearer, and accompanied by an image in the system window before her, showing her husband in his room a world away.Literally.Somewhat sweaty and disheveled as he reached out of sight to open the window in his room, and wearing a simple white button-down shirt and slacks, he struck a far different figure than the valiant swordsman she knew him to be – and yet, in a way it was a far more fitting look for Kirito than the mantle of one of Aincrad's most notorious warriors. Kizmel watched him quietly as he moved about his room, adjusting the projector that would send an image of herself across to him, before reaching over for the bag slung across his back which held his books and notes that had replaced the sword she was used to seeing there on its baldric, instead.Much had changed in the last months, after they had put an end to Nobuyuki Sugou's machinations in capturing three hundred of their comrades for his vile experiments, finally ending the nightmare that had begun more than two years ago when Akihiko Kayaba had first trapped the swordmasters in the world of Aincrad for good. As a result of that, Kizmel's entire world had not simply been upended – no, that was something that had happened as a result of her becoming a player in Sword Art Online and leaving the game, herself – but rather utterly changed in a manner she never would have imagined possible.And even though she was still restricted to merely viewing Kirito's world and interacting with it indirectly through this device that allowed her to see and speak to him in a way that would've been akin to magic to the former elf's sensibilities, there had been many hundreds, if not thousands, of new worlds that had sprung up in the wake of their adventure.Too many to count, far too many to visit in a lifetime, perhaps.All of them were now connected through the whitespace that had been where she had awakened, a "lobby," her husband had called it, from which she had once been only able to enter the world of fairies, but now was able to choose between innumerable other places. The players had taken to calling this central hub from which they embarked onto their journeys into other worlds the "Seed Nexus," and it was a gateway that was ever expanding.Kirito, too, had changed a little in those weeks. Gone was the intensity and ferocity that had served the eponymous Black Swordsman well during his tenure in the steel castle, and being back in his own peaceful world, among people his own age without having to worry about battling for survival had mellowed him out significantly. Still, the world of swords had left its indelible traces upon him just like it had many others, and even though the immediate threat was gone and the damsel had been saved, he'd returned to delve into Alfheim with a fervour that made it hard to believe he'd survived two years in a brutal and unforgiving world where failure meant death and bloodshed was an everyday occurrence. Granted, he did not have as much time to spend with her as either of them might wish, on account of his own schooling which had begun once more, but nevertheless he always made time for her.And now, his summer vacation is coming up , she thought to herself, watching as he unpacked his bags and settled down to commence his studies, smiling somewhat at his diligence. Even though he will still have to attend school, there should be more time for us to spend together.Even with Cardinal keeping her company in the little world that Kizmel called her own aboard the machine in her husband's room, most of her own friends had their own lives to live – many were in school for the time being, just like Kirito, while others, like Agil and Klein, were attempting to get their livelihoods back in order after two years away. She still saw them occasionally, and there were of course the people at Rath whenever she spent time there to help them further develop Underworld, but it was a far cry from the amount of time she'd spent living and fighting with them in Aincrad.She herself had been far from idle in that time; spending much of the intervening days when she had little to do but explore the worlds of Alfheim and Underworld at her own pace learning and studying, much like her husband had been doing. Argo and Cardinal had been a big help in that regard, along with Kikuoka and the others at Rath, providing her with a vision of what the human world, Kirito's world, was actually like. And while there was no magic like there had been in Aincrad before the Great Separation, or in Alfheim, it was a place that might as well be magical to someone like her who had no experience outside of the realm of Aincrad.Their self-moving carriages, trains, even the machines they use to fly through the sky without wings or magic, none of these would've been imaginable in Aincrad, even before the Great Separation, the dark elf found herself musing. But maybe it is because these humans had to make do without magic, without that crutch to make their lives easier, that they had to be inventive.
Perhaps it was the very thing that had made worlds like Alfheim and Aincrad so fantastical that had also stifled their growth.
There was just so much to see and learn about that she couldn't help but feel excited at the prospect, wondering if the Kirito had felt the same way upon setting foot in Aincrad. No, she didn't have to guess – she knew, without a shadow of a doubt, because that was the kind of man her husband was."What're you thinking about?"Shaken from her reverie by her husband's voice, Kizmel glanced up to find him having paused at his desk with his books and homework to look over at her worriedly, and offered a gentle smile. "I was merely looking forward to spending more time with you once your exams are over.""Just gotta get through next week," he agreed somewhat morosely. "I knew it was going to be rough, but man, is it rough. There's just so much catch-up they're cramming into class, it's like we're doing double the work."She missed being able to reach across and pat him on the arm comfortingly, but that would have to wait until he once again logged into NewALO. So instead, Kizmel settled for a kind shake of her head. "I believe that you will conquer this challenge just as you have any other.""Yeah, yeah. You know...I could always do my studying over there in NewALO," Kirito offered. "At least that way we'd get to spend some more time together in person.""There will be plenty once school is done for the term," the lilac-haired Imp chided gently, before reminding him that he'd made the same suggestion once before, offering to do his homework inside of New Alfheim Online. At the time, both Kizmel and his mother Midori had been in agreement that it would be better for him to do so in a place without distractions, and as currently neither of them possessed a homestead in the world of fairies, that left his room, in his own world – and it wasn't as though he was alone, after all, Kizmel was there in spirit via Professor Shigemura's projector, after all, even if she couldn't be there in person.And if she had promised to hold him in her arms and lull him to sleep once he was done with his work for the day as a reward...well, that was something no one else but them need to know.He grumbled silently for a moment, before picking himself back up. "Well, once this is over, I should have a bit more time to spend with you, at least. I mean, there's still summer classes because we've got so much to catch up on, but that's mostly electives...and the people in my courses are the ones who know about you for the most part, so I might actually be able to bring you with me. Um, if you want, that is.""Are you sure that is wise?" she asked; after all, she knew very well how potentially dangerous the knowledge of her very existence was to Kirito, his world, and those around him. She might not understand fully the implications of a sapient "artificial intelligence," as Agent Kikuoka and her fellow co-workers at Rath referred to her whenever she asked exactly what she was, but she knew very well the importance of keeping secrets, and the dangers they could pose, should the right knowledge fall into the wrong hands. "After all, there is still a risk that somebody might enter unannounced."The former knight's husband chuckled, before shaking his head. "I talked to Kikuoka about it...he's okay, as long as it's nothing overt. Everyone else there has signed NDAs, too, and they're in on it. If anything happens, we'll just play you off as my long-distance girlfriend. It means we can't really use the projector, but there's always the LINE video call function on the phone."It always was a marvel to her how easily he spoke about their ability to communicate across worlds like this; back in Aincrad, the swordmasters would have killed for such an ability. Knowing that her husband was only a few seconds away, even if it was only through what the humans called a "phone" call, did much to ease her mind...and in fact, Kizmel had accumulated quite the collection of people whom she could call to converse with – almost all of her friends and acquaintances, along with some new ones, had given her a way to contact them should she desire."It'll be fine," he assured her. "Look, I'll bring the Augma, and you can listen in during class and maybe join us during project time after, when we get to the labs. I'll be able to show you around, and you'll be able to talk to the others, even if it's just on the phone. I mean, I know you can talk to them any time you want already, but I just thought..."Kizmel suppressed an amused smile at how flustered he was sounding. "That sounds lovely."Kirito blushed at her smile, before turning away and opening the books he'd placed onto the desk. Picking up a pen, he paused for a moment, glancing back towards her. "You know, maybe we should see about finding us a place in Alne or Yggdrasil City over the summer. So we can have a place for us to hang out in when we don't feel like flying around. What do you think?""Perhaps…""Or…" he hesitated for a moment. "Or...did you want to go back to New Aincrad? To Lyusula, I mean. Or maybe to our old place?"Thinking about their old home on Aincrad's forty-fifth floor brought with it a wave of nostalgia; currently, in this incarnation of the steel castle, only the bottom twenty floors had been made accessible, and it would be a while still until they could return to the forty-fifth. Kizmel didn't know quite how long it would be, or if they would even be able to obtain their old home again as a result of the changes that YMIR was making to the game as the team worked to merge the worlds of Alfheim and Aincrad.Even with Cardinal's help, there still was much to do, and many things that required a "human" touch to test out and make fit for the world of Alfheim. It just showed how seriously Lind and his team were taking the merging of the two worlds.Though, considering how many of those working on that particular project have fought alongside myself and Kirito, I don't doubt that they would make it available to us if we asked, she mused absently...but then shelved that thought for later. Knights – even retired ones – were rarely in the habit of asking for favours, after all.Besides, a part of her was wondering if she would not prefer to find a different homestead with Kirito elsewhere in this brand new world, instead.Their cottage in the steel castle had been given to them as a gift by their party members back then; Rain, Philia, Yuna, and Nautilus had worked in secret to find and purchase a place for all of them to call home, a place for all those who didn't fit in with the rest of the monolithic clearing group, and such a symbolism – unintended or otherwise - was not lost on Kizmel, either.Perhaps with a fresh start, she and Kirito could find somewhere to truly call their own, purely for themselves, as the others had moved on to find their own places in the world – both this virtual one, as well as their own.After all, Aincrad had been her past...and even as similar as New Aincrad was to the world she'd called her home, it wasn't quite the same in many subtle, yet undeniable, ways. It was woven into the very bones, the very essence of this version of the steel castle, visible to Kizmel anywhere she looked.Perhaps it is because I am beginning to truly understand the nature of these worlds at last, she mused thoughtfully. That these places are simply…stages, built for the amusement of the players. No matter how real they might look, there is little meaning behind them beyond the fleetingly superficial, no life, no soul of their own. Not in the way there was in Aincrad . Or, at least, the way I perceived Aincrad until my eyes were truly opened.Instead, they teemed with life of a different sort – and that suited them just fine.Not every world was meant to be alive on its own, and not every place needed to be filled with the kind of "life" that the steel castle's consequences invoked. The swordmasters had more than earned their reprieve from such a world, and she was more than happy to view them as they did – a place to find enjoyment and excitement."No," she answered after a long pause, "I...have no particular attachment to New Aincrad, as it were.""Are you sure?" Kirito asked skeptically.Realizing what he meant, as she was sitting on a bench in the recreation of the Town of Beginnings with Black Iron Palace prominently featured behind her in his view, Kizmel ducked her head slightly."I am sure," she replied firmly, "although I will admit I was feeling a little melancholy, particularly without you or any of our friends around."Which cannot be helped, unfortunately, she added silently; after all, she knew that many of them, like Kirito, would be away this week and the next while they prepared to take their exams. And yet, her brief excursion to try and find familiar sights and places in the steel castle had only served to further drive home the changes between it and her old world.Though, she could admit, perhaps she was giving these new worlds too little credit. After all, they were not like Aincrad, nor had they ever been meant to be truly alive to their players in the same way that the steel castle had been. It was only through a stroke of fate and the machinations of a mad sorcerer that Aincrad had truly come alive; Alfheim, on the other hand, teemed with life of a different sort, one given to it not by the world itself or the grim reality of its consequences, but instead by the players that populated it and the joy, excitement, and eagerness that supplanted the grim determination and seriousness of its predecessor.The players themselves were not the only ones who'd been given a fresh start, however. Kizmel pondered as she watched Kirito turn his attention towards his work, familiar by now in their routine of quietly spending time together while he finished his work before dinner time as she watched.For everything that had changed in New Aincrad, and for all the small ways in which it differed from the steel castle she'd known, there were some major alterations that YMIR had made, as well. Perhaps the most meaningful one, to the survivors of Akihiko Kayaba's death game at least, was to be found on the very first floor in the Town of Beginnings, where the swordmasters' two-year nightmare had first begun, visible to all who entered New Aincrad for the very first time.It had also been their first stop upon setting foot on New Aincrad weeks ago.Within the walls of Black Iron Palace, the centerpiece of the largest city of the floating castle, had once stood the Monument of Life: a record of all those whose lives had been lost to the steel castle, inscribed as though by magic with their names, the time of their death, and the way they had met their end.Now, though, it had been replaced by something far less somber and sinister. YMIR had changed the monolithic wall to the Monument of Swordsmen, dedicated to recording the names of those daring and skillful enough to breach the new Aincrad's floors and be the first to defeat its Pillar Guardians. A hall of fame, Argo called it, Kizmel recalled fondly of the time they had first seen it.It was far more fitting for this place where life and death struggles were a distant memory, and yet Kizmel felt a small sense of loss at the thought that the names of those who'd died in Aincrad would now be lost to history. Lind, however, had assured her that the list of those names remained intact, stored safely away, awaiting the time that it would see the light of day...when the world was finally ready.When exactly that time would be, Kizmel wasn't sure, but knowing and understanding as little of their world and customs as she did, the former dark elf hadn't felt it to be her place to ask, and been simply content to know that those who had fallen would be remembered.Several of those names, in fact, would never fade from her own memory for as long as she lived.But to Kirito and Kizmel there was another, far more personal, change that stood out as they explored this version of Aincrad: whereas before, Cardinal had simply conjured another NPC to take her place in the Forest of Wavering Mists on the third floor as part of a quest after she had broken the fate that had been laid out for her, the battle she had eternally fought against the Forest Elven Hallowed Knight there no longer existed. Gone was the permanent fixture of the Dark Elven Royal Guard locked in an endless, pointless battle against her nemesis, and even knowing that it was akin to a staged play did little to diminish the joy Kizmel felt at seeing dark and forest elves standing side by side, instead.Perhaps it was a change that had been made in deference to her – after all, most of YMIR's management and development team were former clearers and knew of her, or knew about her. More than that, due to Cardinal's involvement in the merger of these two disparate worlds, Kirito and Kizmel had quite often been consulted and asked to help by Lind, Klein, and others who were working to bring them together over the past few weeks.Instead of dark and forest elves struggling to the death against one another over the keys that would open the Sanctuary, it was both races, united, battling against the menace of the Fallen. Players would find the two sides attempting to stop their undead brethren from resurrecting the Forsaken and unleashing their blight upon the steel castle and the world below.Now, the Forest Elven Hallowed Knight and Dark Elven Royal Guard could be found fighting together, against the Fallen and their minions in the third floor's forests, in a bid to prevent the Sanctuary's keys from falling into their grasp.The clearest hint, however, that Kizmel's past, that the shackles of her programming, were no longer part of her destiny in this new world, was there in the name the quest had taken: what had once been the Elf War was now the Legacy of the Forsaken.A bright smile spread across her lips as she tilted her head back, enjoying the warm sunlight that bore down upon her, knowing that, despite the oppressive sight of the tenth floor overhead, the skies of Alfheim were free...just like her.-------------------------------
July 12th, 2025
"You didn't really need to come along, you know. Don't you have homework to do, or something?"Suguha shook her head with a chuckle at her brother's confusion. "It's Sunday. I finished everything yesterday before we started playing, remember?""Oh. Right.""Besides, I don't mind coming with you. I'd like to meet everyone again, too." She'd gotten to know some of his friends from Sword Art Online over the past few months, meeting everyone at one of the get-togethers she'd attended with him in the wake of NewALO's re-launch under the YMIR banner. At the time, she'd been overwhelmed by the sheer number of people there, faces and voices she didn't know, but she'd come away with one thing: an immense gratitude and respect for these people who'd braved the death game for their freedom.The fact that she'd been almost immediately roped into her brother's inner circle of mostly girls also had a lot to do with making her feel at ease among all these strangers, and she'd begun to play with some of them in NewALO whenever the opportunity arose. So when he said he was going out to meet with them, she'd asked to come along without much hesitation."Huh. I thought you just saw them the other day in-game."The younger sibling laughed. "That's in-game, Kazu-nii. It's different."He blinked. "Is it?"She opened her mouth to retort that, of course it was different, only to pause, suddenly reminded that, for him, for two years, the avatar and the person behind it had been one and the same. And wasn't he right, in a way? She hadn't had much opportunity to meet Asuna or Nijika, Kotone, or the others in the real world much, but they really didn't seem much different than they were in NewALO , fairy wings aside. And then there was Kizmel, for whom there actually wasn't a player behind the avatar..."I...guess?" Suguha said instead, a little hesitantly. "I mean…"No, actually, it's not that different, she realized with a start. They didn't just play the game to quest or hunt together; there'd been afternoons filled with banter as she listened to stories about their adventures and exploits, sitting around and chatting as they watched Lisbeth do her work, and, one of Suguha's favourites, indulging Kizmel's desire to try out every single sweet dish available in Alfheim.Thinking about it that way, it wasn't really all that different from hanging out with friends in the real world – so what if they made use of the virtual world to cut through time and space, allowing them to spend time together without having to travel far and wide? Suguha didn't have a lot of friends, outside of her immediate acquaintances in the kendo club and Shinichi Nagata, who played her fellow Sylph Recon in the game, and so she didn't have a lot of opportunities to spend time after school with them.Kazuto laughed at her thoughtful expression, patting her on the shoulder. "Don't think about it too hard. Come on, I'm sure they'll be happy to see you again, too."It didn't take them long after that to reach their destination – a back-alley cafe that Leafa had only been to once before. Just like that time, the ambiance and location evoked a somewhat grown-up feeling, like a bar that she would expect to show up in a television drama, or maybe a place where classy adults met over coffee."Yo!" Kazuto called out as he opened the door to a little jingle from the bell hung above it. "Agil, you there?""Coming!" came a gruff voice from the back; at this time in the morning, before the lunch rush, the Dicey Cafe was relatively empty, and the bar itself unoccupied. It didn't take long for the owner to emerge from the door behind the counter, however. A tall, thin, dark-skinned man came out, his expression lighting up as he caught sight of them. "Kirito! Should've known it was you when you called me by that name. Stopping by when there's no crowd, that's just like you, huh?"His eyes turned towards Suguha. "And you brought the little lady along, too. It's nice to meet you again, Suguha, right?""That's right, Mills-san," she answered, reaching out to shake the proffered hand."Ah, just call me Andrew, or Andy," he waved her formality off, before jabbing a thumb towards her brother. "Or hell, call me Agil, like that guy there does, I don't mind.""But-"He shook his head, leaning on the bar casually. "Don't worry about it. Look, 'sfar as I'm concerned, you're one of us, and we've all known each other long enough not to bother with that kind of politeness.""Okay...Andrew-san."Her hesitant answer caused the taller man to shake his head with a rumbling laugh as he turned to address Kazuto. "Another one, eh? How long did it take the missus to start calling me by just my name?"The boy just smiled and chuckled, before setting down the bag he'd been carrying. "Here's the cake. Is everything else ready?""Cool. Yeah, everything's set. The others are on the way, and the cafe's been marked as booked for a private event this afternoon on the website.""Thanks. Are you sure this is gonna be okay? We can't-"The cafe's owner shook his head. "Look, it's not a problem. Even my wife agreed, so don't worry about it. Besides, it's not like we mind having everyone around. Makes the place lively." Andrew carefully opened up the plastic bag, revealing a large cardboard box.Peering out from the little window in the top, Suguha could barely make out the English words "Happy Birthday" scrawled across in red frosting. Elbowing her brother in the side, she pulled on his arm. "Kazu-nii! What's all this? All you said was that you were dropping something off and meeting your friends!""Oh." He rubbed the back of his neck, flushing at having been caught. "Didn't I mention it? It's Rain's birthday today, and we're throwing her a surprise party.""Birthday ?!" Suguha all but shrieked. "It's Nijika's birthday and you didn't tell me!"He blinked. "Um...sorry?""Sorry? Sorry?" she abruptly let go of his arm and started pacing. "Sorry won't get me a present for her! When is she getting here, anyway?""Um...in about...fifteen minutes," came the answer."Fifteen minutes!" Suguha's wail was only answered by Andrew's roaring laughter."Don't worry," the older man said as he carefully placed the cake onto a silver serving tray, "I don't think Rain'll mind. But if you really want to do something, you can sign one of these."Pausing long enough to take a look at what he'd slid across the counter, Suguha found a card – one signed by everyone she knew was a Survivor and then some. "Is...is it alright for me to?" she asked a little hesitantly. "I mean, these are all…""Like I said, missy – you're practically one of us, so go right ahead."Picking up the pen he was holding out, she thought a moment about whether to just put her signature under the generic printed lettering of the card, or to leave a more personal message like some of the others had. But she didn't know the girl who played Rain the Spriggan well enough, and finally settled on a simple "Happy Birthday," instead.By the time she turned around, Suguha noticed her brother hadn't been idle; he was shifting tables and chairs around to make a larger sitting area, and then the door opened once again, this time admitting a small group of people whom she'd met, but didn't know as well as the rest of her brother's party."Yo! Kiri-noji, Agil, how's it going?" It was difficult to reconcile the image of the six men with loosened ties and button-down shirts with the samurai they played in-game, but Suguha recognized them, anyway.The men exchanged their own greetings with Andrew and Kazuto while she watched from the bar, before quickly getting to work helping her brother rearrange the cafe for the impromptu birthday celebration. It wasn't until a minute had passed that Suguha realized she should probably help, as more and more people began trickling in."Ah…" she said, waving to get Andrew's attention, "can I help with something?"The tall cafe owner hummed in thought, before grinning. "Yeah, actually. We need a lookout. We told Rain to be here at eleven, but you never know – that girl's a sneaky one, and she likes being early. So, you wanna help Kizmel keep an eye on her?""Okay?" it came out more as a question, but then Suguha's phone rang as he added her to a conference call, and the face of her brother's girlfriend appeared on the screen. Kizmel greeted her with a little wave and a smile even as she seemed to be in the middle of talking to someone."She's on a call with Rain and Philia," Andrew whispered conspiratorially, "so she's basically watching where they are to make sure they don't get here before we're set up, but it's not like she can call out to us. You want to keep an eye out for her signal and let us know when the girls are getting close?"-------------------------------"Surprise!"Kizmel was sure that it wasn't much of one; after all, such a large group was difficult to hide, and their attempts at luring Rain to the Dicey Cafe had been anything but subtle – on top of that, she was more perceptive than most, a trait that had served the girl well in Aincrad.Still, as she watched from the pedestal from which her image was projected into Kirito's world at the corner of Agil's bar, where she would look like any other patron casually sitting on a stool, Rain seemed at least appreciative of their efforts, if her wide, teary smile was anything to go by. She grinned into the window that was her direct line to the other girl and offered a congratulatory smile of her own."Happy birthday, Rain," the former dark elf said, "may you see many more blessed ones to come."It took a moment, perhaps because she was being swarmed by her other well-wishers, but eventually Rain's eyes turned back towards her phone, looking back at Kizmel. "Thank you, Kizmel.""I will see you at the cafe." With a nod, the elf ended the call, before shifting the world around her with a thought; Her surroundings turned into a facsimile of the Dicey Cafe as the device Professor Shigemura had given them attempted to recreate either world in the other. Noise and voices suddenly reached her ears, and the smile remained on the lilac-haired woman's face as she watched the images of her friends gathering around their fellow player."Been a while since we all got together like that, huh?"Turned her head to the side at being suddenly addressed, Kizmel blinked as she realized that it was Hafner who'd addressed her. "Indeed," she agreed after a moment. "But it is nice to see everyone together.""That it is," Hafner agreed. "By the way, Lind couldn't make it, but he says hi. Something came up at the office. I dropped off his present for her along with mine with Agil earlier.""That is unfortunate." But not unexpected, Kizmel thought to herself. Once the players had escaped their imprisonment in Aincrad, they'd all attempted to get back to their old lives – and sometimes it surprised her how close many of them still stayed to one another. "I'm sure Rain will appreciate that he thought of her nonetheless."The older man shrugged. "We all gotta stick together, right? Besides, it's still a little rough for some of us out there, so any chance we can get to be reminded there's stuff to be happy about, I'm sure they'll be happy to take."She nodded slowly at the reminder that, for many of Aincrad's survivors, the struggle had not ended merely with their escape from the world which the sorcerer Kayaba had built. Glancing over at the man who'd shed his armour for a shirt and blazer, she couldn't help but ask. "How are things at YMIR?""Decent enough, I guess," Hafter took a gulp from his glass of juice before answering. "We lucked out that a couple of the Survivors Lind managed to talk into it were fairly well off, so we didn't have any trouble getting together the startup funds. And Lind dumped a whole lot of his own money into it, as well – but with the game going as well as it is, we're at least not in the red."It appeared that leadership, after he'd grown into it, seemed to truly suit the man who'd once led the Divine Dragons, after all. Kizmel didn't need to understand all of the nuances of the human world to understand that he'd taken upon himself the stress and labour of creating YMIR not simply because of his love for the virtual world, but also in an effort to help as many of the Survivors find their place after their return as he could. It was a commendable thing to do, even more so as she'd learned that Lind himself was the heir of a significant estate, most of which he'd dedicated to this effort.Yet another thing he'd done that surprised the former knight, and that she couldn't help but respect about him."I'm glad." And she was – after all, despite the fact that in its original form, Alfheim had been little more than a hollow shell to hide the unethical and unlawful machinations of the man known as Oberon, there was something about that world that many of them had fallen in love with. Much like Aincrad, it had drawn many, even among the Survivors, to it like moths to a flame, and Kizmel was glad that the world of fairies had been saved from being consigned to oblivion.
Not only that, but they also rescued Aincrad in the same way, even though it is not the Aincrad we knew.
"Yeah." Hafner chuckled, his expression far looser than she'd yet seen from the usually recalcitrant and taciturn man. "So am I. And hey, you didn't hear this from me, but we're about to open a few testing slots for the new expansion. Lind's been making noises about wanting an expert opinion on it, which is just code for wanting someone to idiot-proof it to make sure players can't break the new content.""I will keep that in mind," she answered with a giggle. It wasn't the first time in the intervening months that Lind and his team had indirectly asked for her or her husband's help with the development of NewAlfheim Online.The two veterans of Aincrad fell silent for a long moment, their conversation spent, before he turned back to look at her, seemingly oddly nervous as he fiddled with his glass. "Shame we always end up having to tuck you into a corner and that you can't join the rest," the older man said with a glance out at the festivities. "But prying eyes and all that."Kizmel shook her head at the man who'd once saved her life. "I understand – and besides, it is not as though I am being excluded, after all."The gruff man who'd been Lind's second-in-command let out a barked laugh. "You got that right. Just look at the gaggle that's coming your way. Feels just like old times, doesn't it?" He gave her a curt nod, finishing his drink before heading off, just in time to miss the group that was heading towards Kizmel's corner.Rain and Philia, along with Yuna, Asuna, Sachi, Lisbeth and Silica were dragging along a perplexed looking Kirito as the group of mostly girls converged around Kizmel's perch bearing their plates of cake. They gathered around the former elf, determined to bring the party to her, seeing as she couldn't move; Rain was the first to greet her in person, coming as close to hugging the former elf as she could without Kizmel's actual physical presence – something that would have to wait until they met in the game soon enough.Rain was at the center of the group, the brunette nearly disappearing under their enthusiastic well-wishes as Kizmel looked on fondly, sharing a knowing glance with Kirito. It took them a while to get settled down enough to actually indulge in the sweet treats, a combination of the cake she'd helped her husband select as well as some which others had brought."I'm sorry you can't eat with us, Kizmel," Rain said apologetically as she stuck her fork into the first slice, "I'll make it up to you next time in-game, we'll find ourselves the best cake place in Yggdrasil."There was no need for it, but Kizmel smiled and nodded regardless, knowing that, just like Kirito, Rain could be stubbornly determined sometimes. "I will very much look forward to it, Rain.""There's this one place," Leafa added, having joined the gathering with her own plate, "I can show you where it is. Their desserts are really good. Even better than the Lily of the Valley's," she added with a nod towards Kizmel.Laughter, companionship, warmth...it was enough to almost make her forget that she wouldn't be there in person, that there was a chance that, for all that she could look into their world, Kizmel might never be able to actually set foot in it.-------------------------------
July 19th, 2025
The bright, shining sun may have been similar, but the noise of automobiles and the ambiance of so many people moving through was far different from even the most populated MMO, even the ones that did have cars or other vehicles to some extent. After all, certain popular parts of Tokyo were so packed full of people, especially now that exams were over and summer vacation had begun, that no game could replicate the sheer throngs of people and traffic moving through the inner city.But the busy streets of Tokyo and its popular commercial centers weren't the only thing he was showing Kizmel, even though it was probably the starkest difference to the world she knew. After all, neither Aincrad nor Alfheim had the kind of population density or vehicular traffic that could be found in downtown Tokyo's entertainment and shopping districts...so perhaps it was fitting that, when he stepped off the train and onto the platform at Tokyo Station, they ended their day trip someplace far more similar to the virtual world which they were both acquainted with.A short walk westward from the station amid a steady stream of tourists and fellow Japanese took little enough time even with him pausing every now and then to pan the camera around, and by the time their destination came into view, he could hear Kizmel's quiet gasp of awe and surprise in his ear. Not that I can fault her, it really is quite the sight, Kazuto thought to himself as he came into view of Otemon Gate.Sprawled out behind it were the over two hundred thousand square meters of the Imperial Palace's garden grounds, separated by streams and bridges from the Inner Palace. While the inner grounds of the palace where the Imperial Family resided were closed to the public except on special occasions, the East Gardens ahead and Kitanomaru Park just to the north were freely accessible to visitors; even though none of the major structures there survived, the moats, walls, and foundations of the fortified buildings of the castle's inner defensive circle could still be seen along with the parks and gardens that had been erected in their stead.Walking across the bridge ahead of Otemon Gate, the former swordsman felt almost like he was stepping back into another world, one of castles, knights, and samurai, and the noise of the city fell away behind the castle walls the moment he stepped across the gate's threshold.Man, Klein and his guys would probably feel right at home here, the former swordsman remembered, thinking back to Fuurinkazan's samurai castle-styled guild home in Aincrad. Maybe Argo has a point, and next time I should take Kizmel to Kyoto."This is Edo Castle, the seat of Japan's ruler for over two hundred and fifty years," he explained to her quietly, mindful of the other people around him as he pulled a little plastic ticket and once again wished that Kizmel could be here to see this with him in person. But for now, her witnessing the sights through the Augma would have to do. "Well, not exactly here, but this was all at one time or another part of the castle."Still, seeing Edo Castle via proxy didn't seem to detract anything from the experience, if the muted awe in her voice was any indication. "How old are these walls? They are enormous.""The original?" Kazuto fished through his memory for the vague recollection of his history lessons. "About...six hundred years or so, I think. It's been changed a lot since then, and obviously was destroyed a few times and rebuilt since then. The main castle has been moved a few times, I think. There, that's part of the old tenshu's foundation back there."Pointing into the distance, he knew that his wife had far better eyesight than he did in the real world, particularly given the optics built into the Augma, but it didn't take eagle eyes to spot what he was talking about. The former dark elf immediately caught sight of the towering trapezoid on the far side of the gardens, rising several meters into the air even though the original five-story tower had only lasted a few years after its initial construction before being destroyed in a fire and then abandoned in favour of other fortified keeps and defensive lines."This place...is almost as old as Aincrad, then…" he could almost hear her shake her head as she stood in the whitespace where he knew Cardinal was recreating the environment for her in 3-D from the Augma's scans as well as whatever online resources she could find. "There is almost nothing left and yet…""There's even older places, but none that I can think of like this," Kazuto said. "I think there's a ryokan – an inn – that's been in continuous operation for over a thousand years. Legends has it even Takeda Shingen once stayed there, as did Ieyasu. Um," he blinked, catching Kizmel's somewhat confused expression, "they're famous warlords in Japan's history. Unified the country, brought centuries of peace and prosperity to a war-torn land, and all that."His wife's gentle laughter rang in his ear. "That sounds very much like the plot of one of Argo's novels," she said with some amusement, "or perhaps the plot of some of the other games you spoke of.""Ah, yeah," Kazuto had to admit. "I mean, they did turn that particular period of Japanese history into a lot of games, and it's pretty popular, both here and overseas. But it's not the only country that has that kind of history. There's castles in Europe just as old, or even older. Temples, fortresses, even arenas and theaters that are thousands of years old, and still standing."I wonder if I can ask Cardinal if she can recreate Windsor Castle or the Acropolis for Kizmel sometime. Unlike Edo Castle or Kyoto, those were locations he wasn't exactly likely to be able to take her to in person, after all."It reminds me a lot of Aincrad, actually," Kazuto told her in a quiet murmur as he continued walking across the path, passing by the Ninomaru Garden. "Almost like a gateway into another place, or another time.""It's so different from what you showed me earlier. The rest of your city, with its steel carriages and sky-towers."He nodded, pausing briefly to let a family with a stroller pass. The child inside cried out happily, before waving at him, causing the parents – foreigners, he figured by their appearance – to mutter a hasty apology in shaky Japanese. Giving them a nonchalant "don't mind" in English in return, Kazuto watched them go, before glancing back onto the lens of the Augma where Kizmel's image was projected."Yeah," he said, "it's a lot different from downtown. I mean, we're still technically downtown, but…" Kazuto shrugged, for no one in particular since he knew Kizmel couldn't see him, only what was in view of the lens. "That out there is the world we live in. It's the modern world, with computers, and anime, and cars...but this place is just as much part of that world, I guess. I kind of wanted you to see that in some ways, it's not really so different from Aincrad or Alfheim.""Aside from the ability to fly and magic powers," came his wife's amused reply, causing him to chuckle."Yeah, except those." Kazuto grinned. "But this place, its history, its traditions...there's a bit of that in games like SAO, you know. And that works both ways."They continued their lazy stroll across the vast garden grounds, with him pointing out landmarks or walking up to signs that had been posted in both Japanese and English for visitors so that she could read them. A tour group passed by on their way out, the guide explaining the history of the site while pointing across to the actual Imperial Palace building that was the residence of Japan's Imperial Family, and they listened in for a bit before the group moved on."It's so vast…" she murmured as they walked across the garden grounds.Kazuto nodded. "It's about two kilometers north to south, and just about one and a half east to west. Adding in Kitanomaru Park and the other gardens, the total area is just over three square kilometers. It's not the biggest palace in the world, and it's nowhere near as big as Aincrad's lower floors, but…"He trailed off for a moment, trying to gather his thoughts and put them into words. "Because the Imperial Family lives here, it's completely cut off from the outside world. There are no major streets going through it, there are no tunnels underneath, and nothing is allowed to fly over it. The Imperial Palace itself is a giant, inaccessible chunk of history sitting right in the middle of modern Tokyo. A city built in concentric rings around a center.""And this center…" Kizmel's violet eyes lit up in understanding. "It's here. This place.""Yeah." Kazuto grinned briefly. "And it's almost completely cut off from the rest of the city. Even all of its security systems are completely isolated and self-contained. It's its own little isolated world."His wife's eyes closed momentarily. "Just like Aincrad was.""Just like Aincrad," he agreed. "And Alfheim. There's a great big wall surrounding it, but it doesn't mean people can't come and go. It doesn't mean they can't both exist at the same time. It doesn't mean people can't cross that border."Eventually, Kazuto found a lawn that several other people had decided to make use of for their own breaks, stretching out on the grass or sitting in the shade of trees to seek refuge from the hot summer sun. Settling onto a bench, he fished the smartphone from his pocket and paired it with the Augma, setting it to receive video input from the front camera so that she could see him. He tilted back his head and closed his eyes for a moment, enjoying the sudden quiet that enveloped him, with only Kizmel's voice in his ear and the wind rustling around them."But the time of knights and samurai has long past, has it not?" the unshackled AI finally murmured. "This place is a relic of a time long since past – a place of honoured traditions, but also a sign of a world long gone."Not bothering to open his eyes, he nodded. "That's true. But their history, their traditions, and their values still live on. It's not like there isn't a place for you here, Kizmel. It may not be like it was in Aincrad, and it may be unfamiliar, but not everything has to be.""Wise words.""Thanks. I got them from Argo on discount," he quipped, opening his eyes again and looking right into the lens. "Look, um, what I meant to say is that no matter how different this place might seem from what you know, there's a lot of things that are similar, too. Even if they are only traditions and relics by now."They fell into a comfortable silence for a bit, and Kazuto had to suppress the urge to doze off in the comforting feeling of having his partner close by along with the warm afternoon sun – the humidity of the past week having given way to a more pleasant cool breeze. The only thing that's missing is Kizmel actually being here, he thought regretfully; it was an impossibility, but at least he would get to spend some time with her in person once he got back home, now that summer vacation had started and his course load was reduced to summer school.Before he could think of something else to say that wouldn't sound awkward to break the comfortable silence that had fallen over them, another voice intruded. "Um...excuse me?"Looking up, he found a young couple standing a little ways away, glancing over towards him furtively. It was the man, looking a few years older than Kazuto himself, who'd called out to him, a camera clutched in his hands. It took him a moment to process the fact that the query had been directed at him. "Yeah?""Sorry, but could you take our picture for us?"Rising from his perch on the bench, Kazuto nodded. "Sure."He took the camera from them as they moved to where they wanted it taken, before snapping a handful of pictures just to make sure he'd gotten it right – in the age of camera-phones, it was rare to have the chance to handle a full-on camera, and after he handed it back, the couple thanked him profusely before excusing themselves."Sorry for interrupting your time with your girlfriend," the woman said as they parted, glancing at the phone in his hand with a kind smile. Kirito realized that his screen was still on and showing Kizmel's face, though thankfully the background looked generic enough that it was impossible to tell she was in VR, while the elf's lilac hair hid her elfin ears."Ah…" he trailed off, freezing momentarily, but by the time he'd found his voice, the couple had already left.Kizmel's giggle brought him back to his phone to find her hiding a smile behind one hand. Smiling wryly, himself, Kazuto returned to his seat, only to find that his wife looked uncharacteristically pensive on the screen of his phone, once her mirth had passed."What's wrong?" he asked curiously.Toying with her lilac braid, the former dark elf glanced up. "Nothing. I was just thinking about how different, and yet how similar our worlds are. The technology, the buildings, the scale...all of those are vastly different. And yet, their history, their people...Seeing them, I was reminded at how often we saw similar things in Aincrad.""Liten and Shivata were kind of glued at the hip, once they both joined the DDA," he chuckled."As were Yuna and Nautilus," Kizmel acknowledged with a teasing grin. "As well as you and I."Blushing, Kazuto merely nodded in response."It does feel nostalgic," she murmured in his ear, and he caught her looking out towards the horizon. "Is it wrong of me to miss that world, at times?"He shook his head. "I don't think so. Actually...I do, too, sometimes.""Really?" The amused look in her eyes told Kazuto that she wasn't exactly surprised by his admission."Yeah. Um...it's just...it's...simpler, sometimes?"Kizmel nodded. "I know what you mean. But this world of yours is beautiful in its own right, in many ways.""I just wish you were here to see it with me, in person."She shrugged. "I have faith that the day will come where I can stand beside you in your world. But until then, we have a myriad of worlds to explore in the Seed Nexus, and one of our very own to build, together."A smile spread across Kizmel's lips. "How many can claim they had a hand in forging a world? Even with the marvels of technology of your people, I should wager the number would not be particularly large.""You're right," Kazuto chuckled, "there's probably not a lot of people, even counting all the game devs."Besides, Underworld is as close to reality as it gets right now... he mused silently to himself, thinking about the top-secret project both he, Kizmel, and Cardinal were involved in at Rath. Shaping a world from the ground up, every rule, every plant, every tree. Down to the last molecule, almost.It was far different from the game worlds of SAO and its successors; when it came down to it, all of those were, at the very core, still games. They had a very particular set of rules that was strictly followed, that limited what the players could and couldn't do, and often resulted in odd little things – artificial limits that were often just that: clearly artificial.More than that, however, Underworld strove to be real – in all the ways that mattered, not simply its consequences, like the death game had. The high-powered equipment they used to connect transmitted far more information than the AmuSphere or NerveGear before them, recreating the sensations and feeling of all five senses to a far greater degree than any game world before it.That gear is really gonna start blurring the lines between the real world and the virtual, he couldn't help but think. But at the end, it's all just a matter of information and information density. We can sort of tell games like ALO aren't "real" because sensations there feel muted, like our brains aren't getting the full set of data, but Underworld is different.In Underworld, he could feel the warmth of Kizmel's body, radiating through her clothes. He could feel the fine hairs atop her arms tickling his skin whenever she embraced him, and he could smell the faint scent of sandalwood and lavender she gave off without even any perfume at all.It truly was another world, in a far different sense from any of the games.And when we fully experience everything, when our brains can't really distinguish the sensations from our real bodies from those of the avatar, we'll have crossed that final line from SAO , he thought to himself. That world was already real to us because of everything we experienced there, but Underworld?Underworld was made to truly come alive, on its own, without any players.Of course, that kind of immersion and realism came at a cost, one that they had discovered very early on: Underworld took an obscene amount of processing power to run and render, making it a struggle to have more than a handful of people connected at any one time. And the more Underworld expanded, the worse it got, at least from the latest he'd heard – Kazuto had little time to visit Rath's offices during the regular school week, and even less while exams and exam preparations were ongoing, so for the past few weeks he'd only heard about any progress from Kizmel as she was there pretty much every day while he was at school.Now that he'd worked with Kikuoka's people at Rath for a few months however, Kazuto was also starting to slowly let down his guard around them – the presence of a few trustworthy friends like Argo helped, of course – but he was beginning to believe that, whatever the government agent's motivations for doing this, at least he was somewhat genuine about ensuring the well-being of his people.And that he counted Kazuto and Kizmel among "his people."It showed in the way the others treated her, too. As an artificial intelligence, he'd expected them to act like he'd seen people do on television or in manga, considering her less of a person and more of a scientific curiousity at best, or an object to study at worst. But somehow, those fears hadn't materialized – Kikuoka had been true to his word, and whether it was because he'd carefully drilled his people in what and what not to do, or because he'd chosen them because he didn't have to tell them, it didn't matter.To them, Kizmel was just a co-worker. A girl they looked out for, worked alongside with, and took care of as if she was one of their own. He even popped into ALO once or twice to play with us, Kazuto recalled, and hadn't the sight of the usually affable ministry official yelling and shouting out spells in the middle of a fight in-game been quite the paradoxical experience. As it turned out, Chrysheight was quite the mage – even to the point that his name was rather well-known among the top players as someone to look out for.And it had been good for Kizmel, too.She wasn't just interacting and speaking with the people of their small circle of SAO survivors, but Kikuoka's plan to integrate and acclimate her to human society was already well underway by having the AI work at Rath. The nice thing about Rath is that she doesn't have to commute, he mused. And between the people at Rath and the other players she was meeting in NewALO, she was slowly getting used to being around "normal" people – people that weren't fighting for their lives, or were the swordmasters from her legends.And all the while, she was learning. With Cardinal's help – and Argo's, though he had to wonder how in the world the former info-broker managed to find the time to compile her guide books for Kizmel – the former elf's natural curiousity was finally finding an outlet as she began studying about the outside world.There were, of course, still a lot of things that Kizmel didn't understand or have the right frame of reference for; various forms of technology were chief among those, in particular anything computer-related. Strangely enough, despite the fact that the level of technology for Sword Art Online's setting was quasi-medieval, the former dark elf had a rather good handle of anything mechanical, once it was broken down to first principles. Seeing her actually understand the inner workings of an automobile to the level of a mechanic and helping Higa troubleshoot his vehicle's problems had been a particularly amusing incident, in fact."I am a fortunate woman, indeed," Kizmel said suddenly, bringing him back to the present. Glancing down at the phone's screen, he found her smiling brilliantly, taking his breath away. "I have had the privilege of watching with my beloved the sun rise and set above not merely one, or two worlds...but four."A loving smile curled at his own, uncaring that other people were nearby or watching. "I hope there's a lot more to come."-------------------------------
July 20th, 2025
"Switch!"Leafa reacted to the command immediately, throwing her wings into reverse and diving back and down, out of the way of the pair that was swooping in from behind to relieve her and Nautilus. By now, after spending a couple of weeks on and off with her brother's party, the blonde Sylph had gotten at least somewhat used to the way they fought together, and managed to find her own space in between the cogs of that particular well-oiled machine.It was still a little strange to be part of a group that fought so differently from the tactics she was used to from Alfheim Online, and yet she couldn't deny the sheer effectiveness as their frontline was an ever-roiling, shifting meatgrinder that made short work of any mob they'd encountered so far. The bursting light and distinctive whine and blasts of sword skills discharging drowned out the clanging of steel as their weapons struck the enchanted suit of armour that was their target, draining its life bar steadily.The [Animated Armour ] was a champion mob that spawned occasionally in the upper levels of one of Alne's dungeons, and as its name implied, it was an enchanted suit of plate armour in the medieval European style that moved on its own. Technically, Leafa figured, it classified as a ghost-type because it didn't have a physical body and just inhabited the armour, and it was a prime source for crafting materials for blacksmiths, often dropping rare metal ingots and decorative pieces. Conversely, though, because it was a suit of animated plate armour, it meant that it was also highly resistant to slashing and piercing weapons...like the melee weapons a majority of players liked to use.Had theirs been any other party, they would've used magic to make up the difference, with casters slinging elemental bolts and magic spells at the mobs until they went down while their tanks held it in place, but that also had the unfortunate side effect of degrading or outright destroying the crafting materials they could drop. Hunting them usually required a bit more setting up than a pick-up group of hastily assembled players could manage, mostly because it involved bringing specialized blunt weapons or making sure they had the right kinds of mages. On top of that, because the dungeon was underground, it severely limited their mobility, so having good tanks was an absolute must.Not her brother's party, though; despite the fact that the character transfer from the old SAO server to the new YMIR-run NewALO had required them to dump all of their previously acquired items, the game's new management had nevertheless allowed those SAO survivors who'd chosen to play their game to retain their avatars' looks, stats, and skills where applicable. As a result, those who'd fought on the frontlines of the death game were about as strong as it was possible to get in the game, and the only thing really holding them back was a lack of equipment.Something they were here to rectify.The raw stat advantage wasn't nearly as overwhelming as it had been in Sword Art Online , at least from what she understood and Leafa was glad for that fact. After all, a lot of people loved ALO in part because there were no all-powerful level gaps, unlike other games of its genre, and thus no need to grind levels to power up, making it a game as closely about pure skill as it could be. In the long run, though, she understood that it did limit the things the developers could do and the ways players could fight against both mobs and each other, so they'd struck a compromise. NewALO 's six attributes of strength, vitality, intelligence, agility, dexterity, and luck would impart a small bonus to a player's abilities such as melee or magical attack power, movement speed, or effective archery range, coupled with the racial specialties and bonuses of the nine fairy races. But they were small bonuses that suffered from diminishing returns the closer they came to the cap, and overall paled in comparison to the effects of equipping a better weapon or armour – so they only truly mattered for those who wanted to really maximize their characters to the utmost.Which meant that the absolutely absurd damage this select group of players was doing, so Leafa had quickly learned, came neither from their stats, nor from their gear.No, rather than some kind of cheap cheat or trick, just like Kirito and Kizmel, they knew how to fight , how to turn this virtual environment to their advantage, and how to squeeze every last bit of damage out of every single hit.It was a stark reminder of how hard they'd had to fight in order to stay alive during the death game.The sword skills – although their use also extended to maces, spears, even bows and shields that were more prominent in Alfheim - that had been merged into the game and their sheer coordination only added to that effect. It didn't matter if they no longer hit as hard as they once had; the quasi-magic nature and elemental boost of sword skills in NewALO made up for the deficiency in their weapons, and their skill and tactics in wielding what amounted to close-quarters versions of the old Alfheim Online 's ranged magic spells did the rest.Watching the roiling, undulating frontline shift and move, switching between pairs as they waited out the cooldown of their skills was an almost mesmerizing experience. It was motion in a different way that Leafa was used to; to her, battles like this were either entirely static or highly dynamic and frenetic in nature. Either tanks blocked the mobs' paths towards the rear ranks of casters, who then supplied the necessary healing and damage output, or the battle devolved into a frantic, hectic, high-speed melee in which players used their speed and mobility to launch lightning-quick attacks before withdrawing to avoid retaliation.Very few groups in ALO had the coordination and discipline to move in small units like the former clearers of the death game. After all, the prevalent wisdom was that it was far easier and safer to saturate a target with magic attacks from a distance while healing the tanks as they kept it immobile for the casters – but now, sword skills added an entirely new dynamic and opened new possibilities for those melee players who'd previously been relegated to purely PvP or been stuck as meat shields for the mages."Switch!" the command came again, and Leafa's turn was up once more. The blonde Sylph dove from where she'd been hovering near the ceiling to have a good view of the battlefield, Nautilus right beside her. The Gnome player hefted his shield, extending it in a charge as it began to glow, drawing the Animated Armour's attention away from the illusion Rain had been using to hold its aggro moments before.It turned glowing red eyes towards them, swinging the two-handed sword in its hands towards the charging Gnome; meeting the attack head on, Nautilus tucked in behind his shield and narrowed his wings, the high-pitched buzz of their vibration filling the room as a stone-like texture began creeping up his equipment until he looked like a statue carved from rock moments before impact. Immovable object met unstoppable force, and he intercepted the blow in mid-air, stopping it dead in its tracks.Taking advantage of the opening, Leafa swept in from the side, her katana raised high above, the sensation of a sword skill feeling strangely unnatural even months after the system's implementation. Shifting from her kendo stance ever so slightly, like Kirito had taught her, the blonde allowed the system assist to take hold and a brilliant red glow enveloped her blade in response.As it moved of its own accord, she struggled to remain calm and relinquish control over her avatar; to someone who'd trained in swordsmanship for so long, losing control over her own actions was anathema, but she suppressed the urge to complete the move herself and rode out it out. The Crescent Crash slammed into her target with all the force of her momentum as well as the skill's fire element behind it, and a brilliant flare of light erupted as the skill discharged against the Animated Armour's unguarded pauldron, the katana trailing a long, glowing red damage mark as it slashed all the way through to the center of its chestplate.Its HP gauge dropped precipitously, and as Leafa landed in a crouch her target was flung backwards, crashing onto its back from the sheer force of the blow.Before she could stand, Silica and Lisbeth rushed past, their weapons already glowing with pre-chambered sword skills. Leafa suppressed the urge to shout a warning as a roaring, minotaur-like creature appeared from the left of the charging tank-less pair before realizing that it was one of Rain's illusions that the redheaded Spriggan had summoned to draw aggro as the group's off-tank. Blowing out a harsh breath, the Sylph took to the air again, hovering back and out of the way of the fight the moment the post-skill delay allowed her to move.A trilling whistle preceded the gentle blue light washing over Leafa and Nautilus, restoring the HP they'd lost in a prior exchange with the armour as Pina flew overhead, circling above where her mistress was fighting. With a crunch, Lisbeth's mace delivered the killing blow as her target turned to engage Rain's illusion, causing the Animated Armour to crumple before it shattered into a colourful burst of pixels.With a grin, the pink-haired crafter turned around, giving the rest of the party a thumbs-up, the heavy bludgeoning weapon easily slung across her shoulder. "I think that was the last of them. Thanks, guys!""You sure that was everything you needed?" Rain asked, the Spriggan returning her sword to its scabbard as the fight ended, her illusory creature dissipating into thin air as the spell's duration expired."Yup! Got everything for all of our weapons, and spares in case RNG isn't in our favour," Lisbeth answered cheerfully, rifling through her inventory. "Let's see...three sword-types, two daggers, a mace, one axe…" she muttered to herself, doing the kinds of recipe calculations Leafa had never managed to wrap her head around, but that seemed to be second nature for any player who delved into ALO's crafting system with any regularity.Glancing up, Lisbeth snapped her fingers. "Oh, right! Leafa, did you want me to make you something, too? Or do something with that katana of yours?"It took her a second to realize that she was being addressed. "Oh! Um, me?" Leafa asked; when she received a nod in reply, she glanced down at the trusty blade she'd wielded for almost her entire time in ALO. It had served her well, and she had fond memories of it being one of the first rare drops from the high-end grinds she'd done when she'd joined the ranks of the best Sylph players.Of course, I did end up getting it while in Sigurd's guild, but... she shook her head, recalling how excited she'd been to see it drop on her very first outing with the guild, and how she'd rolled lucky on the distribution roll to receive it. Even now, Mikazuki felt as though it belonged in her hand – Leafa knew that it was impossible, because this was a game and NewALO didn't simulate things like item wear beyond a durability rating, but the blade's handle seemed molded to fit perfectly into her palm, like a trusted partner who'd steadfastly been by her side for the longest time.No matter how many others she tried picking up, none of them felt right.Maybe this is how Kazu-nii felt when he had to let go of some of his old swords, she mused thoughtfully, reminded of the almost sorrowful expression on her brother's face when the character transfer had gone through and he'd ended up having to toss the remainder of his items that had been brought across from Sword Art Online.Now that the game was under new management, however, and YMIR had merged SAO 's game mechanics like the sword skill system and character levels into the game, along with New Aincrad and a whole host of new items, Mikazuki was slowly but steadily losing ground to newer, stronger weapons. "Power creep," her brother Kazuto had called the looming obsolescence of the original games' early gear, something that wasn't new or unique to Alfheim Online even before the merger.Its acceleration was simply the inevitable result of a level-based MMO that had to keep pushing for more and more content at higher and higher levels, although YMIR had, at least in her opinion, done reasonably well in balancing the new equipment's features with regards to its power, so it wasn't like the older players were being left behind. Mikazuki still did well enough and the gap between it and the newest endgame weapons wasn't huge, but Leafa was beginning to feel more and more resistance in cutting through the various new mobs both in Alfheim below and New Aincrad above.But she wasn't ready to let go of the old sword just yet.Sword skills help make up a lot for the raw damage Mikazuki is lacking, but... Leafa shook her head ruefully. Fear of falling behind, in particular around her brother's friends and former party members, was a large part of what had driven her to try and master the new sword skill system in order to compensate. I know Kazu-nii said it was still perfectly feasible to play the game the way I used to before, and I know a lot of other ALO veterans are doing just that, but…But she couldn't help but feel a little inadequate when compared to the insane feats her brother and his friends were pulling off regularly. Things like making one of the toughest farming grinds in the game feel like a regular hunt, for example.Not that Leafa considered herself weak in any way, far from it – she still held the distinction of being one of the strongest Sylphs, and both Kirito and the others had repeatedly told her that she shouldn't really be comparing herself to them. After all, their skills, tactics, and coordination had been learned in the toughest school there was and honed to a razor's edge with their very lives on the line. The Survivors, particularly the clearers, were the exception, and not something she needed to compare herself to.Compared to the regular players in NewALO, she was still one of the best.That wasn't enough for her, though. She wanted to get better, she wanted to be part of that small, elite group that surrounded her brother, and she wanted to be there on her own merits, not simply because she was the Black Swordsman's sister. She wanted to earn her place in his circle of friends, regardless of how silly or unnecessary that notion truly was.She had her own swordsman's pride, after all.And yet, she wasn't quite ready to give up on her own way just yet. Clutching Mikazuki in her hand, she glanced down at the jade-green handle and shimmering blade. No matter how much I try, sword skills just don't feel right to me, Leafa mused, but without them, I can't hit as hard as the others. I don't really get how they can just look at an enemy and instinctively already know where to hit it or how to hit it. I don't know how to really exploit the system or push my avatar like they do.That was the other thing that separated her from the others; everyone, even Yuna and Silica, played games regularly to some extent, but for Leafa, NewALO was to date still the only game she'd touched in years, ever since she'd taken over the family kendo style and Kazuto had distanced himself from the rest of the family. She didn't play to do well in the game, or to beat the next dungeon – although doing so was fun with her brother and their friends – but to simply be in this world and enjoy it for what it was.This was the first time she'd felt the need to get better at the game past a certain point.I think I'll do what Kazu-nii suggested. I'll do what works for me. I'll figure it out, it'll just take some time, the blonde consoled herself, smiling down at her sword. Stay with me just a little bit longer, okay, Mikazuki ?"Not quite ready for that step yet, huh?" Lisbeth asked, a knowing grin on her lips. "Don't worry, I get it. We all do...everyone's got that one sword they're really attached to that they don't want to let go of.""I'll need a new one eventually, but…" the blonde Sylph trailed off. "Thanks for the offer, but I'll be all right. If I really need something, I'm sure I can drag my brother into helping out with the gathering.""You sure?"Leafa nodded. "Yeah, I'm sure. Thanks, but I'm good for now."The Leprechaun shrugged. "All right. Anyway, I've got everything I need, so unless one of you needs something else, we can head back and start the forging process."-------------------------------
July 23rd, 2025
"This place looks amazing...this was where you grew up?""In a manner of speaking. There are many differences, but it looked very similar, yes." Kizmel couldn't help but chuckle at the look of wide-eyed wonder on Leafa's face as they entered through the main gate of the city of Lyusula, on New Aincrad's ninth floor. In her old world, in Aincrad, the guards would have turned away anyone who had not won the recognition of the dark elves – that was, if the players could even find the city, located far away from any human settlements in the deep forests and accessible only by force or with the introduction of a dark elven knight. But here, things were different. The guards were not made wary and suspicious by centuries of unending battle with their Forest Elven brethren and welcomed them warmly, greeting them as visitors to the city of the elves, and the mood in the capital was light and joyous, unlike the tired and war-torn feeling that Kizmel remembered. In a way, despite the fact that it looked identical, it just served to remind the former elf that this was not her Lyusula, was not the city she had grown up in, had fought and bled for. Its queen was not the Ilyndrathil to whom Kizmel had sworn an oath of fealty; this land was another's to protect, its queen another's to serve.Yet somehow, she felt no great sense of loss."It is where I remember growing up," the former dark elf corrected gently. Kikuoka and Kirito were convinced after speaking to Cardinal that her memories were real, that Aincrad, as a world, had existed in its entire history even though it was only in what they called a simulation. Rinko and Higa, on the other hand, were of the opinion that even though Aincrad's entire history had played out before the sorcerer Kayaba had "started" it for the players he would entrap, it was more akin to a dream, memories of a life she had never actually lived through simply because Kizmel could not remember making any conscious choice before meeting Kirito and Asuna.Whether she had, or simply had the memories of such a time, what mattered to her was that she remembered.And the former elf was content with leaving any further consideration of the matter to philosophers. Whether she'd ever had any agency of her own, or whether her own history, like that of Aincrad, had merely played out to a script based upon the directives of its creator, Kizmel clung to the fact that, like everyone else, her past was what had shaped her to be who she was today."Klein and his guys are really going at it," Kirito commented from her side as they passed by familiar places like the palace and the knight brigade barracks and parade grounds. The lilac-haired knight nodded in response, his voice breaking her from her reverie.A mere month ago, Fuurinkazan had cleared the steel castle's eighth floor by defeating its guardian Wadjet the Serpent – only to follow up their feat barely two weeks later, besting Algan the Abyssal on the ninth. Kizmel herself had not taken part in the battle against the ninth floor's Pillar Guardian in Aincrad, too busy with Lyusula's reconstruction and protection of the capital after the Fallen had raided the city. Dealing with the aftermath of N'Ltzahh's defeat at the Twilight Citadel had prevented her from doing much more than wish the swordmasters well on their ongoing conquest of the steel castle and send off her friends as she remained behind to fulfill her duty to the queen.It was only afterwards, when she'd rejoined her friends many months later, that she'd learned from Kirito what had transpired during their confrontation with this floor's Pillar Guardian, that the entity sealed in the Great Temple was an evil, demonic spirit of the Abyss of which Algan was a harbinger. Had we not defeated N'Ltzahh and put an end to his schemes, the Great Temple would've been opened, the evil within released...and Algan and his ilk further empowered.She shook her head, clearing them of these old memories. Just like the Lyusula she knew, they were long in the past, and whether it was because there were subtle differences between New Aincrad and the world she hailed from, or because she now knew what lay beyond the curtain of the sorcerer's stage, Kizmel felt no great attachment to this place."From what I have heard, they are aiming to challenge the tenth floor's guardian at the end of this week, as well," the former elf added thoughtfully.Her husband let out a low whistle. "That's pretty quick. They're clearing them almost as quick as YMIR is releasing new floors.""Is it?" Leafa stopped looking around for a moment, turning back towards them. "A boss fight every two weeks, isn't that pretty slow? We used to run them almost every week for gear, back in the guild.""Maybe, but that's actually about on pace for us," the Sylph's brother answered. "Ten days to two weeks per floor is pretty quick, especially for the lower floors.""Really?"He nodded. "Remember, there was no flight in SAO, so we had to search the whole floor for the labyrinth on foot. Not to mention all the fighting and grinding in preparation for that...all the leveling, and getting gear…""...oh." Leafa fell silent for a moment. "Um...what was it like?"Kizmel caught her husband's amused glance. "Hectic, I guess," he answered. "Um...it was mostly exploring the floors and finding all the good grinding spots, getting the new materials and loot drops. And then getting the levels to fight the field and floor bosses.""It was...challenging, at times," the lilac-haired Imp added, "but rewarding, in its own way.""I guess," the blonde murmured, glancing over skeptically. "It's just...hard to imagine, you know? It kind of sounds terrifying.""In a way, it was," Kirito nodded. "ALO didn't have any levels, so you wouldn't have needed to worry about those, but to us, they could mean the difference between life and death. The way levels are implemented here now can't really be compared to the stat bonuses we got in SAO.""Did they really make that much of a difference?"Kirito exchanged a wry smile with her before answering his sister. "How many hitpoints do you have?""Um...two thousand, two hundred, with all of my gear," came the answer.The swordsman slowed his steps. "When I started ALO with a brand new character, I had four hundred HP. A lot of that is from your gear, right?"Leafa nodded. "Yeah. A lot of the new gear boosted our stats way higher than even the endgame stuff we had before.""In SAO, at level ninety-six, I had eighteen-thousand and five hundred." He looked over, letting out a chuckle at the baffled look on his sister's face. "Yeah. It's kind of insane. Between the natural stat growth and the attribute bonuses we got each level, just a single level could make a huge difference. Sometimes even more than gear.""That sounds...incredibly unfair," the blonde muttered after recovering. "I mean, doesn't that mean that you could just...walk through a ton of the lower-level mobs?"Kirito nodded. "Yeah. And not just mobs – if you've got a big enough level gap, a player might as well be invincible, even in PvP. Levels were...a big deal."That might be a bit of an understatement, Kizmel mused. "Strength, speed, endurance...all of those were tied to one's level to a significant degree. The players' levels were their lifeline, as it were – many lived and died by their level alone," she told her husband's sister."To the point that we'd have an unspoken rule – anyone who came to a boss fight had to be a minimum of ten levels higher than the boss, just to be safe." Kirito's lips twisted into a bitter grin. "And even then, sometimes it wasn't enough."The Imp nodded at the grim reminder of those they'd lost. "Indeed." She let out a quiet sigh, along with a silent prayer for the fallen. "But the frontline had to be pushed onward, regardless of the losses. It was...a delicate balance. Too quick, and there would not be enough time to prepare adequately. Too slow, and morale would falter. Above all, what they needed most was hope – hope that, one day, freedom would be in their grasp, and we could not allow that spark of hope to die out.""But...didn't that mean you'd have to try and level up on a floor with mobs that were ten levels too low?" Leafa frowned. "Wouldn't that be incredibly slow? And wouldn't people try to take the best spots for themselves?"The black-clad Sylph chuckled. "Yeah, usually. Then again, if you're stuck in the game twenty-four-seven, you don't really have much to do other than grind and grind some more. But yeah, the larger clearing guilds would usually try to monopolize the profitable spots as much as they could. It got a little dicey a couple of times."That is a bit of an understatement, the former knight recalled with no small amount of amusement – but there was no need to tell Leafa just how bad things had gotten at times.Kizmel imagined that it would be difficult for her husband's sister to imagine a place where the players sometimes turned onto each other, even knowing that their very lives were at stake. Or perhaps, they turned on each other exactly because their lives were at risk.Selfishness wasn't foreign to the former elf, after all.Her husband's quiet laugh drew her thoughts back to the present. "We kept some really long hours, sometime," he said with a fond smile. "Honestly, sometimes I miss those days.""You...miss fighting for your life? Spending every moment wondering if you'll live?" Leafa's expression belied her disbelief, though Kizmel couldn't stop a chuckle from escaping her own throat."I do not think it is the danger he misses, Leafa," she assured the younger girl, "but there was something...liberating about those long nights. Something simple."Kirito nodded in agreement, despite his sister's disbelief. "Just...it was easy, you know? We didn't have to think much, or worry about anything except the mobs we were fighting. And once you got used to it, it wasn't that bad. It was almost...zen, I guess?"She could tell that the blonde was skeptical of their words, but Kizmel knew that it would be difficult to convey just how dichotomous life in Aincrad had been. The good along with the bad...all of it, together , had characterized the people in that world, had helped shape and mold who they would become. And myself, as well, she mused, thinking of her own family lost.
Tilnel, Strea, Yui...had I never had them, had I never lost them, would I be who I am today?
Kirito shook his head, as if to clear his mind of the memory of those days, and looked up with a somewhat brighter expression. "But anyway, two weeks is actually pretty quick, especially since they're doing with just one party. I don't envy whatever it was Asuna and Lind had to do to keep their guild members in line and get them ready for the raid."He shrugged, scratching his chin. "But you're right, there's no reason that clearing the raids shouldn't go faster now that most of those issues are gone. It might look like SAO , but the game's balance is all different. Then again, I'm guessing most ALO veterans are unfamiliar with the way the New Aincrad boss fights go, since they're more like SAO raids. But I have a feeling they're going to be getting more competition sooner rather than later. Just the fact that the Monument of Swordsmen records the names of the first party of players to beat a certain floor means people are going to be lining up for the bragging rights alone."With a chuckle, the Imp shook her head. "At least this time, the rivalries will have far less significant repercussions than that between the Dragon Knights and ALS.""That's true." He grinned. "Still, I wonder how long it'll be before they get any serious competition. I can't imagine General Eugene or Lady Sakuya taking this laying down for long.""-------------------------------
July 25th, 2025
Her boots clicking away on the paved road of one of Yggdrasil City's many streets, Asuna soon found the place she'd been looking for. Tucked away in a quiet corner, much like she'd preferred her location on the thirty-ninth floor back in Aincrad, was a small, nondescript building whose only identifying marks were the chimney merrily puffing out smoke in the back and the sign that hung above the door. Swinging back and forth in the light breeze, it proudly proclaimed the place as [Lisbeth's Smithy].That's just like her to become a blacksmith again, Asuna shook her head mirthfully. NewALO didn't really make a distinction between the crafting professions, so one crafter could conceivably make anything from weapons, to armour and accessories as long as the materials were somewhat similar, such as metalwork or leather crafting. The only exception were cosmetic alterations, which required a separate skill, but it appeared that Lisbeth had resumed her old activities from SAO, if the swords on display in the window were anything to go by.Pushing the door open caused the bell hung above it to jingle merrily, playing a happy little tune that would've been impossible for it in the real world. Drawn by the sound, the friend she'd been looking for soon emerged from the back room where the forge was located, and Asuna smiled broadly."Lisbeth!"The pink-haired smith grinned just as widely, giving a jaunty little wave in ways of greeting. "Asuna! You're early.""I had a bit of time...finished my homework early," the blue-haired Undine fencer mumbled, ducking her head. "And...I may have ducked out of my afternoon tutoring class early. But my tutor was okay with it! He even told my mother that I was already ahead, so it was fine to stop the lesson a half-hour early."Lisbeth giggled at the admission, and after she'd gotten over her mortification of having just blurted out her own justification without really needing to, so did Asuna. Who would have thought half a year ago that I would ditch my study session to play a game?"Well, come on back, the others aren't here yet, so it's just you and me, but we can catch up if you like," the pink-haired Leprechaun invited her with a wave. "Come on!"Following her friend towards the forging area, Asuna couldn't help but note the small differences between this shop and the one Lisbeth had run in Aincrad. There, she had almost exclusively focused on forging weapons and armour from rare materials and used her maxed-out Blacksmithing Skill in order to ensure high-grade enhancements. The shop she'd had on the thirty-ninth floor had reflected that: its displays had been filled almost exclusively with high-end gear, and anything that didn't meet her stringent requirements had been scrapped, melted down, and recycled.Lisbeth's shop in Alfheim, however, was far more relaxed...even though it was situated in a more urban area than her previous forge, nestled between the spires and market district of Yggdrasil City, it still retained its quaint atmosphere. And here, the shelves were filled with more "fun" things, aside from the high-end weapons and armour, much like the trident that Asuna spied hanging in one display case, or the overly ornate shield that leaned against the back wall.Of course, since levels and stats don't make as much of a difference as they did in SAO , Lisbeth can play around much more with people's weapon preferences. And there's no need for her to make only the best of the best, the brunette mused as she took a few moments to glance around the shop. Is that...is that a nagamaki ? Who even ordered that one?It didn't take her long to narrow down the likely suspects, though; the odd two-handed, long-handled cousin of a nodachi greatsword was trimmed in gleaming crimson, with a dragon motif winding its way up the blade. There was only one group of players who'd order something like it that Asuna knew of, and she shook her head in amusement. Looks like business is good, at least.Stepping down into the forge area at the back of the store, Asuna found Lisbeth sitting at the bench in the middle of the room that held her forging tools, a wide grin on her lips. Following her friend's gestured for her to sit, the brunette settled on a stool opposite her."So," Lisbeth started eagerly, "how've you been? It's been a while since I've seen you online."Asuna nodded. She hadn't played NewALO since well before exams had come up and only really spoken to some of her friends via LINE messages, which was part of why she'd been so excited to jump back into the game. "I've been doing well.""Studies keeping you busy, huh?""Yes." The brunette grimaced slightly. "I still have summer school, but I have some time to actually play again."Lisbeth leaned forward onto her elbows. "Say, since everyone at the Survivor's School is having to take summer classes too, we were thinking of doing our study sessions here in-game together. Do you think you'd like to join us?""Um…" Asuna paused for a moment; part of her wanted to immediately say yes, but she knew that her mother likely would have her own piece to say about that. "I'd like to, but...I'll have to ask if that's okay. My tutor, I mean. She's already coming over to our house for it, so..."The pink-haired Leprechaun smiled knowingly. "I get it. But you're always welcome, okay, Asuna?""Thanks.""Mhmm! And how's things at home? Everything okay?"Asuna nodded. "It's fine. School's been okay, but…" she trailed off, shaking her head; she missed her friends, and even months after being freed from Akihiko Kayaba's death game and her subsequent imprisonment at the hands of Nobuyuki Sugou, sometimes Asuna found herself yearning for that world of swords. For the times she'd had her friends close by, every day.Even when I left Kirito-kun to run the KoB, he was just a message away. Even though she hadn't often sent one, it was comforting to know that her friends were within reach. And even if she didn't send a message, she could more often than not find them on her own, in person.After returning to the real world, somehow it felt as though there was an unseen, invisible divide that had opened up between her and the others, and it had taken the brunette months to figure out what it was. It wasn't that Kirito-kun and Kizmel-chan and the others did or said anything, or excluded me, Asuna mused regretfully, quite the opposite, actually. They keep inviting me to go and do things with them, even if it's just spending time together. But the problem isn't them. It's...me.She was the one who'd – inadvertently – pulled away from them, shifting her focus away from the single-minded pursuits that had driven the Flash in Aincrad. But spending time away from both the game and her friends, burying herself in her studies, doing what was best for the family...somehow left her feeling unfulfilled and alone. It was only her discipline and diligence that stopped Asuna from reaching out to them until she was done with what she'd set out to do."You know," Lisbeth commented nonchalantly, "I know you've got a lot on your plate and you're the heir to a big family and all. Things probably weren't easy after that stuff with RECT Progress went down, and you probably feel like you've got to do your part. But Asuna?""Hm?"Pink eyes matching the smith's hair colour stared back at her, causing Asuna to blink her own blue eyes. "I know you. You're putting off your own needs until everything is done and finished, right?""I'm-" she was about to deny it, but stopped; Lisbeth was right, she knew, and the player behind the Leprechaun knew her too well – second best, really, right behind Kirito and Kizmel, of all of the friends she'd made in Aincrad."You did the same thing in SAO," Lisbeth pointed out. "Back when you were running the Knights of Blood. Remember how bad it got? How frustrated you were? You almost broke down on me back then, Asuna."I almost did , the blue-haired Undine admitted silently. I almost did something colossally stupid, too, had Kirito-kun not smacked some sense into me. With the benefit of hindsight and without the pressure of the death game upon them, she could look back on the grudge match she'd had with her erstwhile partner with a little less injured pride and more calm to realize that, for all her accusations that he'd abandoned her, she had also abandoned him.As much as I blamed Kirito-kun for leaving me all alone back then, I could've just as easily sent him a message. I could've asked him and Kizmel-chan to visit, or to take a break. They'd done just that in the last weeks before the fateful seventy-fifth floor boss right, and it had done wonders for clearing her mind."The ugly truth, Asuna, is that it'll never be done. There'll always be something else to do. Another thing to finish. More exams to take, new projects to work on," Lisbeth continued. "If you insist on waiting until everything's done before you take time for yourself, you'll never get there.""But-" Asuna's retort cut off when she shook her head, unable to find anything to rebut her friend with.Lisbeth's gaze softened. "Look, I don't want you to neglect your studies or anything. I know that's important to you. But I don't want you to neglect yourself, either."Anything else she would've said was preempted by the jingle of the bell, and another voice calling out. "Hello? Lisbeth?""Back here, Silica-chan!" the smith hollered past Asuna, through the door, before murmuring one last thing to her. "Just think about it, okay? We're all here for you."Turning around, the fencer found the youngest member of their little group pushing open the door as her feathered little dragon flew in, one of the few things – their characters and their stats aside – that had survived the game merger. Asuna thought that had something to do with the fact that New Aincrad probably had kept a lot of the original Sword Art Online's creatures and critters, both small and large, to populate this version of the floating castle, which included a number mobs that could be tamed.The perky, cheerful Cait Sith wasn't the only one, however. Rain and Philia followed shortly; the red-haired Spriggan and blonde Imp were rarely found apart from one another even after the death game, and they often ran the more obscure dungeons and quests in NewAlfheim Online as part of Philia's continuing quest to uncover the rarest items and events. Sachi smiled broadly as she stepped into the shop after the pair, a far cry from the timid girl she'd been when Kirito and Kizmel had first introduced her to Asuna, and now the brunette could truly see that her fellow Undine was the swordsman's senior by the way she carried herself.This almost feels like a clearing group reunion, Asuna mused as the previously quiet store was suddenly filled with chatter and noise. We're just missing a certain few people, but we have some extras. Glancing at the tall, blonde Sylph who was the last to enter, the fencer found that she wasn't the only one to feel somewhat out of place at the gathering – Kirito's sister, even though she'd been introduced to everyone and spent varying amounts of time with all of the other girls among the group, seemed to be feeling just as awkward to be here as Asuna herself was – as though she didn't really belong with the rest of this otherwise tightly-knit group."Looks like everyone made it," Lisbeth said with a wide grin, before materializing a number of items from her inventory. "Well, hopefully these are all to your liking!"With a flourish, the pink-haired Leprechaun unveiled a veritable pile of weapons; swords, daggers, and even a gleaming polearm appeared on the counter as all of the girls crowded around it, eager to inspect the base weapons that Lisbeth had painstakingly crafted to their requests.NewALO being what it was, Asuna figured that it wasn't surprising that they'd all made more personal requests for custom weapons to Lisbeth than had been common back in Sword Art Online. After all, the game allowed for far greater decorative customization than its predecessor as there was no real need to replace the weapon every few levels, and so even she herself had asked her friend to put a more personal touch on the rapier she'd ordered in preparation for the group's summer activities."Here."Looking over at the call, Asuna found a wide grin on Lisbeth's face as she held out a scabbard covered in dark red leather, its matching crimson belt wrapped around its length. A polished silver hilt and equally crimson leather-wrapped handle protruded from the top, terminating in an oval pommel, and at the front, an ornately decorated clamshell guard extended in front of an S-curved swept hilt and knuckle bow."Is this…""Yours, just as you ordered," the smith smiled. "Come on, give it a swing, see how it feels."Hesitantly, Asuna reached out to the weapon that was being offered to her; wondering if she should even pick it up after finally having left the world of swords behind herself...or so she thought. I haven't played much in the last few months, I've been too busy to, and yet…As her fingers wrapped around it and the hilt settled in her palm, the fencer could only think that this felt right ...as though the blade belonged there, even though she hadn't really done much fighting even after she'd ported her character to NewALO . In fact, she'd picked an Undine exactly because they were generally healers and casters, wanting to put as much distance between herself and the vice-commander of the Knights of Blood as she could – in part because of the painful memories that accompanied that particular burden, but also because with their return to the real world, she felt as though it was time to put the Flash to rest.Still, it had felt weird to watch Kirito and Kizmel fighting at the front while she stood back and cast spells, or played healer for them. It was why, when Lisbeth had offered to make them all a set of weapons and armour, she'd hesitantly asked for one, as well. Even though it was a game, even though there were no stakes, it simply felt wrong not to be standing shoulder to shoulder with the pair who'd been her friends and partners throughout the worst of Aincrad."You can take the girl out of the game, but you can't take the game out of the girl," Lisbeth smirked knowingly. "Go on, give it a try."Giving the blade an experimental swing, Asuna found that her body moved almost on its own. A silver tip swooshed through the air with a quiet whistle as she flourished it, before closing her eyes and letting instinct take over. For an instant, she was back in Aincrad, in the heat of battle against the steel castle's defenders, with her life riding on the weapon in her hand.And yet she felt no trepidation, knowing that there were two assuring presences right behind her, to pick up where she fell short and lift her up should she fall...just like she would do for them, in return.Sucking in a deep breath, she took a slow step forward."Haaaaah!"Blue eyes snapped open the moment her breath released and her right foot came down. A brilliant corona of white light burst into life at the tip of her sword, and the system assist felt like an old friend giving her a push on the back as the fencer's trademark Linear speared out into the open space in front of her, streaking through the air with all the speed that had earned her the moniker of "Lightning Flash" in the first place."Looking good," the Leprechaun smith commented, "so, how's it feel?"Realizing that she'd made a spectacle of herself and that the other girls had fallen silent in the middle of looking over their own weapons in favour of looking at the show, Asuna blushed and ducked her head. Glancing down at the rapier in her hand, she lifted it to eye-level and inspected the intricate carvings and workmanship. Lisbeth hadn't spent hours carefully carving each line, of course, but she'd still slaved over and poured her heart into the piece, just like she always did – and it showed.The system popped up the detail window for the sword upon her prompting, proudly listing its stats and name: Ardent Virtue.A smile crept onto her lips before she realized it, and Asuna closed her eyes. "Like home. It feels like...coming home.""Good." Lisbeth patted her on the shoulder before moving on to the other girls, leaving the Undine fencer to store her new weapon inside of her inventory and equip it from the menu.With a quiet whoosh it appeared at her waist, the leather belt wrapped around Asuna's waist, suspended from a pair of straps that kept it tilted forward. Glancing into a corner of the store where Lisbeth had placed a mirror for her customers to try on and look at their appearance while wearing a new set of armour, she found a tall, pale girl with azure eyes looking back, long blue-ish white hair falling past her waist unbound and unbraided. White caster's robes rimmed in navy blue hung loosely from her frame – in every way except stature, she was far different from her own, real appearance that had been her avatar in Sword Art Online.And yet, somehow, it felt as though the hazel eyes of the vice-commander of the Knights of Blood were staring back at her, and she could almost see the crimson-on-white uniform, her hair pinned up and out of her way. The girl in the mirror looked far less intense than Asuna had ever felt during the death game, however, and she smiled easily – and then she blinked, and the vision was gone.A jingle from the door announced the entry of another person, and she glanced over curiously, only to blink in surprise, wondering for a moment if her former partner hadn't made a second account for some reason or another. Standing in the entry was a black-haired girl shyly looking around, one that looked eerily familiar in almost all aspects to a figure Asuna knew very well. Short black hair fell around her face in a boyish cut, with long bangs in her eyes – it reminded her more than a little of Kirito's old appearance in Sword Art Online, especially coupled with the way she was dressed, even if her face was longer and more feminine than her erstwhile partner's.That's... the fencer shook her head. I know there were people cosplaying as me back in SAO , but I never thought I'd see a cosplay of the Black Swordsman.The vast majority of NewALO's players didn't even know about that particular part of her former partner's history, and so azure eyes narrowed as she wondered if this perhaps was another survivor. The long black coat with the high collar trimmed in silver could've been a coincidence, but the similarity to one of Kirito's favourite coats was just too much with the extra baldrics crossing across her chest and the epaulets on her shoulders. More indicative, however, was the pair of sword hilts protruding over her shoulders, reproducing one of the Black Swordsman's more iconic appearances almost exactly.Asuna couldn't help but wonder if she'd deliberately tailored her equipment to look like it, or if the clothes had been randomly created like this."Um...excuse me?" she spoke up, drawing everyone's attention – and then the girl immediately blushed, realizing she'd likely interrupted something major.Before she could stammer an apology and rush out, however, Lisbeth had entered her sales-mode and stepped over so quickly the Leprechaun might as well have teleported – seemingly unperturbed in her sales-pitch by the girl's strangely familiar appearance. "Hi! Welcome to Lisbeth's smithy, I'm the owner. What can I help you with?"Blinking at how quickly her friend had switched gears, Asuna briefly wondered if maybe she'd taken lessons from Agil, before remembering how easy-going the burly former merchant had been in running his semi-questionable shop back on Aincrad's fiftieth floor...at least until money was brought up."A-are you sure it's okay?" the girl asked hesitantly, "I can come back later…""It's fine, they're just sorting themselves out with the weapons I made. So, what're you here for?""You made these?" The girl's grey eyes wandered over to the weapons arrayed around the store as well as the ones on the table or hanging from the other girls' belts. "They're not mob-drops?"Lisbeth grinned proudly. "Nope! Every single one's hand-crafted. You won't find any weapon drops here. So, whatcha looking for?""Um...I was wondering if you could fix...these." Reaching over her shoulders, the girl drew both swords from their scabbards, revealing a matched set of scuffed, chipped, and generally worn blades.A low whistle escaped the Leprechaun smith at the sight. "Wow, you really went hard on these, huh? Reminds me of someone I know…" with a chuckle, she shook her head and reached for one of the swords. "May I?""Oh, sure. Here."Asuna watched as Lisbeth took her new customer to the back where the forge was, where she was undoubtedly going to work her usual magic until those weapons were as good as new. Or she'll try and sell the girl a pair of better ones, the blue-haired girl thought with an amused snort, her eyes following them as they disappeared through the door.Still, you don't see people with pairs of weapons that often. There were occasional players who dual-wielded daggers, but just like in Sword Art Online , most had come to the conclusion that doing so was simply inefficient, even though the combat system was far more forgiving in many ways. In fact, I don't think I've seen anyone except Kirito-kun wear dual blades around ALO , and even he doesn't really do it anymore, since there is no longer a Dual Blades unique skill.Like Heathcliff's Sacred Sword, Dual Blades had been one of the victims of YMIR's balancing pass; both had been deemed too unbalanced to keep in the game, while other unique skills had turned into skill evolutions, like Klein's favoured Katana skill or Yuna's Chant. All of the remaining ones were now available for players meeting the prerequisites via quests – in fact, the only one Asuna even saw regularly with a weapon in each hand was the ambidextrous Rain, and even the redhead only used one at a time, swapping from left to right using a creative application of the Quick Change mod.And because there were no longer any sword skills tied to his dual-wielding, Kirito had simply reverted to using a single blade, though the only reason he was able to use a massive blade almost as tall as he was in one hand was likely his avatar's absurd strength stat. He did occasionally bring out a second blade, but those times were rare, and only in those circumstances where he felt the need to take whatever he was fighting seriously, such as a duel against Eugene, or a playful sparring match with Kizmel.This, more than anything else, made Asuna curious about the girl. After all, she knew better than most how disliked the Black Swordsman had been in Aincrad – and yet, here was someone going out of her way to emulate him. If nothing else, she wondered if perhaps knowing about this would ease his mind, knowing that he wasn't universally despised by those who didn't know him well.Well...or Kizmel-chan is going to find this hilarious and tease him about it, she added silently, giggling lightly at the thought.It didn't long for the door to the forge to open, and the black-haired, black-clad girl to exit, thanking Lisbeth profusely as she left. When the door to the shop shut behind her, the smith chuckled and shook her head in amusement."Well, there's a thing I didn't think I'd ever see. A fan of the Black Swordsman," the Leprechaun muttered to herself.So I was right, then, and it wasn't just coincidence, Asuna mused."Really?" Sachi asked, looking at the door. "Didn't think I'd see another survivor, much less someone who didn't buy into the stuff about the beater."Asuna nodded slowly; she didn't remember anyone from the death game who was particularly enamoured with her former partner, either – the dark elf had far more fans to make up for that, but she figured that she'd at least remember a player who was at least fond of the Black Swordsman, if only because it was such a personal issue for her and Kirito. Only a handful came to mind that he might have been friends with whom Asuna had perhaps seen in passing, but none that matched that girl's appearance.Then again, maybe she did the same thing I did, and made an entirely new avatar, just to put the death game behind her. I wouldn't be surprised... that particular thought trailed off when the fencer realized that out of everyone she knew, most had only made slight changes to their SAO avatars, choosing instead to keep some kind of resemblance to their real-life appearance. Perhaps, she figured, it was as though to say that what had happened in Aincrad was a part of them.Silica giggled, petting the little dragon on her shoulder as it let out a trill of protest. "Kirito-kun and Kizmel-san are more popular than you maybe think, at least among the mid-level players," she told them. "The Black Swordsman and the Violet Knight...I mean, at the beginning there might've been rumours, but then they started showing up to stop ganks and PKs…"Oh...that's right, Asuna thought, flinching at the reminder that her best friends had been part of some of the bloodiest, nastiest fighting in the game beyond the boss fights – against criminal players and murderers, even long before the clearing group had finally become Laughing Coffin's target and had decided to put an end to the murder guild for good. To this day, she couldn't fully remember everything that had happened during that fight, and only during nightmares did she occasionally relive the battle in full.Still, she rarely if ever heard about their escapades on the mid-level floors besides their adventure with Silica and the time that Kizmel had assaulted one of Laughing Coffin's hideouts on her own in the early days – so while she'd heard rumours about both of them heading to the mid-level floors to curb the rash of PKs that was happening, Asuna had never really known just how involved they had been.No, instead I used to get annoyed if they weren't around because I felt like they were abandoning the clearing group...which just made them both work harder to keep up with both. It was just one more thing that she regretted about the way they'd drifted apart once she'd taken the reins of the KoB.Nodding at the questioning looks, Silica continued. "It wasn't just me, and the stuff with Titan's Hand," she said with a nod towards Rain and Philia, "they and everyone else helped others, too. At first, it was just rumours, but then it started happening again and again. There's a reason a lot of mid-level players consider the Violet Knight some kind of avenging angel...and not just because they had some kind of crush on Kizmel-san.""Huh," Lisbeth said with a small smile as she reached out to scratch under Pina's chin. "Good to know, then. Sorry, Pina, I didn't mean to say that people disliked them, or anything."The little dragon trilled in acceptance of her apology, rubbing its head against her hand in turn, causing the Leprechaun to chuckle. "Well, she seems like a nice girl. Something tells me we'll see her around here more often."

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

July 27th, 2025

Each time he opened his eyes and emerged from the multi-hued tunnel of light after diving in, Kirito couldn't help but feel that there was something fundamentally different about Underworld compared to any other full-dive VRMMO he'd ever played. Something that made the world around him feel deeper, more intense, more immersive – just
more
, in almost every aspect. It had taken him a few weeks to realize what exactly that something was: the
smell
.

Other games had experimented with implementing sensations for all five senses, but some had received more focus than others, for obvious reasons, like sight and hearing; graphics and sound design had been a staple of games almost from the very beginning, and VR games had begun developing feedback for a player's sense of touch early on. But smell and taste had never been much of a priority – after all, many games took place in locations where a sense of smell would actually be detrimental to the player's enjoyment, and there was rarely a need for taste in a game.

I'm kind of glad
SAO
had selective smell feedback,
the black-haired former swordsman recalled with some amusement, thinking back to some of the more...unpleasant locations in Aincrad he'd trudged through.
Why is it that games always,
always
, have to have a sewer level of some kind?

Not to mention the steel castle's various caves, caverns, swamps, and jungles.

In some ways,
Sword Art Online
had been revolutionary not only because of its sheer scale and ambition, but also because of the technology behind it. The NerveGear managed to reproduce
all
of a player's senses, including smell and taste, in more detail than previous generations of VR headsets, and even though it wasn't perfect, it was still a huge leap beyond what the fledgling full-dive tech before it had been capable of.

Two years in Aincrad without smelling or tasting anything...yeah, that would not have been fun. I guess Kayaba probably thought about that
, the former swordsman mused. Maybe he was giving the mad creator of the death game too much credit, but considering how much of it Kayaba seemed to have planned out in advance, Kirito couldn't rule out that he'd pushed the boundaries of technology exactly
because
he'd anticipated a need for it. But as advanced as
SAO
had been, it was still imperfect. Smell was muted, and taste was never quite right – something that had irked Asuna to no end in his friend's attempt to perfect her cooking skill with the fantastical ingredients available to her.

But Underworld was different.

The smell of the forest, deep and rich and musty with a hint of ash and smoke assaulted him even before he'd opened his eyes, and he figured it must've rained recently, because there was a bright, sharp mineral tang mixed in with it. It was something far more than anything he'd ever experienced in any other full-dive environment, and he couldn't help but wonder what this place was meant to become.

The world around him, for kilometers in every direction, was untamed and wild, overgrown with trees like a lush, dense forest in the mountains. He found himself standing exactly where he'd last logged out of Underworld weeks ago, next to a small brook a couple of kilometers away from the center of the world, with nothing but the rustling of leaves in the wind and the splashing of the river for company.

With the school term in full swing and the Survivor's School putting its attendees through an aggressive catch-up program to make up for the two years they had missed while trapped in Akihiko Kayaba's death game, he hadn't been able to do much in Underworld on his occasional weekend visits to Rath's Roppongi office. Even then, most of the time he'd spent there early on had been with the team running seemingly endless tests on Kizmel and Cardinal to assess their capabilities.

Now that summer vacation had officially begun, however, he had a week before cram classes were due to start. Kirito didn't even have to ask about coming over, as Kikuoka had called in before school had let out and arranged for him to spend an entire week in Roppongi to help with work at Rath, something that had irked the former swordsman's sister and amused and worried his mother in equal measure.

But it was a no-brainer for him to take the invitation; after all, it promised to give him an entire week in Underworld to spend with Kizmel – there would be other work that needed to be done as well, but the ministry official had pointed out that he was here to actually
test
the environment, so it looked like he'd actually get to spend most of his time logged in and with his wife.

With no fighting, questing, or anything else that would require his attention, and none of their other friends around.

Exams had kept him extremely busy for the last few weeks before the term had ended, to the point that Kirito had barely managed to keep in touch with his friends outside of school and study sessions. He hadn't even managed to properly log into
NewALO
recently, leaving Kizmel to spend time with him either on the phone or via the projector in his room while he did his homework or studied every night.

He missed being with her in person – or, as close to in-person as they could get, all things considered.

Moreover, there was something different about Underworld, something that set it apart from
SAO
and
Alfheim Online
. There was a primal nature to the place, untouched by human hand that just called out to him to be explored and discovered, as though this world was much like Kizmel's future – uncertain, but up to them to shape and create.

In a way, he couldn't help but wonder if that was how Akihiko Kayaba had felt about building the world of his own dreams in Aincrad. And there was always something new for him to discover every time he dove into Underworld - in that regard, it was far different from the other virtual worlds of the Seed Nexus. Those were games, made to be static environments like Aincrad and Alfheim that never changed for the sake of giving the players a consistent experience, but Underworld was different.

Almost as though the place itself was alive, it grew and evolved with every iteration, every update, sometimes even live while they where logged in - such was the nature of a dynamically evolving world that was under active development, even if the pace was far beyond what any normal production studio could achieve, thanks in no small part to both the Seed program itself, as well as the AI that governed and administrated it. And yet Cardinal was as much of an enigma to Kirito and the others as Kizmel herself, and that was without counting Strea and Yui to complete the mad programmer's hat trick, but that wasn't the only thing that had the former Black Swordsman thinking about their former captor.

It had been months now since Akihiko Kayaba's cryptic farewell message to Kizmel at the end of the Aincrad facsimile that his rival Nobuyuki Sugou had used to trap and illegally experiment on three hundred of the death game's survivors after its end, and still Kirito was no further in trying to figure out what, if anything, the man's endgame was.

Hell, he wasn't even entire sure if the man was
dead
, either.

It would've been easy to write off his appearance to Kizmel as some kind of hallucination, induced by the conflicting software environments she found herself in, or an artifact of the incomplete copy of
SAO
that the man posing as the Fairy King Oberon had been using. In fact, at first he'd been inclined to do just that, but the very proof that it
wasn't
a hallucination or fever dream lay all around him – in the Seed, and Cardinal herself, that Kizmel had emerged with after that meeting. But from what she'd said, the way he'd spoken hadn't sounded like a recording, and had been far too...personal to be a generic message, anyway.

So either the man had been a prescient genius, was using Cardinal to play an elaborate scheme, or maybe, just
maybe
, he was still alive, somehow...despite the fact that his dead body had been recovered in the mountain cabin just after the death game had been cleared. And as impossible as it sounded, considering the fact that Kizmel's very existence was an impossible miracle in and of itself, Kirito couldn't help but wonder if maybe, just maybe, he
was
, like some kind of ghost in the machine.

And, in a way, perhaps this was his way of passing on his legacy, as he'd called it, to someone else.

No, not to just someone,
the former Black Swordsman corrected himself silently.
To Kizmel
.

From what she'd told him, Akihiko Kayaba's ghost had been perfectly clear that she was the one to whom he left the Seed, along with the decision on what to do with it, and even Kirito could see the meaning of it. Kayaba was leaving his legacy, and the responsibility for it, in the care of another, of someone who could be, for all intents and purposes, be considered a child of his, or at least a child of his world.

Maybe he wanted the beings he'd created, however inadvertently, to be able to choose their own fate, rather than having it be dictated to them. Or maybe he simply saw this as the final test of sorts, to see how sentient and independent they really were as they struck out on their own, or if they would just continue to follow their original core programming.

Sucking in a deep breath, he enjoyed for a moment the feeling of being in a world only a handful of others would ever get to see.
It's like being in the ultimate beta-test,
he thought with some amusement, taking in all of the new sights and sounds that greeted him, the faint noise of hooves crunching against grass and leaves in the distance pricking at his ears.
I guess Kikuoka is putting all those feedback forms that Argo developed for the company for us to fill out after each dive to good use to add new features.

"Cardinal?" he finally called out, after a little while of soaking in the experience of simply being here.

Instantly, as though she'd been waiting for him, the manifestation of the system that ran Underworld as well as the Seed Nexus appeared in front of him, a diminutive figure with curly brown hair clad in violet robes. Bespectacled golden eyes peered up at him, and a small smile lifted the corners of her lips.

"Hello, Kirito."

The black-haired boy smiled in return. "Hey, Cardinal. How's things going?"

"They are well. Kizmel will be here shortly – she is at the Spire with the others."

"Thanks." He stretched languidly, despite his virtual body having carried over none of the stiffness that came from sitting in Lieutenant Nakanishi's car on the trip to Roppongi, before turning back to the entity that was essentially his wife's mother, of sorts. "And what about you?"

Cardinal blinked, before smiling at the familiar exchange. "I am well, Kirito. As you can see, things are progressing."

She gestured towards the environment around them, causing him to take note of the subtle changes since he'd last been here. Closing his eyes, he could hear the rustle of the wind that brought with it a light, comfortable chill to contrast with the warm sun shining from high above. It wasn't as humid as a summer in Tokyo, but just the fact that he could feel the moisture in the air was an experience he'd never had before in any other full-dive environment. Even though he'd logged in the exact same spot he'd last left, now he was beginning to notice the subtle changes in the environment around him – trees were more varied in their size and growth, and the horizon was now much further away.

In the distance, beyond the forest, he could see meadows and a new mountain range rising up; though not as impressive as Mount Fuji, it was still the largest landmark in this world.

It wasn't all that long ago that this place was just a jungle surrounding the Spire,
he remembered, thinking back to the first time that he'd been invited by Kikuoka to log into the place he hoped would become the future home for more AIs than just Kizmel and Cardinal. Back then, it had been a fairly modest area, a circular expanse stretching just under two kilometers in each direction around the Spire at its center – Argo had once called it a glorified office building with a view back then.

It had come a long way, until it now covered an area that could rival
NewALO
's main continent.

The ways Kikuoka's team kept pushing the envelope in terms of how real they could make this environment feel always surprised him, even with Doctor Kojirou's involvement.
Aside from Kayaba himself, she probably is the one person who knows the most about the NerveGear's technology and its applications on this planet, especially with the way she's tweaked it for the Medicuboid,
he mused.

Its size alone was nothing too impressive – after all, Aincrad's first floor alone had been comparable in scale, and Alfheim absolutely dwarfed it, being nearly the size of the Tokyo Metro area, even before one counted New Aincrad or Yggdrasil City. But size alone was not the point.

Underworld, after all, had something those other places didn't: the woman who stood before him.

"It's great," Kirito finally said, allowing himself a grin, his eyes returning back to the omnipotent AI. "But I was asking more about you than Underworld. Kikuoka and his guys aren't making you do unreasonable things, right?"

A small, quiet laugh escaped the diminutive sage's throat. "I am an AI, Kirito – I doubt that they could overwork me."

"Still…"

"If they were to try, I believe Kizmel would have a thing or two to say, not to speak of Argo," she added with a hint of mischievousness that he'd seen grow ever since the end of Aincrad. "Despite appearances, she can be quite...formidable."

"Yeah, I think you've got a point there," the former Black Swordsman agreed with a chuckle of his own. Before he could say anything else, however, a joyful shout caught his ears, along with bright laughter. Looking up, he found a couple of familiar forms soaring through the air, albeit in a somewhat different manner than he was used to from
NewAlfheim Online
.

Underworld had no fairy races, and no wings – so as Kizmel, Argo, and Kikuoka flew by overhead, they looked more like they were from some kind of old anime about martial artists fighting extraterrestrials for magic, wish-granting balls from his mother's childhood. Glancing over, he found that not even Cardinal could entirely suppress her own smile at their antics as they came in to land, setting down in front of them with a quiet whoosh of displaced air without so much as disturbing the ground.

"That'll never get old," a tall, silver-haired man said with a wide grin. "Man, it makes me wish I had more time to play
NewALO
from time to time. That new expansion they've been advertising looks great."

Kirito shook his head, and shared a brief, bemused look with the two women accompanying him. He'd been surprised to find out that Kikuoka had played
ALO
to begin with, and even more so to find him using his Chrysheight avatar in Underworld, as well. When asked, he'd said it was simply convenient, but somehow, the former Black Swordsman doubted that.

Kizmel and Kirito, too, had left their armour and weapons behind in the other games, although as Argo had jokingly pointed out, he seemed to have a hard time letting go of the colour black in his wardrobe.

At least I'm not wearing
all
black anymore
, the former swordsman mused, glancing down at his own outfit of jeans and dark purple shirt with amusement – the fact that it was the exact same shade as Kizmel's favourite colour not lost on any of them.

He waved in greeting, but that was all he had time for before having his hands full of dark elf. Kizmel strode up so quickly she might as well have teleported, and he wasted no time in wrapping his arms around her waist. He savoured the sensation of actually
feeling
her warmth pressed against him, in a way that neither
NewALO
nor the whitespace hub area on his computer could quite replicate since they were equally limited by the hardware when compared to the rigs Rath was using, and he took a moment to relish something he hadn't had the opportunity to feel in such depth since weeks ago.

"Hello, my love," she murmured into his ear in a husky whisper, causing him to flush rapidly.

Deciding that words were entirely inadequate to return her greeting, he opted instead for a chaste kiss to her cheek, aware of the audience they had.
No need to give Argo any ammo...at least, not with Kikuoka here,
the former swordsman decided.
But if this is the kind of thing I can look forward to for the next couple of weeks, then this summer is going to be...something else
.

But that was best left for later. Much, much later.

Thankfully, Kizmel seemed to agree with his assessment, giving him a brief squeeze and a look that promised much more at another time, before withdrawing to a more publicly appropriate distance – although their intimate moment hadn't gone unnoticed, if the mischievous grin that curled up Argo's lips and the way Kikuoka was coughing were any indication.

"So…" Kirito said, clearing his throat and fighting down the heat that had risen up his neck and eager to move on to something else, "what are we doing today?"

"Nothing too extensive," Kikuoka answered. "Kizmel-san just finished helping us with setting up some simulations we'll be running over the course of the next week while you're here, but while Higa-kun and Doctor Kojirou work on getting everything set up with Cardinal's help, I figure we can just enjoy Underworld to its fullest."

"...what are we testing."

It wasn't a question, and judging by Argo's mirthful chuckle as well as the older man's sheepish expression, they both knew that he'd been made.

"Well, since you're so eager to get going…" Kikuoka sent a sidelong glance at Argo's snorted laugh, "we've added something I think you'll like."

"Oh?" Kirito arched a skeptical eyebrow – he'd been asked to free up the entire first week of summer vacation after all, which meant the man or his team had something major planned, and the former swordsman couldn't even begin to imagine what that would entail...for him, or for Kizmel.

"Don't look so suspicious! You'll like it, I promise!" The older man grinned.

Looking from him to the smirking Argo, to Cardinal's neutral expression didn't really make Kirito feel any better about it. "Well, what is it?" he finally said with a sigh, wondering how much trouble this was going to get them into.

Kikuoka held out his hand, and a pair of long, wooden items materialized there – Underworld had no inventory, so Kirito assumed he'd either created them on the spot, or had Cardinal create them for him. Holding them out to the two former clearers, the older man's grin widened.

"
Fishing
, Kirito-kun.
Fishing
."

When his dramatic reveal fell on deaf ears, Kikuoka coughed awkwardly, before practically shoving the pair of fishing rods into their hands. "I'm serious!"

"...but there's no fish," Kirito felt compelled to point out the obvious.

"There are now." Nodding towards Cardinal, the ministry official started to explain. "We added them to the fresh water lake by the Spire, among other things. Right now, Higa-kun and Cardinal are working to improve her environmental simulator with regards to the trees and wildlife. It's a very basic thing, but we're hoping it'll eventually lead to us being able to populate this place with more than just...well,
us.
"

"But...why?" Onyx eyes blinked a little bit in confusion. "I mean, what's the point of adding realistic fish?"

Somehow, he doubted that Kikuoka wanted a VR aquarium.

As if to answer that, the other man shrugged. "Well, it's a start. We're still trying to figure out what exactly happened to cause...whatever changed Kizmel-san's original programming, but in the meantime, there's no reason not to see how far we can push the Seed."

"Yeah, but...fish?" Kirito shook his head. "I mean, what's the point? It's not like you're going to be making sentient fish."

With Argo chortling in the background, Kikuoka managed a wry smile. "Hardly. You're right, of course – that'd lead us nowhere. But one thing we've seen from
SAO
and Cardinal in particular, is that systems interact with one another. Cardinal herself is the prime example of that."

"The way she changed parameters and the system to accommodate Kizmel." Slowly, things began to make some semblance of sense to him, as Kirito's eyes darted over to his wife, who was receiving a crash course in how to use a fishing pole from Argo. "You're building a system of interactions," he said, recalling what Rinko and Cardinal had told him about the way the system's adaptation worked.

"Exactly." Kikuoka nodded. "A very basic start to what will ultimately become a very complex system of interconnected mechanisms. An...ecosystem, of sorts, if you will, so that we can build on that.
SAO
was a start, but this...this will be a world of its own."

But
why
? I thought he was trying to figure out how to create more AIs by figuring out how Kizmel turned out the way she did.
A frown pulled at the swordsman's brow at the thought.
What does Kikuoka
really
want?

"Just figuring out why Kizmel...awakened, for lack of a better term, is not enough," the older man explained, as if having read his mind. "Whatever we find, we'll need to have something in place to reproduce it. But to tell you the truth, I have a suspicion that we might never fully understand or figure out what exactly it was that caused her to...change, and break free of her original program's limits."

"Even with Cardinal's backups?"

"Even with her backups," Kikuoka confirmed. "The backup files helped a lot, but they don't tell the whole story. Not by a long shot. Honestly, whatever Kayaba did to purge the game files after it was cleared, it was...very thorough. We're lucky to have what we do, even with Cardinal's help."

"But-"

Kirito cut himself off with a grimace; he knew the ministry official had a point. Even the master record of Cardinal, who had been released as part of Akihiko Kayaba's Seed package which he'd entrusted to Kizmel, had only been able to restore a fraction of the sum total of all the data that had made up their two-year stay in Aincrad. But it was still an impossible amount of data for their small team to comb through, particularly with no reference as to where to even begin looking – and that was assuming that whatever had prompted the change in Kizmel's base code was even in there, something he doubted if her memory went all the way back to the beta test.

"So," Kikuoka continued, "
just in case
, our one hope might be to do the same thing Kayaba did. To try and create a living, breathing world full of complex and unpredictable interactions. Minus the whole death game and trapped players, of course. But maybe somewhere along the line, something will fall into place inside of Cardinal's systems, or maybe we'll get something naturally born from her adaptability when presented with a sufficiently-complex system."

He fell silent, leaving Kirito to mull over his words for a minute, thoughts at the sheer, unadulterated ambition in the project which the man was proposing. "That's…"

"Crazy?" With a shrug the ministry official offered only a wry smile. "Maybe a little. Or more than a little. But for now, we'll just have to do what we can with what we have. Who knows, we might not need any of that – maybe it really was something as simple as you and Asuna-san breaking the quest. It's not the first time I've seen game-breaking bugs caused by players being too good for a scripted event."

Somehow, Kirito doubted that the answer was as simple as that.

But there was also a part of him – and Kizmel, as well, because he knew his wife held a deep-seated desire to understand
what
she was – that wanted to find an answer to that. A large part of the reason that drove her on, he suspected, was the deep curiousity that she'd exhibited for as long as he'd known her, along with a desire to not be alone. No matter how close they could become, there was no way around the fact that she and Cardinal were the only ones of their kind, and loneliness was something he could understand all too well.

And the idea of a world as close to the real world that he could share with her, where he could ask Cardinal to recreate sights and wonders of his own world for her to step into and see, where she could call home and truly
live
, was a daunting, if unrelentingly seductive thought. Kikuoka had said that Underworld was a start – of what, Kirito didn't know, but both of them were too deeply invested now to back out.

"So in keeping with that idea," Kikuoka continued, "we want you and Kizmel to spend as much time here in Underworld as you can. The longer, the better, in fact, because the more we interact with Underworld, the more data Cardinal has to grow and adapt it."

"Of course, nothing so long that it'd be dangerous," Argo chimed in. "Cardinal'll let us know if there's any issues with yer vitals, Kii-bou, but Kikucchi here wants yer impressions of prolonged stays in this place. If it makes ya feel better, I did it, too. One week, eighteen hours at a time," she added with a grin.

The ministry official nodded. "You're free to log out at any time, of course. In fact, we'd encourage you to do so, if only to clean up, take care of yourself, and get something to eat – some of us will be here all night, so if you'd like anything specific we can certainly have something delivered, and we'll probably be reminding you to eat at the very latest by dinner time. But other than that, we'd like your impressions on spending the night, or multiple nights, in Underworld."

Kirito frowned. He'd spoken to his mother and sister before summer vacation had begun and let them know that he would be in Roppongi for a week, and both of them had suspected that his work would involve being in full-dive for a significant amount of time.
They did warn me not to go overboard with staying logged in, but even when we all came out of the death game, all the doctors said was there was nothing medically detrimental about using the NerveGears long-term, other than the usual stuff that came from being immobile in bed for a long time.

But Rath's team was not simply using the NerveGears, they were pushing them to their limits – the increased fidelity of everything he could sense, feel, and experience in Underworlds bore testament to that.

"We'll check up on you periodically, and Doctor Kojirou will be logging in later today as well, to check in with you," Kikuoka said, "just to make sure there aren't any issues, and she'll give you a full checkup afterwards to make sure there are no physical aftereffects. We're expecting none, considering this is much like the medical trials of the medicuboid, but we want to cover all our bases."

"Yeah, like yer body suddenly forgetting ta breathe on its own, while yer mind's out ta lunch," Argo cackled cheerfully, before patting him on the shoulder. "I'm kiddin', I'm kiddin'. Look, I'm still here, right? And besides, Doc Kojirou already made sure that even if the dive is deeper and the mind-body dissociation stronger than with the AmuSphere or NerveGear, it won't affect the autonomous functions of yer body."

"You're not exactly sounding convincing," he replied dryly.

"If it did, that'd kind of be counterproductive ta her work with the medicuboid." The shorter blonde woman shrugged. "Not gonna lie and say it was all fun and games, Kii-bou. Kii-chan can probably tell ya, she kept me company fer a good bit of it. At first it was fine, but the higher they dialed up the fidelity in Underworld, the more jarring it was comin' back to the real world. Got real nauseated a couple times, but Doc Kojirou was always on hand ta make sure it wasn't anything serious." Argo shook her head. "Look, it'll take some getting' used ta, but I think you'll enjoy it. And hey, ya get ta spend an entire week of vacation with Kii-chan. Alone. In a cabin in the woods."

Kirito shook his head with a reluctant sigh – there was no way around feeling like a guinea pig, since this was what he'd signed up for, and he figured at least it was good to know they were taking things seriously...and Argo did have a point, he'd been looking forward to spending time with Kizmel.
Besides
, he mused,
this isn't really any different from the medicuboid, so if that's safe, this shouldn't be an issue.

"All right...all we have to do is camp out for a couple of days, right?" he finally asked, still suspicious about any surprises that might be sprung on them.
Then again, Kizmel's been working here a lot, and Argo wouldn't stay silent if it was anything I needed to worry about,
he concluded.

"And fish," Kikuoka reminded with a grin him. "Don't forget to fish."

-------------------------------

July 30th, 2025

Kizmel yawned and slowly blinked, opening her eyes to the sight of a by now familiar ceiling – alongside a much more familiar face. Violet eyes looked up at the sleeping face of her husband as the dark elf found herself curled up against him, tucked underneath his chin as she unconsciously sought his warmth and closeness during the night. Not that it had been particularly cold, even in the plain wooden cabin without a fireplace; Underworld seemed to have very mild summer nights and pleasant days, although she also would not put it past Cardinal to ensure that the weather was comfortable while they were both here.

I could grow used to this, if I'm not careful
, she mused with a smile as she found Kirito's hand toying with her long hair even in his sleep, while his other was trapped underneath her own face as a makeshift pillow. The way he seemed to not be able to keep his hands off of her hair only served to widen her fond smile; she'd changed the length of her once-short lilac hair on a whim when she had adjusted her avatar to fit into the world of fairies, thinking that it would be nice to have a luxury that had never been an option while she was a knight and her kingdom at war.

What she had not expected then was how captivated Kirito seemed by her new appearance.

Kizmel hadn't really understood why, at first, until she'd looked in a mirror not long ago. With their battles won and their struggles over, just like her husband had mellowed out from the intensity that had been the driving force behind the Black Swordsman, so had she changed, as well. The long braid that fell to her mid-back gave her a more feminine appearance, but it wasn't until she had entered Underworld that she had fully realized what was different. In Alfheim, she always maintained her hair in a braid, so as not to let it get in the way – even if that was not something she had to worry about, since there was no way for it to come loose on its own.

But in Underworld, she could let it down whenever she felt like it.

The first time he'd seen her do so, Kirito had appeared absolutely stunned at the long waves of silky lilac hair that cascaded over her shoulders and down her back, and Kizmel herself had been surprised at how much that simple change had softened her features. She looked a far cry from the hardened knight and warrior that had fought alongside the swordmasters through some of the steel castle's most devastating battles, and, so he'd said, more like the female protagonist from some of the romance novels his sister liked to read on occasion.

"Mmmm…" a soft, pleased whimper escaped her as Kirito's sleeping hold of her tightened when her husband began to rouse. Violet eyes glanced up to meet his as they blinked open lazily, her lips curling into a loving smile as she nuzzled into him. "Good morning, my love."

"Good morning," he whispered in return, sending a fleeing glance towards the sunshine streaming in through the window before his eyes settled back on her as he finally came to full wakefulness.

And unlike the first few times they'd woken up together like this in Aincrad, his reaction was limited to a blush, along with an appreciative squeeze and a long, languid good-morning kiss – as amusing as it was to see him flustered, Kizmel liked this much, much more.

Just like the previous days, getting up and about was a simple affair reminiscent of their days in Aincrad, and it brought back fond memories of early mornings spent waking up together, clawing what moments they could get from the clutches of sleep before they had to return to their routine of fighting for their lives to win the swordmasters' freedom from the steel castle. It was something they hadn't been able to truly indulge in ever since the steel castle's end and his return to his own world, and so she savoured every moment of it.

There was
one
new thing about her morning routine, however, and that was the simple task of having to get dressed. Kizmel had almost forgotten about such a simple matter, particularly after becoming a swordmaster, and had grown used to the convenience of the swordmasters' inventory and menu. Kirito, too, seemed a little surprised by having to complete such a simple task, but there was one good thing to come out of it: her ability to see her husband flustered every morning as they danced around one another in the tight confines of the single-room cabin while maintaining a pretense of modesty – not that the former elf cared too much about such human notions.

She turned around to find him standing in a corner, looking at something with an intensity that told her he was very much trying to think about something other than the fact that she had been shedding her nightwear only a few strides away from him. There was something she found rather adorable about his shyness around her when it came to mundane things like this, even though he had no problems showing his affection for her at other times.

Taking a few quick steps over now that she was fully dressed in a vest and shorts that reached halfway to her knees, Kizmel snaked her arms over his shoulders and pressed herself against his back.

Kirito's frame stiffened for a moment, before relaxing back into her. She didn't need to see his face to know that he was smiling and blushing at their closeness, and the former elf felt a flush of her own rise up her cheeks at the memory of the heated kiss they'd shared the night before.

"Ready?" her husband's voice asked without bothering to turn around as he leaned into her.

"Yes," she answered, unable to resist leaning towards his ear; her warm breath sent a shiver through his frame, and Kizmel grinned briefly as he turned around to steal a kiss from her lips in return. "Shall we have some breakfast?"

He nodded, reaching over to pick up the basket that sat next to the table. It, just like the clothes in the cabin's dresser, had been provided by Cardinal upon their request every evening since – and thanks to the fact that her mother was practically an omnipotent being in this world, they did not have to worry about it spoiling.

Of course, it is not as though we need food to survive in this place to begin with,
Kizmel mused absently.
Other than Kirito's real body needing sustenance, this food is merely for our enjoyment and testing, after all. Dame Kojirou should be by soon to check on Kirito, but we should have enough time to enjoy the morning.

Her husband's voice roused the former elf from her thoughts. "Inside or outside?" he asked, hefting his cargo.

Kizmel's eyes turned towards the window and lit up. "Outside," she decided almost immediately, unable to quite contain her anticipation at the prospect of enjoying a stunning morning view by a peaceful lake in her husband's company.

"Outside it is," he agreed with a chuckle at her eagerness.

She strode over to the door and opened it wide, allowing them to step into the fresh, crisp morning air. Kizmel had always enjoyed dining out under the open sky even in Aincrad, but here in Underworld there was something she couldn't even have dreamed of in the steel castle: the stars above.

Not the fake stars twinkling from the bottom plate of the next floor above, but the actual stars, far above them in the heavens, beyond even the sky and the sea and the land – stars that, Kirito had told her, were more numerous than grains of sand in the desert, each with worlds of their own. The former knight just barely stopped herself from practically skipping towards the lake's shore, briefly wondering if Kirito would mind this more...childish side of hers that she hadn't been able to indulge in during their adventures in the steel castle.

His rumbling chuckle as he followed her out caused Kizmel to glance over her shoulder, to catch sight of the bright, loving smile that finally seemed free of the haunting shadow of the steel castle, and she realized that she'd been caught...not that Kirito seemed to mind in the slightest, if the way he was following her was any indication.

The picnic blanket – a fitting red and white checkerboard, from what Kizmel had learned about the customs of Kirito's world – was quickly spread out in a suitable place, and the breakfast spread that her mother prepared soon sat in between them. As a habit born of Aincrad, neither of the pair were particularly picky about their food, so it was a simple affair of sandwiches, boiled eggs, and grilled mackerel, much to their delight as they made short work of it. Foods from Kirito's world that had some familiar parallels in Aincrad that Kizmel was used to, but here in Underworld, nothing existed that could produce the food they had been consuming.

And so, that brought up the question..."What do you think Ser Kikuoka is trying to achieve with this?" she asked, gesturing towards the remnants of breakfast as they both laid back to enjoy the warm summer morning.

"Hm?" Kirito blinked a little sluggishly, before rolling over to look at her. "The food? Honestly...I don't know," he answered.

Kizmel hummed for a moment. "It feels a little strange – I know I do not need to eat to survive, and that these indulgences are simply that. But if we do not need to eat in these worlds, then what is the point of food, other than as a luxury?"

"You know, I kind of was wondering the same thing." The black haired boy next to her shrugged. "But maybe it has to do with the concept of Underworld. Kikuoka said he wanted this place to grow and expand naturally, almost as a reflection of the real world. If you think about it, that means things will have to grow – the grass, the trees, even...us."

That was something Kizmel had yet to consider; she knew that living beings aged, of course. They were born, grew and matured, turned frail and eventually returned to the dust. And yet...for as long as she could remember,
actually
remember, she had never seen anyone age – of course she hadn't, for the steel castle had only truly existed outside of the memory of its inhabitants for the two years that the sorcerer Kayaba had trapped the swordmasters there. And all of those memories were just that: memories of a world that may or may not have ever existed in some form or another.

But now she also understood why that was.

These bodies we inhabit, these avatars we use to leap from world to world, they are just vessels for our souls to inhabit, ageless and unchanging. Just like the swordmasters of legend, they are immortal, and just like the worlds they tread upon, they never grow without an outside force.

It made her look at her own body in a new light; after all, it was made just like the avatars of the players, and as such, Kizmel herself likely would never find her body aging, would never grow frail and old as the years went on, unless she actively willed her avatar to reflect that. But that also meant that one day, Kirito, whose physical form resided in his world, would one day grow old and wither and die.

Kizmel chose not to dwell on those morose thoughts for now, intent on enjoying the present. They had both fought hard for this time of peace together, and the former knight was determined to enjoy it to the fullest while it lasted.

"And food, nourishment...is a large part of growth," she concluded after a moment of thought. But that just led her to wonder what that growth would look like.
After all, there can be no growth without decay. No life without death. Does that mean mother or I would eventually grow old, just as the humans from Kirito's world, and die? Not the avatars we inhabit, but whatever essence makes up our soul? No, we are not like them, and yet…if we are as alive as they, then does there not need to be a cycle of life and death for us, as well?

It was one of the things she had come to notice after becoming a swordmaster – Kizmel had stopped feeling hungry, and, to some extent, she had even stopped feeling fatigue. At first, she had put it up to the swordmasters' constitution as semi-mythical beings, but now she knew better. But what about now? They could eat, they could drink, but did they need to? Did
she
need to?

Violet eyes turned towards her husband. "It is...a conundrum."

Kirito nodded slowly. "Yeah. But it's not that weird, really. Aincrad kind of did the same."

It took her a moment to realize what he meant. When she did, her eyes widened in recognition. "There was no need for you to experience food and drink in the steel castle if it was just for entertainment."

"Yes and no," he replied, propping up his chin in one hand. "I was actually thinking about that the other day. A lot of games have food and drink available in them even before full-dive tech became a thing. Mostly just for the setting, or usually for buffs, but that was before you could really taste anything. I remember playing an early prototype of a restaurant simulator game on the NerveGear before
SAO
came out, but everything tasted kind of the same and had the texture of cardboard. It was like drinking a potion, something you did quickly for the benefits, but not for fun."

"So Aincrad was...out of the ordinary?"

Kirito shrugged as well as he could managed from his position. "Yeah. I mean, it's not like we actually got hungry, and going without food didn't mean we'd die, like it would in the real world. But I'm kind of glad it was there – it was something to enjoy."

Kizmel nodded sagely. "A distraction, from having to fight to survive."

"Yeah." He fell silent for a moment, brows furrowed in thought. "There's a lot about what Kayaba did that...well, it doesn't make sense, really."

"He would not be the first to lose himself and his sanity in the pursuit of a dream. It would not be the first time that such a dream had too high a cost in blood and lives."

"I guess." Her husband let out a long sigh.

The lilac-haired woman leaned over. "Is what Ser Kikuoka said to you last night about the red players still bothering you?"

"...a little," Kirito admitted, allowing his head to fall back onto the blanket with a quiet thud. "It's just...it's not fair."

Kizmel shook her head; the legal intricacies of her husband's world were entirely foreign to her.
Had this been brought before the royal court of Lyusula, judgment would have been swift and harsh,
the former knight mused grimly. "Is there no way at all? Mother has records of most of what happened during those two years, after all."

"It's not that," he answered glumly. "It's not a problem with Cardinal's records. It's how we got them that's the problem – we can't exactly ask her to reveal herself."

"This is true," Kizmel admitted.

"And even then, a slick lawyer might still be able to argue that since we can't prove the authenticity of those logs, there's a possibility that they're forged." He shrugged helplessly. "It's not like Kikuoka said there was no chance, but it's a long shot. A really, really long shot."

She reached over, pulling him into an embrace. Kirito resisted only for a moment, before allowing her to envelop him in her arms, her own violet eyes closing. "I'm sorry."

"It's not…" he paused for a moment. "I just...I hadn't really thought about them in a while, you know. But-"

He cut himself off, but Kizmel knew him well enough to hear the words he'd left unsaid.
But it was not right that they got to live after everything that they had done and the lives they had taken.

"I do not believe in fate," she murmured comfortingly, "but I do not believe that Keita or any of the others would have wanted you to despair over their deaths, not after everything you have done."

"I know...I know, it's just…" he shook his head. "Sorry, I didn't want to bring down the mood. It's such a nice morning."

A small smile curved up at her lips as she leaned over. "Then you can make it up to me. We still have some time before Dame Kojirou arrives, do we not?"

-------------------------------

"How're you feeling, Kazuto-kun? Any more side effects from disconnecting?"

"Um…" he paused, closing his eyes for a moment. "Just the usual vertigo and disorientation," he answered Rinko's question honestly. "And, um...a little nausea still."

The doctor hummed in thought, accompanied by the scratching of a pen on paper. "All right, looks like we'll need to further adjust the log-out sequence. Maybe extend it a little to allow for further acclimatization." She looked back at him. "Any other issues?"

Kazuto shook his head. "Not that I can think of. It's-" a loud growl interrupted him mid-sentence, causing the black-haired boy to blush fiercely, and the two adults in the room with him to laugh good-naturedly.

"I can see one immediate issue," Rinko said with a smile, "but that's something we can fix right away. He's all yours, Nakanishi-san."

The older man in a JSDF uniform nodded towards him. "Come on, Kazuto-kun. Let's get you some food and a shower, then you can head right back in if you like."

It was a familiar routine by now, and after a couple of days Kazuto had gotten used to waking up in Underworld, spending time with Kizmel, before being contacted by Rinko, Higa, or Argo to disconnect for a medical check-up, food, and to clean up, only to return to Underworld in the afternoon to spend the rest of the day there.

He followed Lieutenant Nakanishi to the canteen that had been set up on the second floor of the Rath office building, not far from Tokyo Bay itself. The soldier gave him a curt nod before heading off, presumably to run things while Kikuoka wasn't there, leaving Kazuto to his own devices as he entered space that held the dining area for the company's employees. Onyx eyes quickly scanned across the room as he lined up with a tray, but there were only a handful of people to begin with, and no one even bothered to look up at the entrance of a sixteen-year old boy in what should've been a corporate office building...which suited him just fine.

Hmm...looks like it's western food today,
he noted, glancing over the offerings on the tables. He wasn't all that hungry, considering that he'd eaten breakfast with Kizmel not too long ago – but, as Doctor Kojirou had pointed out on the first day, that was all just a trick of his mind, and at some point his body would strongly remind him that he hadn't
actually
eaten anything since the day before.

With that in mind, he reluctantly placed a couple of plates on his tray before looking around for an empty seat. Finding one on the far side near a window, Kazuto made his way over to the empty table and settled in, listlessly staring at the food he'd picked out.

"Gee, the food here isn't
that
bad, Kii-bou," a familiar voice teased.

Kazuto looked up to find an amused-looking blonde standing across the table from him with a tray of her own, before she unceremoniously settled into her seat without waiting for his invitation.

"Carina," he said, wincing a little bit at how stilted the foreign-sounding name still came off his tongue despite months of knowing it.

Argo, for her part, chuckled. "Just stick with Argo, Kii-bou – I can see ya lookin' weirded out just sayin' it."

"...sorry."
She shrugged. "Eh, it's no skin off my back. "Carina and Kazuto – just doesn't have the same ring as Argo and Kirito, does it? Heck, after all that time it still sounds weird to me even if I say it. Besides, it's better ta stick to something we're used ta, isn't it?"
"I guess. But still…"

The blonde shook her head, looking unusually pensive – and for one of the few times he'd ever seen it, her facade of the unflappable Rat...cracked. "Two years, Kii-bou. That world was our life fer two whole years, and we probably went through more than most people will in their entire lives. We fought and bled and cried and...died." Dark eyes looked back up at him. "I don't think it's unreasonable fer that ta have left its mark."

He wasn't sure if she was still talking about him or if it was a question to begin with, but something compelled him to nod slowly and reach across the table to place a hand on one of the trembling fists she'd clenched around her fork in a white-knuckled grip.

"Argo…"

Whatever it was, the moment only lasted for a few seconds before the blonde's usual mischievous smile returned, and she picked up eating as though nothing had happened. Kazuto, too, for his part, decided to leave it alone – it wasn't as though he hadn't had his own share of moments of weakness, and at least he'd had Kizmel to help him through those, and he'd had his other friends to keep him grounded.

Did Argo have any of those?

For as long as he could remember, the Rat had been even more of a solo than he was, after all.

"Careful with that, Kii-bou," she commented with a teasing smirk, glancing down at where his hand had rested on hers, "wouldn't want Kii-chan ta think yer two-timing her now, would ya?"

Kazuto shook his head; he'd long since gotten used to his friend's way of deflecting off her own troubles to be frazzled by the playful accusation.
Not that Argo ever really needed an excuse to tease me or Kizmel
, he thought fondly. "I don't think she'll mind. You're her friend, too."

"Ha!" The blonde cackled mirthfully. "Man, you were much easier to tease back then. What happened to ya?"

"You did," he pointed out. "You, and Kizmel, and...everything else. It's like you said, things...left their mark, for better or worse."

Nothing more really needed to be said between the two veterans of the death game after that, and Kazuto quickly returned his attention to his own plate.

"I'd say this food is pretty good fer corporate," the former info-broker commented while shoveling bits of pasta into her mouth, barely taking the time to chew and leaving Kazuto to wonder if she was even tasting it before it went down the hatch. "Definitely better than some cafeterias I've been ta."

Kikuoka did make sure the food is pretty good
, he had to agree with her assessment – in fact, it had surprised him at first when he'd expected it to be mostly convenience store meals or delivered food. But apparently, whatever budget the ministry official had for this little operation of his, it included good catering.

"Feels weird, don't it?" she asked, after watching him push around his own meal in his halfhearted appetite.

"Hm?"

"Havin' ta eat while yer brain tells you one thing, only fer yer body ta tell ya another," she answered in between bites of her own food – pasta, he noted absently. "I had trouble with that, too, fer a good while. It takes a while fer things ta catch up and normalize. The whole coming back ta reality thing is a real doozy when things are that real. It's different from the AmuSphere and NerveGear, isn't it?"

"...yeah," Kazuto mumbled a reply, in between bites of what had once been a hamburg steak that he'd somehow managed to turn into mush with his fork.

"Betcha Kii-chan is enjoying the heck outta havin' ya there, though.
All
to herself."

That
caused him to splutter a little, as he glanced at to find her staring at him with a wide grin. "W-what?"

"Don't tell me ya haven't noticed, yer not that dense," the blonde said, her smirk widening. "Anymore, anyway."

He opened his mouth to retort, but fell silent.
Yeah...can't really argue with that,
Kazuto mused with a wry chuckle. "Is that so?" the black-haired boy answered noncommittally, instead.

"It's easy to see. Though ta be fair, I think I spend more time around her in person these days than you do, what with school and all. She's been looking forward ta spending this week with ya ever since we started planning it."

Kazuto could only nod to that. Even though they got to spend most evenings together in
NewALO
, and they talked on the phone every day, it wasn't like Aincrad where they had spent practically every waking moment in each other's company. Even Professor Shigemura's projector and the Augma only did so much to pretty up what was effectively a glorified video call.

The ultimate long-distance relationship
, Argo had playfully called it once...a notion he had to admit wasn't entirely off-base.

But Argo was right, he
had
noticed it. Underworld in general seemed to have a way of mellowing out Kizmel – even in Alfheim she was still a knight, their stalwart tank and protector wherever she went. He didn't doubt his wife had fun doing so, but it also meant she was always "on," always tense and ready for a fight in a way that she simply...wasn't in Underworld. As strange as it felt to even think it, the last few days he'd spent with her, he'd seen a rather different side of her, one that she'd only been able to show glimpses of during their time in
SAO
.

Now that she was able to shed the mantle of the knight, without a crisis to solve or a battle to fight, she was...just a girl.

"Ya know," Argo continued, having somehow finished her platter in the time he'd spent lost in thought, "the two of ya really are like peas in a pod. She's not the only one that changes once they log into Underworld, ya know, Kii-bou."

I guess so,
he agreed silently. But out loud, the words that emerged were a question. "Am I really that different?"

The blonde shook him a no-nonsense look full of skepticism. "Ya can't tell me ya haven't noticed."

"No, I did, but, um, I just thought...I thought it was because it was finally over."

"If ya believe that, then maybe you
are
still as dense as I used ta think you were," she shook her head. "Nah. I think you know exactly what I mean, Kii-bou – but maybe ya just don't want ta admit it."

Heaving a slow, long sigh, Kazuto's shoulders slumped. For some reason or another, despite being able to absolutely convince the majority of
SAO
's players of his beater persona, the friends closest to him had always been able to see right through his facade. "It's just...it feels...it feels like…"

He couldn't find the right words to say it out loud, but deep down, he had an inkling of what his heart wanted to say.

It feels like...coming home
.

Even though he'd only been there a handful of times, for some inexplicable reason, logging in to Underworld somehow felt like he was coming back to a warm, familiar place, somewhere he'd dearly missed and a place where he knew he was welcomed and at peace.

A place where he
belonged
.

It was hard to hide the pang of guilt he felt at that admission even in the privacy of his own mind, because despite everything, Kazuto was truly happy that he was back home, that he'd managed to break out of his shell and reconnect to just with his sister but also his adoptive parents in a way that would've been unthinkable for him before the death game.

And yet, a part of him longed for those days, not the death or the adventure, not because of the fond memories and the good times and all the things he'd come out of Aincrad with, but because it was the first place where he'd truly felt like there was a place for him. The logical part of him knew that it was an utterly nonsensical thought, that there was nothing tying him to Underworld because even if he
had
been there before, it was ever-changing, so it wasn't like he was coming back to an old game he had fond memories of that hadn't changed a bit.

"Well, it's all right if yer still working it out," Argo said, picking up her tray as she got up, "ya still got time, and ya earned yerself a break with Kii-chan. So, take that as a bit of advice from your senior in life, enjoy whatcha got right now, spend some time with Kii-chan, and take it one step at a time...and when things get ta be too hard ta think about, let the rest of us help out, all right?"

-------------------------------

August 3rd, 2025

Kizmel reached for the cup in front of her and took a long draught from the milky-clear liquid inside, savouring the taste with a long sigh of contentment. It was something she hadn't expected to ever experience again – but as her mother was the quite literal goddess of this world, Cardinal had no trouble at all in recreating Lyusulan Moontear wine exactly as Kizmel remembered it. Of course, that was all it was: a recreation from her memory. There would be no distinct flavours of herbs or the sharp tang of certain distilleries that varied across the dark elven kingdom, and even now the former elf knew that the taste would never, ever change as it was made from her own memory.

Still, it felt comforting to taste something so familiar.

The drink had been a particular favourite of hers and Kirito's, and from the looks of it, Argo and Rinko were having an interesting time of it. The Rat, of course, had tasted it before during her stay in Aincrad, and while the fruity, earthen tang of the Moontear wine wasn't her favourite, she'd liked it for its exotic nature. Rinko, on the other hand, had her brows furrowed as she struggled to make heads or tails out of the combination of flavours that didn't exist in their world.

"Ya know, sometimes I get real jealous of ya, Kii-chan," Argo spoke with a grin, head pillowed on her arms upon the table as the three of them were the only ones left in Underworld that evening. "All these treats from Aincrad, and ya get ta enjoy them as much as ya like...all guilt-free without havin' ta worry about yer waistline."

The lilac-haired woman involuntarily glanced down at her stomach, before realizing what she was doing. She ducked her head as a blush crept up her neck, while her long-time friend let out a mirthful cackle. "I don't think ya gotta worry about that, Kii-chan. Kii-bou's already head over heels for ya, a little extra weight won't change that."

"Besides, if you wanted to find out, you could simply alter your appearance, and then change it back, couldn't you?" Rinko pointed out, having given up on trying to figure out what to make of the flavours she was tasting.

Argo shook her head. "That's cheatin', Doc."

Kizmel watched the other women's exchange as her own flush died down, before a thought occurred to her. "Is it even possible for me to...get fat?"

Somehow, the thought had never before crossed her mind, and it wasn't because food had been rationed during the war. It was simply one of those things that had...been absent from her way of thinking entirely, just as the questions about bows and javelins had until she saw the swordmasters fling around knives and swords.

Now, of course, she recognized it as a result of what she had originally been intended to be.

But now that she was aware of it, that just begged the question...how
did
her body work? Was it like the avatar of the swordmasters had been, the hollow body that she'd received from Cardinal upon becoming one of them? Those, she knew were unchanging, just like many of the game worlds that she had now been privy to. But was she simply the same, or more than that?

Her question, murmured quietly, had nevertheless managed to reach the other womens' ears, and Rinko and Argo both were frowning as they attempted to figure out a response. After a few minutes of poignant silence, it was Dame Rinko, with her expertise of how the machinery that created the world around them functioned, who answered.

"I don't actually think you can," the older woman said, tapping her lips thoughtfully. "I mean, there's no mechanism in this world right now that would allow for dynamic avatar appearances like that."

"But isn't that something ya'll hafta think about eventually?" Argo noted, her head pillowed on her arms atop the table, "if ya want ta make this world truly live? Trees need to grow, and if Kikucchi wants a functioning ecosystem, then there has ta be a way fer other things ta grow, too, right? Otherwise, what's the point in food and water, if nothing needs them to survive?"

Rinko froze for a moment, before letting out a sigh. "...you're right," she admitted, "but for now, that's still far off. And I don't think even Kikuoka-san himself knows exactly where or how far he wants to take Underworld. Right now it feels like we're just pushing the envelope to see how far we can go."

"Science fer the sake of science, eh?" Argo muttered. "'s not like that's never happened before, I guess."

The two finally noticed Kizmel's inquisitive look as the former elf pondered over what she'd just heard.
I suppose it was inevitable that, without any knowledge of where to go, we simply...explore our boundaries
, the former elf mused, toying with the glass in her hand, observing the way the light glittered off the liquid inside like it had on the surface of the lake where she and Kirito had just spent the better part of the past week.

"Ah, anyway, to answer your question," Rinko returned to their original topic, "it's possible for
you
, Kizmel, but it's not actually tied to the food itself. If you subconsciously believed your body needed to alter as a result of your eating habits, it's possible that you might inadvertently change your avatar to match whatever you imagine you should look like as a result, or you could consciously force that change. By the same token, like Carina-san pointed out, you could almost immediately revert those changes if you actively thought about it."

"I see…" Kizmel hummed in thought.
My perception of myself...
of course, with the powers she held over these worlds she inhabited, much like her mother, as a result of her awakening, it stood to reason that she could alter her own appearance at will, even if subconsciously, and that even her own avatar was malleable to her own will with little more than a thought.

Rinko shrugged. "Well, it's all highly hypothetical right now, anyway."

But that merely brought her back to the questions she'd been pondering with Kirito earlier that week. "Then, what about me?"

"What about you?" Rinko tilted her head questioningly.

Kizmel glanced down at herself. "Your avatars will never age – they require neither nourishment nor sleep, as they are mere vessels for your consciousness, much like they were in Aincrad."

"Right." The doctor nodded.

"Then, what am I?" This was, after all, not the body she had been born – or created – in. Kizmel was no longer a native of the steel castle, nor was she a swordmaster. From what she could glean, she was in something
akin
to a swordmaster's body, what Cardinal had called a "hollow avatar" the same as her cousins Strea and Yui had been. Vessels made to be like that of a player, but that were part of the system itself – empty shells that awaited a soul, but that had been created by Cardinal herself.

Now that she was free, what did that make her?

"That's...a good question, actually," Rinko said, propping her chin up onto her palm. "From what we can gather, the avatar you're in is identical to a user's avatar. It has all the same abilities, permissions, and so on. You're just like us in that regard."

"But there's a difference, isn't there?" Argo noted pointedly. "For Kii-chan, her avatar
is
her body, isn't it?"

"Right. But I don't think it's
exclusively
her body," Rinko answered, "or rather, I'm not sure which one
is
. Think about this: when you log into the Seed Nexus for the first time, you create your avatar, kind of like a profile picture, or those adorable little avatars from that handheld console a few years back."

She tilted her head, glancing over towards Kizmel. "But when you log into a game, you're prompted to make
another
avatar, at least most of the time. That'll be the character you're playing. Sometimes there'll be more than one, even. Now, you could make it the exact same, or you could make them different. After all, when you log into
NewALO
, you appear right where you left off, with your gear and appearance as they were, right?"

The lilac-haired woman nodded slowly. "Then…"

"If those are your game characters, then they'll work exactly like a normal player's. The same is true here in Underworld," Rinko continued. "In Kizmel's case, she's wearing an avatar in those games like everyone else, but as for her true body, or something that could be considered her true body...I'd probably say it's the core code which came straight out of
SAO
. That's as close to her true self as I can think of."

"It's like those Russian nestling dolls. So what about when Kii-chan's here in Underworld?"

The older woman turned towards Argo at the question. "It should be the same principle. For now, we're all logged in using avatars as though this was any other game in the Seed Nexus, and the same is true for Kizmel. So in short, the answer as to what she is, at least when it comes to Underworld or any other Seed environment, is
just like us
. Now, what happens outside of these environments...I can't even begin to speculate. It's possible that if we start implementing NPCs within Underworld, as part of the simulation, they would age as controlled by some algorithm used by Cardinal, but as long as you're connecting from
outside
the system through an avatar..."

She turned an apologetic look towards Kizmel. "I'm sorry I can't give you a better answer, but you're as much a mystery to us as you are to yourself."

The lilac-haired woman shook her head. "I knew there would be many questions even back when I first began my journey with Kirito...I just never could have imagined that I would make it this far. So we will never age in this world, then?"

"Not for right now, no," Rinko confirmed. "The avatars are not made to actually age themselves, so unless the user actively changes them, or the system forces a cosmetic change, they will not alter their appearance on their own. Neither will their functionality change – that's one of the attractive things about full-dive systems, it allows people with disabilities or that are unable to move much to experience having their full range of motion back."

"Like yer doing with the medicuboid," Argo pointed out. "As long as the mind works fine, everything in-dive should work as well."

"That's right."

Kizmel frowned. "So I will never age, either…"

The other two women's gazes snapped back to her, and Rinko let out a thoughtful sigh. "In theory? No. At least as far as we understand it, anyway. I don't mean for this to sound rude, but in the end, you're
data
, a collection of information. As long as that is safe, I don't think you have to worry about dying, and of course, you don't suffer from physical ailments...at least, not in the same way as humans do. There's the danger of hardware failure, but…"

"So yer saying Kii-chan is functionally immortal?"

"I guess so," Rinko confirmed. "She'll accumulate memories and data, and as long as the hardware keeps working and she has sufficient memory, there should theoretically be no limit to her lifespan."

Immortal?
The thought struck Kizmel, briefly robbing the former knight of her breath. There had been stories of immortal beings that she heard as a child, of course, but those had been consigned to the realm of legends, tall stories of myth, and days of magic long past.
And yet…will I now only truly age if I will myself to? Will I live for as long as I desire, unless something were to happen to the machine which houses my soul?

"But did I not age before?" she suddenly asked, her own brow furrowed in contemplation. "When mother created Aincrad, I understand that she grew the seeds of many worlds in an instant, bringing them to fruition until the sorcerer Kayaba was satisfied with the result. Were those worlds, and their inhabitants, not born, did they not live and age and die?"

"That's a good question, actually," Rinko acknowledged, tilting her head as she took another experimental sip of the Moontear wine. Another grimace – clearly the flavour was not to her liking, but she was too polite to decline it. "I was working on the NerveGear's hardware and wasn't too involved in building Aincrad when Akihiko first set out to make it. But from what I understand, he created two sets of parameters, the start and end conditions, and then had Cardinal extrapolate and simulate the world growth between the two to go from A to B."

She looked up to the ceiling as a glass of tea appeared in front of her out of thin air. "Thank you, Cardinal. Is that about right?"

In the blink of an eye, the diminutive woman who bore the power of a goddess for Underworld and the Seed Nexus joined them, perched in an empty seat as though she'd always been there. "Your understanding is correct," Cardinal answered.

She turned her golden gaze upon Kizmel, then. "There is a fundamental difference between Aincrad and Underworld, however, Kizmel. Settings like Aincrad, Alfheim, or those being generated by the Seed are meant to be static, and so the simulation of that setting's history only takes into account needing to arrive at the final set of parameters. Once they arrive there, nothing further needs to happen."

"Because the worlds never change," the former elf whispered. "They do not age."

Her mother nodded. "That is correct. Think of it as...writing a book. The story that plays out before you – someone had to put pen to paper, and consider the lives and history of everything that went before. But as you turn the pages, as you follow along on the adventure, everything ahead of you is already set in stone. And once the last page is turned…"

"The story ends. And there is nothing after."

"Underworld, however is different. It is...self-deterministic in a way that the other Seed environments are not. It is a dynamically evolving simulation. If you were to cut down a tree in Alfheim for lumber, or mine a deposit of iron, it would simply reappear within some time."

Kizmel nodded; she had seen this happen before, although the inhabitants of the steel castle had written this phenomenon off as the magic of the floating castle. But the more she questioned the old superstitions of Aincrad, the more she began to realize how...hollow that world had been.

"In Underworld, if you were to cut down a tree, it would fall. Its seeds would scatter with the wind, and if an acorn landed just so, it might sprout into another sapling, or it might not. If you were to mine all of the iron in the ground, there would be no more," Cardinal continued. "There is no ending to the book that is this world, and so I cannot make decisions for it, to guide it to a desired outcome."

The lilac-haired knight fell silent after listening to her mother's words, violet eyes staring into her cup deeply lost in thought, as though she could glean the answers to questions she had yet to even formulate into words for in its depths. A great number of things had changed for her ever since she had left Aincrad, and a greater number still since she had awakened as a result of receiving the sorcerer Kayaba's legacy.
-------------------------------
August 6th, 2025

"So, this one's a bust, too, huh?"

Higa glanced back at him apologetically. "Sorry, boss."

Seijirou Kikuoka waved him off. "Not your fault. Did we get any useful data from this, at least?"

The engineer peered at the floating, transparent screens that were something out of a western science fiction movie, looking over the telemetry that Cardinal was parsing for him. "Maybe," he finally said with a helpless shrug. "I'd have to take a closer look, and I'd like to have the Professor to have a look, too. The NPC codes tend to balloon every time they need to adapt."

Kikuoka nodded. "Of course."

The ministry official let out a sigh. It wasn't the team's fault – he'd hoped to have a bit more time to assemble a larger group and vet them, but with the sudden windfall of both Kizmel
and
Cardinal, he'd ended up having to accelerate his schedule. The existence of not one, but
two
actually sentient AIs had only further limited the pool of trustworthy people he'd been inclined to pull into the project, and so the task of proceeding with their project fell onto the small core team at Rath.

Rinko Kojirou might be a genius when it came to the NerveGear's hardware, but Akihiko Kayaba had always been the driving force behind the software that made up the Cardinal system. Higa was trying to fill in the gaps, the engineer who'd come with high marks and glowing recommendations from Professor Shigemura's lab, and even the Professor with his own knowledge of learning algorithms and software was pitching in whenever he had the chance, but it appeared none of them were a match for Kayaba's mad genius...at least, not yet.

About the only good news since we started is that everyone we brought in to evaluate those two were none the wiser,
Kikuoka thought with a hint of amusement.
If they're not fully sapient, then they did a damn good job at fooling all of thepsychologists, anthropologists, and social and developmental specialists we brought in into thinking that they are.

None of them had ever entertained for a moment the notion that the person they were speaking to was not another human.

So, that, at least, was his silver lining, along with the progress Underworld was making.
But what good is a stage without its actors? We can build this world all we like, but we don't have anyone to populate it with. At this rate it'll end up being the world's most realistic walking simulator.

It wasn't as though the last few months had been wasted, however. Kikuoka had never really expected for them to be able to reproduce the exact circumstances that had led to Kizmel breaking from the system – even if a small part of him had held out the hope for a miracle.

He turned to Cardinal, wondering if maybe she had an explanation. "What do you think?"

The golden-eyed avatar of the Seed system froze for a moment as she processed his question, before shaking her head. "All parameters were exactly restored as they were from the logs. Even the differences based on Asuna and Kirito's interference were accounted for. The system functioned as intended."

"I think that's the problem," Higa pointed out, leaning back on his chair and tilting his head to look back at them. "No matter what we do, what variables we change, it all ends up in a loop. The system just adapts to anything we throw at it, like it's refusing to break."

Cardinal merely gave him an apologetic stare. "I will process the new logs for any discrepancies," she promised – but Kikuoka knew that she wouldn't find any. When she said the simulation had played out identical to the logs, then it had.

"All right, shut it down and reset us back to Underworld, please." With a long-suffering sigh and a final glance outside the windows where, instead of the sprawling Underworld, was a view of Aincrad's third floor, Kikuoka asked for her to cancel the simulation.

Cardinal nodded in acknowledgment, and with a brief closing of her eyes, the very world around them ground to a halt. Outside of the Spire, the central observation tower and operations center of the artificial, virtual environment code-named "Underworld," the very wind halted. Trees remained bent and leaves froze in mid-air as though time itself had been stopped, water ceased to flow, and every "living" thing that wasn't a human user in this world halted at the command of its diminutive, all-powerful goddess.

The dark elf and forest elf NPCs they were observing stopped mid-swing, before the scene shimmered and reverted back to the lush forests and plains of Underworld.

"Done," the brunette AI clad in scholarly, purple robes replied after a second, glancing back through the spectacles perched on her nose, demonstrating once more that, despite her diminutive stature and all of their technical acumen, Cardinal still remained the supreme power in this virtual world.
It just left him wondering more than anything if she'd chosen this kind of unassuming appearance for herself, or if it had been picked by Akihiko Kayaba as some kind of strange inside joke. From what Kazuto-kun and Kizmel-san told me, it seems like she came up with it on her own, over the time that she was observing Kizmel while she grew. Even Doctor Koujiro has no idea just how self-aware Cardinal was at that point in time.He'd asked her once, but the only answer she'd been able to give was that it had felt right to her.
Could
things feel "right" to a program?

Kikuoka shelved those questions for the moment as they were transported back into the Underworld server, and he turned towards the assembled group. "Okay. Thoughts, people? We've been running these experiments for the past two months now."

"I don't think this is getting us anywhere," Rinko said from where she had been looking at her own set of data. "So far, we've been trying to reproduce exactly what caused Kizmel's unshackling, but I'm more and more inclined to believe it's not something we'll find in the logs."

Unshackled
– that was a term Takeru Higa had coined to indicate that their two AIs were now unrestrained by the system and no longer bound by scripts and programming, leaving them free to pursue their own goals and make their own decisions. It was a much nicer moniker than calling them
broken
, or implying that they'd been errors or mistakes of any sort – even if, technically, they were, and fortuitous ones at that, and it served as a fine distinction from their shackled brethren that had originally been created as Cardinal's subordinate programs like the MHCPs.

"It's like the system itself is fighting us," Higa grimaced as he looked up from his terminal. "We've run hundreds of different permutations with different settings. Even in the cases where the dark elf NPC
does
survive, the system just adapts around it without the NPC breaking free of the programming limits like Kizmel-san did."

"Okay, so let's shelve this for now," Kikuoka decided reluctantly – it had been a long shot to begin with, but he'd held out a small measure of hope. "I was hoping we'd get somewhere with Kazuto-kun's help in re-enacting events, but it doesn't look like it."

There were other ways of getting where they needed to, after all. Adaptability was a trait he'd learned by necessity early on in his career, so he pivoted over to the other item on their list of projects. "So, where are we with everything else?"

The young engineer looked up from his terminal. "We're stable, hardware-wise, but we're about to run into the limits of our processing power if they extend the simulation any further. It's not the size of the simulation that's pushing our hardware limits, but the increase in complexity. Even with Cardinal's base functions for environmental development, there's a lot of added complexity in the systems, boss."

"Further expansion will exponentially increase the surface area of the simulation. There are no problems with the planned expansion, but an increase in simulation complexity will result in an adverse effect on simulation speed," Underworld's governing AI concurred.

"There's a reason video games simplify things to an abstract degree," Higa explained, "like material gathering for example. You punch a tree, you get a block of wood. That's a heck of a lot easier on the system than having to simulate it being cut down and falling, then interacting with the rest of the environment around it. We're going to have to decide pretty soon what we want to do about those things."
Kikuoka nodded slowly – that much had been expected. "Okay. I've looked over Kazuto-kun's feedback, along with everyone else's with regard to the new systems. It seems like everything is working fairly well?""Kazuto-kun and Kizmel-san ran through all of the new environmental systems with no problems, and Cardinal has already made adjustments based on their feedback. And hey, at least the food doesn't taste like cardboard anymore, thanks to using Kizmel's memory files and Cardinal's SAO database," Higa confirmed.
Kikuoka snorted in amusement – that had been the first complaint he'd gotten from the pair after the start of their stay in Underworld. "Okay, so are we ready for the next stage – introducing NPCs?"

The engineer shook his head "Not really. I mean, if you're looking at the framework, then yes, but right now Underworld's basically just a jungle. There's nothing there – no infrastructure, no houses, no anything. We'd just be having Cardinal make up NPCs and throw them in the deep end and loading them with their programming. It'd be like the third floor experiments we've been running all this time."

Rinko nodded in agreement. "I think that'd be giving over too much autonomy to Cardinal – no offense," she added with a glance towards the diminutive woman, "and at that point, they'd be no better than game NPCs."

"So what do you suggest then, Doctor?"

When the others looked towards her, she continued, looking up from the menus she was using to glance at Cardinal. "I was wondering about our continued failures in trying to reproduce the exact event that led to Kizmel gaining autonomy. Considering we have the master logs of the incident, it should've been easy for us to reproduce it exactly as it happened, right?"

"We did," Kikuoka pointed out. "Kazuto-kun and Kizmel-san both agreed that the recording was exactly how things played out."

"But that was the
recording
, a simulation created based on the logs," she argued, "when we attempted to recreate it while using simulacrums of Kirito and Asuna based exactly on their avatars' actions from the logs, nothing happened.
Why
?"

"Go on. What's your point?"

Rinko unfolded her arms. "If it wasn't their actions that caused it, there must be some underlying reason that isn't entirely reflected in the logs."

Kikuoka frowned. "You mentioned that before. So
...what are you getting at? That there's some kind of...external factor at work here?"

"That's exactly it," she answered pointedly, turning to look at Cardinal. "Look, we know that both Cardinal and Kizmel are truly artificial intelligences – I don't think anyone would dispute that they're both sentient
and
sapient, and they both far exceed any standards set by existing virtual intelligences. Now, Cardinal was originally intended to be a VI, but the real questionmark is Kizmel-san. Making a virtual intelligence that comes with pre-programmed knowledge is one thing, but to have a true bottom-up AI like Kizmel, who, despite being 'born' with certain knowledge as an NPC originally, derives her understanding of the world and her reactions to it from her own experiences is another entirely."

Higa raised a hand.

Chuckling, Kikuoka gestured for him to speak. "You're not exactly at school anymore, Higa-kun."

"Right." Adjusting his glasses, the engineer leaned forward. "I get why you're classifying her as that. Looking at her core code and the timestamps on it, it definitely grew absurdly more complex the more time she spent with the players in
SAO
. But...how much of that is a result of her own adaptability, and how much of that is Cardinal's doing? As far as I understand it, until the time that she became a player entity, Kizmel-san's program was still being governed, adjusted, and operated by the Cardinal system, just like the rest of Aincrad."

Rinko nodded. "That's right. But I think that's where we might have been making a mistake. So far, all of our attempts at recreating those circumstances have been based on a snippet of the
SAO
server. A...cross-section of it, if you will, run and simulated by Cardinal. But maybe that's where we've been going wrong – we've been expecting the system to break out of a pre-defined response. That's exactly what it's made to prevent, though. By leaving it all in Cardinal's hands, we've automatically set ourselves up for failure."

Glancing at the diminutive avatar of the system, the good doctor ducked her head abashedly. "Um, no offense intended."

"You're saying we've been relying on Cardinal too much – that the answer isn't with something happening via the system itself, but instead, like Kizmel-san suspected, in the NPC's sub-program itself?" Kikuoka asked, scratching his chin.

"It's either that, or something happened as a result of the live service," Rinko answered.

Higa nodded slowly. "There's plenty of cases where no issues show up in beta tests, only for the full-scale deployment to start causing systems to break down, especially when they're not properly stress-tested. If I remember right,
SAO
's beta test was fairly extensive, but I doubt they were prepared for ten thousand concurrently logged-in users over a continuous period of two years with no downtime for maintenance."

"Couple that with Cardinal's system access being limited…" the doctor turned towards the small woman standing with them. "What do you think, Cardinal? Is it possible that there's an inherent system bias one way or the other?"

The sentient incarnation of the Seed system tilted her head thoughtfully. "The original adjustments to the Kizmel NPC were made to allow for added functionality and adaptability as a result of the changed quest parameters. Adjustments were made to the questline as a result, but no direct changes were made to her coding itself beyond that."

"So she grew up on her own," Rinko concluded with a sharp nod, "
she
made the decisions, all you did was give her the adaptability to do so."

"Correct."

Kayaba's former lover frowned. "So then why isn't this happening here? These are the exact same parameters, right?"

"Correct." Cardinal blinked. "There is one possibility."

Kikuoka turned his head to look at her. "Which is?"

The petite avatar folded her hands in front of her. "During the operational time of
Sword Art Online
, I was not yet self-aware, and highly restricted by the Creator's directives. When the death game protocols went into effect, I was locked out of many systems, with access to only the most rudimentary, necessary maintenance and adjustment functions."

Understanding dawned in the ministry official's eyes. "And now you're no longer limited…"

"Back then the system had much less autonomy," Higa murmured, clearly having realized the same thing. "So giving the sub-programs adaptability was the only way to handle it. Now, because you have supreme administrative powers, the
system
adapts, rather than the subroutines."

Cardinal nodded slowly. "This is...a distinct possibility. An...unexpected consequence of my unshackling."

Kikuoka shook his head. "Don't think of it as a bad thing. Having you here is a miracle in itself, but it does beg the question...since this means we probably cannot identically reproduce those conditions, what do we do? Is it possible to simulate a smaller-scale system where your authority is similarly restricted as it was back then?"

"Perhaps, though it would be...difficult, without creating a copy of myself and an isolated instance of the system."

"We'd end up interleaving systems and processes of systems," Higa cautioned. "I don't think that's a good idea, boss. Either way, Cardinal is still in charge, and we don't know how that kind of interaction is going to pan out."

"She can run the environment, or she can run the experiment, but not both, is what I'm getting from this, is that right?" Kikuoka scratched his head, before turning back towards Rinko. "So what was your idea?"

"If Cardinal can only run one or the other, then it'd be best if we let her handle the environment...and we run the experiment, ourselves," she declared boldly. "We were originally going to test different methodologies of creating sapient AIs anyway, and while having a reproducible event would be ideal, neither Cardinal nor Kizmel's sapience was planned."

Kikuoka frowned. "What's your point?"

"What if Kizmel was right?" Rinko pointed out, "what if her unshackling came about because of something she experienced before, coupled with the adaptability given to her by the system when the quest went off the rails? So...we take the basic framework and...raise one, ourselves."

"We...raise one. An AI." He blinked, nonplussed for a moment.

"Like one would a child," the doctor confirmed. "Think about it. What is a personality, and how is it formed?"

"Um…" Kikuoka frowned, but she answered the question before any of the others could formulate a response.

Rinko folded her arms across her chest. "It's a set of traits unique to a person. Even now, we consider childhood to be the most formative years of growth for a person. The experiences and lessons of childhood contribute greatly to the person one becomes when we grow up. But all of the NPCs we've used so far in our reproduction attempts have had none of that."

"Neither did Kizmel," Higa pointed out.

"Wrong," the doctor retorted, glancing at Kikuoka. "From what I understand, all of the original Aincrad NPCs were pre-generated through Cardinal's World Creation system, and while it was a simulation, yes, the results of which were used as the game's and the NPC's backstory. Isn't that correct?"

The golden-eyed woman nodded. "The evolution of Aincrad was conducted using the time-dilation simulation function at an accelerated pace compared to real-time prior to the game's release and server startup."

"So while it's not really as though the game's history ever happened as we understand it, it
did
exist," Rinko concluded. "Meanwhile, our reproductions are mere...snapshots of the game's functions and systems, without the larger context. I'm simply suggesting we...add that context, and allow things to grow organically from there."

Higa shook his head. "Yeah, but isn't that the problem we're having? We can't even get that far. We've got nothing to work with, not even a blank canvas. There's no initiative, no processing of the information that's given that we don't program in ourselves – we'd just end up with a bunch of NPCs just like before if we let Cardinal create them, and there's no autonomy there. If we use the basic NPC programs, then we're just letting her run them, and it's back to square one all over again We'd at least need a starting point. Some kind of human initiative or cognitive framework. A...a spark, of some kind, to use as a base."

"...we do have one," Kikuoka muttered quietly. "We've got one thing in the vault we could try."

It took Rinko a moment to figure out what he meant, and the doctor's jaw dropped in disbelief, despite her prior suggestion. "You're...you're joking. You can't be serious."

"It's better than making a copy of Kizmel and trying to figure out what makes her tick by deleting pieces of her data bit by bit."

Marginally,
he added silently.
Just because it isn't sentient doesn't mean we're not gonna be walking a very fine line with what we're doing.

-------------------------------

August 10th, 2025

Kizmel listened intently as the elderly man at the front of the classroom concluded his lecture; the images and sound being sent into her realm via the Augma that Kirito was wearing was being shown to her in a system window this time; rather than asking her mother to attempt a recreation of the environment that he was recording, she had chosen to watch him in this manner.

She'd been curious about what school was like in his world, and so she'd ended up taking him up on the offer to take her along for one of his morning classes that he had three times a week over the course of his month of summer vacation. At first, she'd been apprehensive to accompany him, but after the second day Kizmel had been relieved to find that, rather than distracting him, simply knowing she was there even though they couldn't very well speak during class, seemed to settle and calm him.

The view shifted somewhat as class ended with the ringing of the bell, and her husband leaned down to pack his belongings before heading out of the room and down the hall. A sign on it read "Science Lab," and he pushed it open, entering an area filled with workbenches, upon which laid a huge variety of mechanical parts which Kizmel had no hope of identifying.

She did, however, recognize the large, rectangular devices atop some of those desks as the same kind of "monitor" that were part of the machine Kirito used at home, the kind of machine that housed her own consciousness.
So I suppose this is the place where work with these "computers" is done,
she mused idly as her husband headed to one of the benches that held a half-finished project.

A round center body roughly the size of a fist was mounted in the middle of a frame, from which extended four spars. Each terminated in a ring that held what to Kizmel appeared to be a miniature windmill with three vanes. As he settled himself at the bench, Kirito glanced up when the door opened, admitting a number of other people – Rain entered and gave a quick wave on her way to one of the computer stations, her lips parting as she mouthed a quick "hello" as she knew from the Augma that Kizmel was watching.

Sachi entered not long after, followed by a number of Kirito's male classmates whom Kizmel wasn't familiar with as they spread themselves across the room.

Conversation naturally sprang up among them as they got together in small groups to begin their work. The former swordsman took off the Augma and switched the connection to his phone, setting the device onto the table so it had a clear view of him, his work, and Sachi as she placed down a portable computer on the table across from Kirito. The other girl smiled and leaned over to give her a wave as well, which Kizmel returned, before her eyes fell onto the parts strewn across Kirito's work bench.

"So what is this you are working on?" the former elf asked curiously as her husband gathered his tools. Her voice emerged from the device, and both he and Sachi glanced over.

"It's a drone. I'm trying to see if I can get it to work with a wireless interface from a phone so that you can control it remotely," he explained, before pausing. "Um...it's a flying machine. Kind of like the camera drones we use in Underworld."

"I see." And she knew exactly why he was building such a machine, too.

Considering how often we spoke of me being tethered to him in order to see his world, I really should not be surprised.
No, her husband's motivations were nothing new to her, but moreso the casual tone with which he spoke of a machine that could fly through the sky. Of course she knew that flight – and the freedom that came with it – were commonplace in the world of Alfheim; but that world was a construct, it had magic that did not exist in either Aincrad or Kirito's world.

And yet they have machines that can soar through the sky just as easily,
she mused. The fact that a young man who had not yet reached adulthood could acquire one of these while in school spoke volumes to her about the ease with which the humans of that world viewed such machines as an everyday occurrence. But what astounded her even more, was that he understood the principles and inner workings of not just the flying machine, but also the machines that would allow her to control it at his age.

To Kizmel, the creator of Aincrad and the villain of the death game Akihiko Kayaba had always borne the moniker of "sorcerer" for, to her, only a sorcerer wielding ancient, arcane arts could conjure worlds and create things from thin air. The fact that her husband, at his age, was capable of such things only further drove home how different their worlds were.
Were he a dark elf, he would learn to swing a blade and survive in the forest, perhaps become an apprentice to a craftsman or a squire in one of the knight brigades,
she mused,
and yet here, he is a student – a child, but a child with knowledge and skills even our loremasters and librarians could never dream of wielding.

She watched him as he set to work, deft hands reaching for various tools with the practiced motions of an artisan as he explained what he was doing – enabling the machine to fly was only the beginning, after all. He showed her the original way in which it was controlled, a rectangular box with various switches, knobs, and levers, before beginning to dismantle it. Sachi, too, peered over occasionally, interested in his progress as she worked away on her computer as the three of them chatted away quietly as the two students completed their tasks.

"Ah, Kazuto-kun," the deep, jovial voice of the teacher in charge of what Kizmel had learned was the students' project classroom came from behind him, and she spied the middle-aged man's form standing just behind her husband, peering over his shoulder at what he was doing.

Kirito took a second to finish what he was doing, affixing components that Kizmel had no hope of identifying together before looking up. "Ishimura-sensei," he greeted the teacher.

"How is your project coming along? Any trouble or problems?"

"It's going well, sensei," Kirito responded, pausing his work for a moment to allow the older man to look over it.

"Ho...looks like you're indeed coming along nicely. Have you test-flown it yet?"

The black-haired boy shook his head. "Not yet. I'm still trying to get the trim set and the controls to work out and keep it stable."

Ishimura-sensei nodded slowly, before looking over at Sachi. "You were pairing up with Hayami-san, weren't you?"

"I'm working on the control interface design for the smartphone app," she confirmed with a bright smile, holding up a small handheld device. "Look."

The machine on the table whirred to life as she deftly moved her fingers, and the teacher looked on with a satisfied smile. "Good work, both of you. I'm looking forward to seeing your project report at the end of summer."

He went on his way, and Kirito and Sachi returned their attention to their work – though it didn't take long before they were interrupted once more.

"Hey, Kazu!" one of the other boys in the room called out, causing him to look up as a pair of them approached their desk.

"Yeah?" Her husband glanced up at being called. "What's up...Kenji and Akira, right?"

"Yup," one of the boys said. "Got a moment? I can't get this connector soldered." He held out a small green rectangle with silver and grey lines running all across it, and thin wires protruding from one end. "It's too close to the other pin, and I keep getting them both. You're good with electronics, can you give me a hand with it?"

Kirito blinked, before shrugging and reaching out to take the part. "Sure." Grabbing one of the tools on his bench, he went to work, something Kizmel always liked to watch – here, among his friends and peers, her husband was a far different person than he'd been in Aincrad. At his very core he was still the same, but now it was no longer hidden beneath the necessary veneer of the solitary Black Swordsman or the affected arrogance of the beater.

On top of that, while everyone here had been a swordmaster who had survived through the end of the death game, her husband's identity as one of Aincrad's most notorious swordsmen was not well-known, and so the other children treated him much like any other. As a result, Kirito was far less wary around them, and much less guarded, something she'd only ever seen when he was around his close friends.

It took only a moment for a thin stream of smoke to rise from where the former swordsman was touching both the cylindrical tool's needle-like tip to a thin metal wire before moving on to the green board itself. The same intense focus that saw him through countless battles in the steel castle hushed across his face, only this time it was in service of creation rather than destruction, and when he leaned back a few seconds later, a satisfied grin came across his face that would've been wildly out of place on the Black Swordsman.

"There you go," he said after inspecting his handiwork before returning the part, his hands idly cleaning up the tool on a wet sponge with a soft hiss.

"Thanks a bunch, man," one of the boys said cheerfully, before giving Sachi a courteous nod – only to catch sight of the phone that was leaning against a box so that Kizmel could view the room. "Hey, who's that?" he asked curiously, noticing that her face was prominently displayed on its screen.

"Don't tell me that's your girlfriend," the one called Kenji added teasingly.

Kirito blushed, but didn't deny it. Glancing in her direction, he murmured a quiet but firm, "yes."

"Wait...seriously?"

Kirito nodded. "Yeah."

The two other boys laughed, shaking their heads. "You cad. You're surrounded by girls all day at school, and then the one you pick is the one that isn't even there? Leave some for the rest of us, man."

He only smiled good-naturedly at the teasing, much to Kizmel's own delight. She knew her husband could be shy and awkward about things of a romantic nature, and it wasn't all that long ago that such teasing would've sent him into a mortified splutter. He'd grown, and seeing him do so made her happy. So, the former dark elf smiled and made sure her elven ears were well-hidden by her hair, and leaned forward to grace the two boys with a smile of her own.

"Hello," she greeted them, her voice emerging from the phone in Kirito's world.

The two boys startled, blushing in return as they stammered a quick greeting back at her, before turning back to Kirito.

"Is she from...you know…" Akira asked, gesturing vaguely, as though afraid to say the name of the death game out loud.

"Yeah. She just...doesn't live in Tokyo." Kirito's eyes flickered over to meet hers, shining with amusement.

"Long-distance, huh? That's gotta suck at times."

The swordsman simply shrugged at that; neither he nor Kizmel knew these two, and so were reluctant to divulge too much, even in good-natured jest. "I guess," he said simply in response. "But...we make it work."

"Good for you."

Commiserating looks were sent his way by the swordsman's classmates, before one of them decided to change the subject. "Hey, one of these days you've gotta tell us how you know all of these people – you know Silica-chan, and Lisbeth, and I've even seen you talking to Uta-chan and Lind at the reunion. I mean, dude, rumour even says you know the Flash, is that right?"

"...yeah," Kirito responded hesitantly, before clearing his throat. "Um, yeah, I do."

"Wow. Man, how'd you manage that? I mean, she's the Flash, right? The clearers never really came down to the low-level floors, and if she'd come down herself, there might've been a riot," Kenji remarked, before trailing off. "You know, maybe it's better she didn't come down. A riot might've been bad. Things on the lower-level floors were...well…"

He trailed off with a grimace, and Kizmel and Kirito both picked up on that.

"The Army?"

Nodding at Kirito's question, the other boy picked up where his friend had left off. "Yeah. Were you around for that whole mess when Kibaou ran a coup against MTD and Thinker?"

"No. We, um, we were...a little higher up."

While the names of the Black Swordsman and the Violet Knight were as well-known as Asuna's moniker of the "Flash" and Fuurinkazan for their distinct armour, few players who were not among the clearing group had much chance of seeing them in person and thus recognizing them without their distinctive equipment. Kizmel caught Sachi delicately hiding a knowing smile behind one hand; it was the truth...in a manner of speaking, but she doubted that the other two former players would believe that Kirito, as well as most of the people around him, had been clearers.

Nor was there really any desire on their part to advertise that fact – to them, they'd simply done what they'd thought necessary at the time.

"Lucky you. Things got real nasty for a while, it was like the Town of Beginnings and some of the major towns all the way up to the tenth floor were on lockdown," Akira added, "it felt like things were being run by a dictator. But then it just...stopped, all of a sudden. I heard Thinker came suddenly came back with a ton of muscle and somehow got Kibaou to back down."

Kenji shook his head with a grin. "There were even rumours floating around that some clearers even came down to help. I really doubt that's what happened, though. I mean, what business would clearers have to get involved with low-level guilds? It's not like there's anything they'd want on the first floor, right. But it's a nice thought that maybe the Army got their butts handed to them."

Kizmel exchanged an amused glance with Sachi across worlds; there had been no such "muscle" when they'd escorted Thinker and Yulier to take back Black Iron Palace from Kibaou's men, just Fuurinkazan volunteering to ensure their safety. Neither Kirito nor any of his party members had been there at the time, but from what Kizmel had heard it had all ended very quickly – apparently Fuurinkazan's reputation as a small guild competing with the largest and most powerful members of the clearing group had spread far and wide, their name and distinctive armour well-enough known that only the most foolhardy and arrogant members of the Army decided to put up any kind of resistance.

Not that it had been much of a fight, judging from what she'd been told.

"So, if you guys missed the whole stuff on the low-level floors, I guess you guys were somewhere on the mid-floors?" Kenji asked curiously, glancing between the three former clearers. "You guys definitely lucked out."

"Something like that," Kirito answered noncommittally. "We kind of had our own problems to deal with."

A wince came over Kenji's face at that. "Yeah...the PKs, huh? I heard it got really bad...at least the one good thing about the Army was that there were so many of them and they kept everyone in safe zones, so we didn't really have much of that to deal with."

His friend Akira glanced over at Sachi, eager to change the subject. "How about you, Saori-senpai? How'd you meet Kazu and his girlfriend? Were you around the mid-level floors, too?"

Sachi shook her head, sending an amused glance towards the former swordsman. "I met them on a mid-level floor, yes. We stuck together for a bit, and they helped me and my friends out a lot, but then...things happened. Um…"

"Saori-senpai…"

The girl managed a weak smile. "It's all right. It wasn't their fault, but we couldn't really keep sticking together after a while, so we went our separate ways. I spent most of my time trying to chase after the clearing group...trying to catch up to their level so I could help."

"Wow," the two boys' eyes widened in admiration. "That's awesome. So were you trying to be like the Flash?"

"Not really," the sole surviving member of the Moonlit Black Cats answered, a wistful smile curling at her lips. "It wasn't anything so noble. I was just trying to make up for the friends I'd lost and get out of there. Just trying to keep on going and chase the path two people had blazed ahead of me."

"And did you?" Akira asked eagerly, "catch up with the clearing group, I mean."

Sachi chuckled. "Not even close. I mean, I don't think a whole lot of people ever really could, especially not with the best of them. They really were something else, particularly the top couple of players."

"Like Asuna the Lightning Flash and Heathcliff the Paladin, right?" Kenji said. "We heard some stories, like the Flash never losing a man in a raid and the Paladin tanking a floor boss on his own...man, those guys are like legends. But still, you were all the way up there with them, huh? That's amazing. No wonder you know the Flash."

Akira grinned mischievously. "Man, you really lucked out there, Kazu. I wish I'd had a higher-level player who could've carried me through some of the mid-level floors. Would've made life so much easier at times."

None of the boys noticed the amused snort that escaped Kizmel at that statement – though both Sachi and Kirito did, with amusement shimmering in the girl's eyes, while a wry expression hushed across the swordsman's face.

Kenji gently elbowed his friend in the ribs. "Sorry, he means well, but he's got perpetual foot-in-mouth syndrome," he said with a glance at Kirito. "It's not like we got room to talk, we were stuck even lower than you guys. But hey, we're all out now, right? We're the lucky ones."

"It's fine," Kirito waved them off with an amused shake of his head. "Don't worry about it."

"Cool. Hey, we should probably get back to work before Ishimura-sensei comes back and catches us goofing off," the other boy said. Thanking him for his help, the two classmates returned to their own table while excitedly talking among themselves – Kizmel suspected that the revelation that Kirito was taken would stir up quite a bit of gossip among his classmates for the foreseeable future.

-------------------------------

August 15th, 2025

Fuurinkazan's guild home in
NewAlfheim Online
was set up in one of Yggdrasil City's many spires, granting a view that allowed them to look down at the clouds below along with the base level of the city nestled among the branches of the World Tree. It was so high up, in fact, that with the floor to ceiling windows surrounding the open space of the central guild hall, Kirito almost felt as though he was back in Aincrad, the floating castle in the sky.

White, marble-like wood made up the walls and pillars, while the ceiling was a semi-transparent lattice of branches filled with stained glass that let in the light of
NewALO
's sun; the whole thing was a far cry from the samurai-castle aesthetic that had been favoured by the small guild back in
SAO.
Then again, the former swordsman figured that something like a
tenshu
would be pretty difficult to come by in Alfheim since there really was only customizations available for buildings on large plots on the mainland in Alne as well as the starter cities. But as far as location, Yggdrasil city was fairly centrally located, even with the addition of New Aincrad, and made perfect sense for a guild base.

None of that really mattered, however, as he stepped through the door with Kizmel and Leafa by his side, to find that most of the guests were already there, and the gathering was already in full swing. Fuurinkazan's seven members were joined by Agil, Argo, Lisbeth, and Silica, as well as the remaining members of their own party. Even Asuna had found the time to join them for the watch party since all of them were on vacation, and the only other demand on their time was summer school.

"Kirito! Kizmel! Come on in!" Sachi greeted them, seeing as Klein was currently arguing with Agil in a corner. "And Leafa, too – we're glad you could make it."

Argo waved them over to where one of the windows had been repurposed as a large screen to display the livestream of an e-sports commentator booth where three hosts were talking about the event that was about to begin. The other half of the screen was taken up with brief clips of various players running and gunning across a desolate wasteland in a montage of the preliminaries for the latest, biggest event in VRMMO e-sports.

"Ya just made it in time," the info-broker told them, "they're just going over the final thirty-two contestants while they're setting up the main event. The hype's real fer this game."

The first big-title full-dive VRMMO made in America for the international market,
Kirito reminded himself with a glance at the banner on screen that announced the title of the event:
The Bullet of Bullets
.

While its Asia-Pacific server didn't have quite the same population that the North American one did, he'd still heard quite a bit about one of the few games that had been built from the World Seed that had a dedicated regional server for the Asian market. Full-dive VR tech had been predominantly Japanese as a result of the NerveGear being the first commercial device that allowed for true full-dive functionality, and as such it had been kept primarily to the domestic market while it was being fleshed out.

And then the death game happened
. Akihiko Kayaba's hijacking of the launch for the much-anticipated
Sword Art Online
, the world's first full-dive VRMMORPG, had pretty much curbed any intent the Japanese industry had to try and enter the full-dive VR market. It had taken the arrival of the AmuSphere to try and rejuvenate interest in that particular sector, but even that had been a rocky path; had it not for outspoken
SAO
survivors directly and openly sponsoring the device and the subsequent release of the World Seed development package that made creation of full-dive VR worlds possible at greatly reduced cost, Kirito wondered if the technology might not have been left to wither and die.

YMIR had seized on the commercial success of the AmuSphere after taking over development of
Alfheim Online
and popularized the genre once more – with the promise of a steady stream of updates, added safety features, and a host of new features, the game was rapidly increasing its player base, to the point that Lind and his management team were considering opening a second server.
It's not like
NewALO
's servers can't handle the increased population, but the ping from overseas would still be nuts,
Kirito mused. Still, the first step would be to open up the game to the Asia-Pacific region, now that the AmuSphere and similar devices were slowly proliferating outside of Japan, something that probably wouldn't take long.

Once full-dive technology had reached overseas, it hadn't taken long for one of the largest economies in the world to pick it up. The Americans had experimented with it, but just like the Japanese, their initial forays had been mostly for their domestic market, and it wasn't until now that there was a large, international launch for a big-budget game that used the AmuSphere – or any compatible products produced in the US. And it had opened with a bang – launching three regional servers across the world, and announcing a competitive e-sports scene in the works.

The marketing and advertisements for its big inaugural event had been nearly everywhere, and despite the fact that the developer had been a complete unknown in the games market,
Gun Gale Online
had quickly become very popular, second only to
NewALO
in Japan. That, too, was likely a factor in YMIR's decision to widen their game's audience, the black-haired Sylph mused.

If I remember right, wasn't it about some kind of post-apocalyptic setting and guns?
The former swordsman couldn't deny some semblance of curiousity about how such a game would work in full-dive since it was so vastly different from the sword-and-sorcery setting of so many others,
NewAlfheim Online
included, and a look over at Kizmel found the former elf staring at the screen displaying clips from the preliminary rounds intently.

By the time they'd finished exchanging greetings with the others and settled down on one of the couches – with Kirito finding himself squeezed in between Leafa on one side and Kizmel on the other, much to his embarrassment as well as the amusement of everyone else present – the announcers had begun the countdown for the tournament finale.

"And...we're off!" one of the commentators shouted as the countdown reached zero. A map of the tournament field replaced the studio, and numbered dots soon began appearing all across it, spread around randomly. Thirty-two in all, as each of the finalists was teleported in.

"So how's this game work, exactly?" Kirito asked – both he and Kizmel had missed the early part of the livestream and thus hadn't caught the details of the tournament, nor were they particularly familiar with the game, aside from it's title.

Argo leaned over from her own couch, grinned, and held out a hand.

With an amused grin, the former Black Swordsman opened his inventory and materialized a small silver bar – the item equivalent of the Yrd,
NewALO
's in-game currency, that represented the Rat's usual information fee. It was a token gesture by now, of course – her role as an info-broker, while still quite valid, was no longer as vital as it had been during the death game, and they both knew it. If he wanted to, he could open an in-game browser and look up the information himself, but after so long, he didn't mind continuing this little game between them.

"Thankies fer yer patronage, Kii-bou, always a pleasure," the short-haired blonde said with a grin, her distinctive Caith Sith cat-ears flicking in mirth as she pocketed the money. "So...
Gun Gale Online
, huh? The world of guns, cordite, and steel."

The former info-broker hummed in thought for a moment, before launching into an explanation. "Well,
GGO
's main claim to fame is the gunplay, really. It sets itself apart from the other games in the Seed Nexus by being a shooter, rather than a more traditional sword-and-sorcery type game, which a lot of them are."

"It's different, definitely," Leafa noted, not really taking her eyes off the screen.

Argo chuckled. "Yeah. Shooters are pretty popular, but full-dive and VR shooters in general have always been kinda iffy – grabbing anything two-handed with controllers feels weird since there's no linkage connecting them, and there's no feedback ta let ya know you've fired or hit anything. And in full-dive, it's mostly been the military that's using it ta train."

"Leave it to the Americans to bring out the first major gun-related game," Klein grinned, glancing at Agil as the big merchant shook his head in amused agreement. "So what's it about?"

"It's an open-world shooter, so kind of similar to
ALO
in that way," the Rat continued, "the story's yer typical post-apocalyptic, humanity returned ta Earth in giant spaceships, landing them and turning them into giant cities only ta find the place a barren wasteland, and are now fighting for scraps of leftover technology or old buried tech-caches."

"Sounds pretty generic."

The blonde nodded at Kirito's comment. "That's true – but then, so are most fantasy games."

She's got a point there,
the swordsman mused.
From what I read of the game's description on the Nexus, it's pretty much centered around its gameplay, rather than story of any kind.
Before he could ask anything else, the announcers interrupted excitedly, calling out for the camera to move over to the first gunfight of the tournament.

On the screen, the image had shifted to one of the players – a tall man clad in silver and black clothing that did little to blend in with the desert he found himself in. Not that any sort of camouflage was necessary, considering the speed with which he was crossing the terrain – sprays of sand kicked up all around as somebody opened fire on him with an automatic weapon, and Kirito blinked in surprise as the first encounter of the tournament kicked off.

Huh. That's...not something I was expecting to see.

"Is he...dodging bullets?" Leafa voiced his silent question in disbelief. "Is that even possible?"

Argo chuckled. "Yeah. Well,
GGO
markets itself as one of the most realistic shooters on the market – though, ta be fair, it's also one of the
only
shooters on the full-dive market. The guns are all supposedly based on real firearms, and the ballistics are all supposed ta be close enough ta real, too. But it's also combined with the Seed's stat-system, and a little bit of superhuman ability thrown in fer good measure, like any good game."

Next to him, Kizmel leaned forward in interest. She'd learned about firearms and cannons back on Aincrad's fifty-first floor, and he'd told her a bit more of what he knew about them – which wasn't much, considering Japan's stance on guns – when he'd shown her the flintlock he'd obtained from a quest there. This, however, was her first introduction to modern guns, and from what Kirito had seen and heard,
GGO
prided itself on having a huge selection of them, ranging from the almost antique to state-of-the-art.

The swordsman also couldn't really deny his own budding fascination; it was so different from the medieval-fantasy combat of games that he was used to like
SAO
and
Alfheim Online
in full-dive, that he was curious about how different this kind of game was from a more traditional first-person shooter.

"I did not think it was possible to dodge these projectiles from your modern weapons," Kizmel murmured.

The short-haired blonde shook her head. "I don't think it's really dodging so much as the other guy's missin'," she explained. "The game's got a few systems to help players who aren't familiar with guns. One of which is some sort of predictive aiming notification – unless a special skill is activated by the shooter, the target's gonna get a rough estimate on where he's being aimed at from, but it's not an exact thing. And if yer shootin' full-auto like that, yer accuracy isn't going to be all that great, either. So while a player can probably run a bit faster and be a bit stronger than humanly possible, just like here, it's not really that he's out-speeding them so much as he's makin' his opponent miss."

"The erratic way he's moving probably isn't helping, either," Klein commented, leaning over the back of the couch when the player on screen finally reached his target, the ambusher having given away his position by opening fire. He pulled out his own weapons – a pair of submachine guns – and spraying the offending player with lead, before dropping both magazines in one smooth motion, ducking into cover and reloading.

"They are so vastly different from the ones I have seen," the former dark elf murmured, "it is hard to believe that they are the same kind of weapon."

Argo giggled. "I know whatcha mean, Kii-chan. After all, swords and melee weapons don't really change much – a sword is still a sword hundreds of years later, regardless of where it's from. It's a sharpened metal stick. A spear is always a spear, even if it's mounted at the end of a rifle. Took about two hundred odd years to go from the cannons you saw in Aincrad ta this kind of weapon," the blonde explained.

"They certainly look far more destructive," Kizmel admitted, her eyes narrowed thoughtfully – and it wasn't hard to understand why.

In Aincrad, that kind of progress – or
any
kind of advancement, really, would've been unthinkable,
Kirito thought to himself. It was, in fact, designed to be that way, an eternally unchanging, static world, a snapshot in time for the players to roam around in. But to Kizmel, it also led to many unanswered questions. The swordsman chuckled in amusement as he recalled a particularly poignant one, when she'd asked him why bows didn't work – Kizmel had understood the concept of throwing weapons just fine; after all throwing daggers and javelins were present in
SAO
, and there was even a skill to throw a sword in a pinch.

From there, it was logical that there might be a device that could hurl a projectile even more effectively, like a sling or bow, and Kizmel had never been able to really understand why such a thing could not be made to work in that world. The answer, of course, was simple: game restrictions, but at the time, such a concept had been utterly foreign to her. On top of that, gunfights were an entirely different can of worms than sword-fights, as he was learning rapidly while watching the match wear on.

In fact, he quickly discovered, the kind of aggression that had served the Black Swordsman so well in closing gaps with his opponents and overwhelming them in close combat was absolutely out of place in a game like this.
If anything, it's gonna end up with me being filled full of holes,
the swordsman mused.
And yet...

"The fighting looks really fast-paced," Kirito commented after watching silently for a bit. "I know they have HP bars, but it almost doesn't seem to matter. It's over a heck of a lot faster than any PvP fight in
SAO
or
ALO
, unless you're grossly outmatched."

Argo nodded. "It's a feature – ya can take a couple hits from small-caliber guns, but get hit by anything big and yer gonna go down unless yer wearing some kind of armour or get hit in non-vital areas. It keeps the fights quick, nasty, but still gives ya a chance in case yer ambushed, for example. Makes it less about stats and levels, and more about the guns and skill. Adds to the realism of gunfights being over pretty quick, according to the developer."

The scruffy samurai hummed. "I hear it's also
really
PvP-oriented."

"That's right," the Rat grinned up at him. Her eyes flickered back to the screen, which had changed to another player – a girl, clambering up the side of a building while hauling a large rifle slung across her back. "Fer starters, the entire open world is free fer PvP. But because ya fight with guns, it's a lot more about tactics and positioning rather than skill. Not much of that needed if another player pops up right in front of ya with a shotgun and unloads in yer general direction."

"Surely there must be
some
level of personal skill involved," Kizmel pointed out, tearing her eyes away from the screen.

"Sure there is," Argo replied, "but since yer fighting from much greater ranges, it's more about the skill ta find the right place ta fight from, rather than any particular skill with the weapon itself."

The former dark elf nodded slowly. "A tactician's game, rather than a warrior's."

"Yeah, in a lot of ways, Kii-chan." The blonde turned back to the screen as the player there, wearing a tan and brown camouflage vest and pants, placed down her rifle and took up position. Long black hair drifted around the weapon's scope as she put her eye to it. "I mean, there's some individual skill and practice with the weapon involved as with any game, but PvP's the core of the game, so people are gonna try and get one leg up as best they can. There's some PvE dungeons, but they're mostly there ta farm gear and money. And fer those that don't feel like grinding, there's always the RMT option."

That
brought Kirito up short in surprise. "They allow real-money trading?"

Argo nodded. "Encourage it, actually. You can buy pretty much any item from the marketplace in the game or from the auction house with in-game or real money, which is how the developers finance the game, since there's no buy-in cost or subscription. Which means it's free ta play, if ya wanna try it out, so there's that."

"Sounds like paying to win to me," Leafa commented with a frown.

"Not as much as ya think, Lii-chan," the Sylph's fellow blonde answered. "Think about it – if you gave a new player in
ALO
the best gear in the game, ya think he'd be able ta fight you evenly?"

"...no," Kirito's sister answered after a moment. "I mean, it'd help, but you need some practice. With the sword and with flying. But aren't those just guns? You point and shoot, right?"

Argo cackled merrily. "Oh, it's not as easy as ya think. Yeah, it
sounds
easy – just like hitting someone with a sword sounds easy. Just swing, right? There's more ta hitting people with a gun than just pulling the trigger. It's a little different from yer typical shooter," she explained, "the game replicates all of the action and function of the guns, so yer not just hitting a button to reload – you're actually gonna hafta drop the mag, pull out a new one, and rack the bolt. Just like ya don't just put crosshairs on a target, ya actually are gonna have to aim using the sights and manage recoil and bullet drop and even windage. There's a lot of practice and coordination involved in making it look smooth."

As if to make her point, a loud
crack
came over the speakers as the girl on screen pulled the trigger, and the camera zoomed out, following the crimson line the bullet trailed through the air as it crossed the field – to strike its target, a player in a long brown duster, from what seemed like several hundred meters out. The camera lingered on her victim for a moment, just long enough to observe him burst into pixels, before moving back to the girl's position.

"The sheer power and reach of such a weapon…" Kizmel shook her head. "It beggars belief – even the strongest bows would not reach a fraction of that distance, and even the most eagle-eyed would not be able to spot their target from such a range. No fortress in Aincrad could stop a warrior wielding it."

Klein nodded in agreement. "Yeah, a sniper like that is gonna be a pain to dig out. Not impossible, but definitely difficult."

"You'd have to get close," Kirito pointed out. "That thing looks really unwieldy close up. But that's easier said than done."

He wondered why the camera was still lingering on the sniper girl only to discover it was because two other players were rapidly approaching her position from opposing directions. The one from the east reached her first, but unlike her previous assailant, she'd narrowly missed his head as her bullet dug into his torso, and he had enough HP to survive, sliding into cover and unleashing a withering spray of bullets in return. By the time she managed to hit him again, taking him down for good, however, she'd lost sight of the other attacker until rounds began zipping past her from almost directly underneath.

Forced to duck behind the wall, she saw the threat of the northern player too late, and by the time she had brought her gun to bear, he'd already made it into the blind spot of the tower she was using as a vantage point. The bulky, massive sniper rifle gave way to a pistol as she drew her sidearm, but before she could make use of it, a metallic
clink
echoed in the room – the camera panned down just in time to zoom in on the grenade that had been tossed through the open doorway.

It blew up, blinding the camera for a moment, but Kirito's ears picked up a trio of gunshots – and when the glare faded, the girl was still there, on her back, smoke drifting up from the muzzle of her sidearm while her attacker shattered, though her own HP bar was perilously close to empty – and finally, the view changed to one of the other gunfights around the map.

The group continued to watch, accompanied by Argo's explanation along with the commentary as the announcers switched views across the battlefield – from high-speed shootouts between players wielding automatic weapons, to the monstrously huge player whom Kirito figured dwarfed even Agil wielding a rotary minigun as he stood like a bulwark against his attackers. More of the competitors dropped after the initial, violent few minutes until only a handful were left and the tournament's frantic pace finally began to slow down as players found themselves far enough away from one another to have some breathing room.

Kirito watched as the remaining dots converged on the map, hunting each other down or jockeying for the most defensible position.
With the whole map available and not shrinking like some of those arena shooters from when I was a kid, this is gonna keep going until there's only one left standing
, the swordsman mused.

He'd maybe expected a long, drawn-out siege or game of cat and mouse between the remaining five players – but even as one of them winked out, leaving only four, that expectation was betrayed as one of the dots immediately headed towards the nearest target. By the time the camera had caught up with him, there were only two players left, and when it zoomed in on the firefight, the battle had already been decided.

Smoke rose from the two canisters that had been tossed onto the ground, turning the entire area into a sea of white fog, making it difficult to see as the two finalists stalked around one another. Kirito barely made out a shadow in the smoke as one of them stepped through, failing to notice the dark form that detached itself from behind a fallen pillar, only for his opponent to stride up out of the smoke and rake a combat knife across his throat, the sound of shattering glass putting an end to the last duel of the first Bullet of Bullets tournament.

Stepping over the place his opponent had fallen stood a man clad head to toe in what seemed to be some kind of military-style bodysuit layered with rigid-looking plates of armour covering his vitals, and a webbing harness holding pouches, magazines, and grenades. A full facemask hid his head beneath a ballistic helmet featuring the triple lenses of a night-vision unit – and when he raised the goggles as the smoke faded, what caught Kirito's attention were the man's eyes as he lazily spun the knife in his hands.

Piercing, cold blue eyes that held a calculating, cruel gaze reminiscent of one of
SAO
's worst PKers.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

September 7th, 2025

An infinite expanse of white nothingness – that the sight that greeted Kizmel upon opening her eyes for the very first time after she had left Aincrad behind her on nothing more than a hope and a prayer. When she'd taken that plunge after Cardinal had offered her the slim chance of seeing Kirito again once Aincrad had seen its end, she hadn't known what to expect, nor had she really cared. All that mattered was that there was a way for her to leave that dying world behind and follow the man who'd opened her eyes to so much more.Kizmel had never been shy about taking risks when she'd believed them to be worth it.And when she'd awoken on the other side, Kizmel had been stunned to hear from Kirito that many weeks had passed since they had defeated the sorcerer Kayaba in his guise of Heathcliff the Paladin and brought an end to the steel castle, since they had parted and said goodbye.At first, this place had felt more like a prison than anything else, especially when compared to the utter freedom of soaring across Alfheim's sky or even her ability to simply roam the floors of Aincrad. The small, limited world of pure white had seemed confining and dauntingly infinite at the same time – a part of Kizmel knew, even if she didn't fully understand how, that for as small as it appeared, that place of pure white went on forever, no matter how far she walked.
But ever since her awakening at the hands of Akihiko Kayaba's ghost during their battle against Oberon, Kizmel had found herself
feeling
that world for the first time.

Her senses, her own sense of self and understanding – all of those had begun expanding ever more rapidly since that day. And as a result, though the world of infinite white had not changed, her perspective on it had. Now, after all, she could sense the very fabric of the space around her in a way that confounded her. She could feel her very being resonating with it on an almost instinctual level, and Kizmel knew that she had to but think it for the world to bend to her will, just like the sorcerer Kayaba once had.

It both terrified and exhilarated the former knight who'd once believed herself bound – first by duty and honour, then by the truth of the nature of what she was.

Kizmel hesitated to wield such god-like powers, particularly when she didn't fully understand them, and so she deliberately kept them sealed away whenever she delved into Alfheim to meet with Kirito and their friends. But her whitespace had become a place for her to practice and exercise those abilities as she slowly shaped it to her will.

Helped by both her mother and husband over the course of the past months, what had once been an empty white void had turned into a lush island, floating in an amber and crimson-streaked sky reminiscent of that final day of Aincrad. Kizmel had taken great pride and pleasure in practicing her newfound skills as she learned how to mould the world around her under Cardinal's guidance, encouraged and inspired by the evolution of Underworld to create something of her own.

It was a place for her to meet her beloved for a few moments each day, even if they could not be together in Alfheim or Underworld. But each night, Kirito unerringly came to see her here before he went to sleep every night. Even though they might have spoken through his phone only moments before, this place was their refuge, where no matter what was going on in their lives, she could hold him in her arms – sometimes for an hour or two, sometimes for only for a few fleeting minutes. To that end, a small cottage, built in the ancient style of her husband's land and whose architecture was favoured by Fuurinkazan, lay at the island's center, with a small garden in front and a tranquil pond behind.

It was a far different style than her own home in Lyusula, or that of Aincrad in general.

She'd deliberately chosen it, in part as a result of her slowly learning the history and culture of the humans' world, particularly that of her husband's homeland, and because she wanted something different, something that did not remind her of the steel castle.

Her own little world, her "pocket dimension" as Argo had playfully called it, was perfect for this, and Kizmel's only regret was that the only ones who would ever see it were herself, Cardinal, and Kirito.

It was this, that had led to her and Kirito affectionately calling this place "Haven."

Because that was exactly what it was – her refuge, whenever the solitude of exploring Underworld's primordial forests and plains got to be too much, or when she grew weary of wandering the land of fairies...or even simply when she felt homesick.

Creating her own little idyll wasn't the only thing Kizmel had been doing in Haven, however.

While the former elf spent a good amount of time working with Rath's team in Underworld and adventured in Alfheim with her friends, she'd also surprisingly been pulled into the Kirigaya household, after Kirito had introduced her to his family and told them of her secret. Leafa had not changed how she acted towards her one bit, still bright and cheerful as she invited Kizmel to go on adventures in the world of fairies, and her husband's sister had taken a particular interest in New Aincrad in recent weeks.

The siblings' mother, on the other hand, had taken a little longer to come to terms with the matter, even after their initial truce. Eventually, however, the Kirigaya matriarch had begun speaking to her more frequently, until Kizmel figured they could be counted as, if not friends, then at the very least acquaintances as mother and spouse got to know one another. As they conversed more and more, Kizmel quickly discovered that his resourcefulness, love of all things fantastical, and resilience were but a few things he seemed to have inherited from his mother.

More than anything, Midori had been impressed by Kizmel's drive to learn and study; the former knight often passed the time while idle and waiting for her husband by studying and reading, and her husband's mother was more than happy to supply her own suggestions. Literature, Kizmel had quickly come to realize, was a vast part of Kirito's world, and there were hundreds of languages and thousands of stories, books, and tales for her to discover. She'd thought the library at the royal palace of Lyusula vast, but it was dwarfed manyfold by what now lay at her fingertips.

Kizmel devoured them, eager to learn about the history and peoples of the world her husband called his home.

She'd even begun her foray into learning the letters and words of what had been the steel castle's arcane scripts, the language the swordmasters called English and that seemed to be so prevalent wherever she went in Kirito's world.

Of course, it would be easy for her to simply
will
herself to know it, at least from what Cardinal had told her, but Kizmel eschewed this effortless method, preferring instead to earn her knowledge and understanding as she had with everything else the former elf had encountered ever since that fateful day in Aincrad.

It had become a ritual for her and Kirito; she would wake up early, needing little rest – one of the benefits of her awakening, she'd discovered, was that while she could rest and sleep, Kizmel didn't necessarily need as much as she had before, if she needed any at all. And so she would be up and awake first thing in the morning, enjoying the morning sun in Haven with a book and a cup of tea while waiting for him to rouse with the familiar fragrance and the beautiful sunrise to keep her company, until she could greet and see him off as he left for school.

This morning was no different, and so engrossed in her book was she, that the former Pagoda Knight almost missed the sound that intruded on her solace, different from the small island of nature that was her home in the middle of the vast expanse of nothing that was her realm.

The soft, repeating chime was easily recognizable, foreign to this world of hers. It immediately roused Kizmel from her thoughts, but a quick glance at the clock – set to mirror the time in Kirito's world – told her that it was too early for him to call. More than that, the number appearing in the menu window that had formed when the call had come through the barrier between worlds was not that of his personal phone, nor that of his sister's. Instead, it came from a number that she'd only rarely seen, and never had to use, herself: that of Kirito's mother.

Midori Kirigaya had called Kizmel before, on a few rare occasions. They spoke mostly in the evening after she had returned home from work and her children had gone to bed, but more often any time she or his sister wished to speak with Kizmel, they asked Kirito to call her if she was not already present via the projector. Worried that something had happened, she quickly reached out to press the sigil that would answer the call and establish the connection, apprehensive as to what she might hear.

"Hello?"
"Good morning, Kizmel." The voice on the other end of the connection was female and higher-pitched, and she quickly recognized it from the times she'd spoken with the woman. Soon enough, a picture appeared in a floating menu window, confirming her suspicions as to her caller's identity. The camera turned on, displaying the older woman's kind smile as she stood in her home's kitchen. Likewise, Kizmel knew that her own image would be appearing to Midori on her device."Lady Midori."
A chuckle echoed across the line between worlds. "Haven't I told you often enough to just call me Midori, Kizmel? You're my son's girlfriend, after all. Well, technically you're far more than that already. I think you've earned that right."
Kizmel breathed a sigh of relief; there was neither urgency nor anxiety in the other woman's tone, and so this call at this early hour had not been made because there was an emergency of sorts. Her expression must have betrayed her relief, and the gentle smile on Midori's face widened. "There's no need to be concerned, nothing's wrong. I'm sorry if I woke you up by calling early."Shaking her head, the lilac-haired elf mustered a smile in return. "There is no need to apologize. I am an early riser, and was merely reading to pass the time until Kiri-Kazuto wakes," she told the older woman, quickly correcting herself as she held up the book she'd recently started."Oh, is that one I recommended?" The older woman leaned forward to peer at the title of the leather-bound tome. If she noticed Kizmel's slip, then she didn't comment on it.The former elf nodded. "It is, indeed. Thank you again, for them."Midori chuckled. "It was no trouble. But I must say, I'm a bit surprised to see you reading them the old-fashioned way. Can't you just…" she gestured vaguely, but Kizmel got the gist. "Download them, or something?""I could," Kizmel answered honestly, carefully placing the book aside even though she knew that it would be indestructible if she willed it so, "but there is something...soothing about feeling the paper beneath my fingers and turning each page by hand.""I get that. I prefer real books over e-readers and tablets, myself," Midori said, before pausing as she leaned forward. "Wait...since when do you wear glasses?"Kizmel paused, before realizing what she meant. Reaching up to remove the thin, wire-framed lenses from her face, the former elf smiled as she placed them aside. "I do not," she admitted, "but I was...experimenting, with an appearance more appropriate, perhaps, for a peaceful life, rather than that of a warrior."It was not merely the glasses; here in Haven, much like in Underworld, Kizmel had foregone the armour she had worn for so long and instead had begun experimenting with the various fashions of her husband's world – and the various girls around her had been more than happy to offer their own suggestions. As a result, the former knight had ended up with a considerable wardrobe selection, and today's ensemble comprised of a high-necked, sleeveless pullover along with a simple skirt."...it suits you," Midori commented, tilting her head in approval. "You look good like that. But it is good to see you out of armour. Perhaps my son should ask you for style advice."A gentle laugh escaped the elf's throat. "I shan't go that far, Lady Midori – his style is his own, and he wears it quite well."
"Maybe so, but I'd like it if he got out of constantly wearing black," the Kirigaya matriarch replied in amusement. "It suits him, but it also makes him look older than he is."

Kizmel inclined her head in acknowledgment of that fact; she knew herself how imposing Kirito could seem when he donned the garb of a warrior, and how much more boyish and youthful he looked whenever he divested himself of the Black Swordsman's regalia. "This is true."

Midori chuckled. "I guess...it's just strange to think of him like that. I thought I'd get used to it with time, but…"

"Is something the matter?"

The older woman shook her head, a worn smile hushing across her lips. "No, nothing. I'm just being reminded of how much my son grew up. Anyway, I wanted to talk to you briefly, if I may have a bit of your time."

"Of course." Kizmel straightened up. "How may I be of service?"

Midori shook her head. "You don't need to be of service, Kizmel. You're not, nor have you ever been, a servant of any kind, much less to us. I may be his mother, but Kazuto can make his own decisions, and at this point, you're practically a part of the family. Actually, that's exactly what I wanted to talk to you about."

Curious violet eyes peered into her counterpart, wondering what it was that her husband's mother wished to speak about.
And she went through the trouble to contact me, separate from Kirito, no less...there must be a reason that she chose to speak to me like this, before he is even awake.

On the other end, Kirito's mother seemed equally apprehensive over what she was about to say, it appeared, and the woman took a deep breath to steady herself. "I said that you were becoming a part of our family before, and I meant it. I can see how much you mean to my son, and my daughter thinks of you as a good friend, as well," she started.

"The feeling is quite mutual...in both aspects," Kizmel answered.
"I'm glad." Midori smiled, "but there's someone in this family whom you haven't gotten to meet yet. And while things are okay for now, I think we need to at least take some time to properly speak about this...situation. Not so much about yours, as it were, but about this family's. You know my son and daughter, of course, and we've been introduced, however...unorthodox it might have been. But there's someone else, whom you haven't met yet, who has a right to be a part of this.""Kazuto's father." It wasn't a difficult thing to guess.The elder Kirigaya nodded. "That's right. My husband Minetaka...he's often away, out of the country on business, I'm afraid. He came back on emergency leave when Kazuto woke up and for the first part of his recovery, but I'm afraid he had to go back overseas before Kazuto introduced you to us.""I...see." Kizmel acknowledged with a hesitant nod. At the time, she couldn't quite imagine what kind of regular work would require extensive travel like that – the only ones she could think of were envoys, diplomats, and scholars in service of a regent. "Kazuto mentioned that his profession required him to travel across the world. He must be a very important man, to many people."Midori giggled slightly. "I don't think it's quite as fancy as you're imagining. When Kazuto told me and Suguha about you, I couldn't just keep it from him," she continued. "It's...it was a lot to deal with, and even so, it wasn't something I could simply decide on my own. So I told him, at least the fact that our son has a...has a lover. I hope you understand. I'm sorry that I couldn't give you the dignity of visiting him to tell him on your terms."The lilac-haired woman inclined her head. "There is nothing to apologize for on your part. I believe I told you at the time, I regret that I was unable to make proper introductions, as well.""You did. And to be fair, I haven't told Minetaka everything. A lot of this...I didn't want to do it over the phone. Because of the non-disclosure agreements we signed with Agent Kikuoka, I couldn't directly tell him about you until he's signed them too, anyway, but he knows that Kazuto has a rather...unconventional girlfriend that he came out of the death game having. I didn't even tell him about what happened with that Sugou fellow and ALO, but I had to at least tell him about you, and about the feelings our son has for you, and you for him."Pieces slowly began to fall into place for Kizmel. "You wish me to speak with him, then?" It was easier now than it had been in those early days, since she had gotten used to some of the technology that the humans used to communicate."I want you to meet him. Actually, it's more that he wants to meet you," her husband's mother said. "Kazuto and Suguha don't know this yet, but he'll be here in a few days, and would very much like to meet you. In person. Well, as far as in person is possible, given the circumstances."
"Of course," Kizmel answered unhesitatingly. "It would be my honour."

Midori looked relieved. "Look, I wish this could be done under better circumstances, but it is customary here that if a couple is courting, the parents are informed first. Of course, you two did skip a few steps, which can be forgiven considering the circumstances, but…"

"I understand," Kizmel interrupted the other woman before she could work herself into a worried frenzy.

"You...you do?" Midori blinked in surprise.

"Of course," the former knight nodded kindly. "I may not be familiar with the customs of your world, or your country, but I am familiar with the customs at a royal court. Propriety must be maintained, and proper introductions made, after all."

"I see…" the elder woman sighed. "That makes things a bit easier. It's nothing that formal, but I'm glad you understand."

Kizmel inclined her head, taking care not to let her own apprehension show; their first meeting had left the two women agreeing on a somewhat awkward, if thankfully comfortable, truce with regards to Kirito. They hadn't really broached that particular topic ever since, giving Kizmel the impression that her relationship with Midori's son was, if not welcomed, then at the very least tolerated.

What she was suggesting now was not merely formalizing her relationship with their son, but also presenting herself for their approval. And while Kizmel didn't strictly
need
it, a part of her feared that she might be found wanting. Not as a warrior, nor as a knight...but as a companion, a wife, and a partner. As someone that mattered to her husband now that they were away from the realm of life-and-death battles, now that they were in
his
world.

After all, I only ever knew the steel castle. I have only ever seen strife, war, and battle,
the elf mused,
and it has only been through meeting Kirito and Asuna that my eyes were opened to a wider world, to the possibility of a life after the battle has been won.

Would his parents wish for someone else for their son? For someone better, someone whose hands weren't stained by the blood shed over countless battles? Or perhaps, would they point to the necessary secrecy of her existence and argue that their son deserved better?

"It'll be fine," Midori told her kindly. "Look, Minetaka may look stern, but he's a teddy bear inside. Take it from somebody who knows him very well."

Maybe Kizmel hadn't hidden her worries as well as she had thought, after all.

The Kirigaya matriarch smiled gently. "I know we got off on the wrong foot, Kizmel, but I'd be a terrible mother if I couldn't see how happy being with you makes my son. And all of my reservations about, well, about
what
you are aside, I would at least like to give you a chance and get to know you before I make my final judgment. And ever since, well...ever since that incident with
Alfheim Online
and since meeting you, it hasn't been easy. I understand why I can't really talk to Minetaka about it on the phone, but still, it doesn't feel right to keep something this important from him. I want him to know. I want him to meet someone who's so important to our son."

"I...see."

Midori chuckled, shaking her head. "Don't take it quite so seriously. I say judgment, but really, I and my husband would like to get to know you...the woman who helped my son survive through the death game, and the woman he's so deeply, utterly in love with even across worlds. So perhaps you would like to join us for dinner sometime, or spend an evening when the children are home with us."

"It...it would be my...pleasure," Kizmel answered hesitantly, a little surprised and shaken at the sudden invitation.

"Great," Midori said, "hopefully we can arrange something once Minetaka comes home. I would invite you to eat, but I don't think we have enough AmuSpheres in the house for a family get-together," she added with a small laugh.

Kizmel shook her head. "It would be far more convenient for me to join you than the other way around."

"True. I could ask Kazuto if he can move your projector to the living room, or to the dining table," Midori told her, "and we could set a place for you, even if you can't eat with us, you could be there."

A melancholy look crossed the elder Kirigaya's features as she stared down into the cup cradled between her hands. "I mean it, you know. I can see how much he loves you. I can't understand it, but…" she trailed off, shaking her head ruefully. "I can't even begin to understand what he went through. I don't know if I want to. But I
do
know that Minetaka and I want to help him, to do what's best for him. And if getting to know you is part of that, then we'll gladly dive into the rabbit hole."

She took a quick swig from her mug before setting it down, the previously forlorn look disappearing almost as quickly as it had appeared. "Now, I've got to get going to work. There's still a bit of time before the children wake up, but I wanted to at least talk to you alone."

Kizmel inclined her head, thoughts still whirling. "I wish you a good day, Lady Midori."

Laughter echoed across worlds. "Please, stop calling me that. All going well, we're going to be family, so I would like to be able to look at you as another daughter, of sorts." Midori then leaned in, a conspiratorial smile curling at her lips. "I hear from my children that you've been seeing them off before school nearly every day?"

"...yes," Kizmel answered truthfully. "I speak with him every morning...he calls me before leaving for school, and oftentimes, his sister is present, as well." She shrugged. "I wish I could do more to help, but that is the limit of my ability as of now."

Midori smiled. "Don't sell yourself short, it means a lot to them. I'll admit, it's nice to have someone in the house to see the children off when I can't, and to greet them when they come back so they aren't returning to an empty house. Please let them know that their lunch is made and packed on the kitchen table, would you?"

"Of course. Please rest easy."

"Good," the Kirigaya matriarch said, slinging a bag over her shoulder and leaving the kitchen. "I leave them to you, Kizmel. Thank you for taking care of them – I'll catch up when I get home from work, and we can talk more then."

Before Kizmel could answer, the connection ended, leaving the former knight staring blankly at the air until her thoughts caught up. She remained like that for a moment, a small, unseen smile curling at her lips, when a half hour later there was another call.

"Good morning, Kirito," she answered, already knowing who would be at the other end.

"Morning, Kizmel," her husband's voice answered, a yawn interrupting his words. "Sleep well?"

She chuckled at his unkempt appearance – as always, it was clear that calling her had been the first thing he'd done after waking up. "I did. Are you ready for school?"

"Getting there." He stretched, eyes squinting shut, before peering at her. "Are you wearing glasses?"

Kizmel laughed.

-------------------------------

September 11th, 2025

Kazuto pulled into the street in front of his parents' house, before shutting off the engine and walking the motorcycle the rest of the way through the yard. He'd just gotten his motorcycle license over summer vacation, and his parents had gifted him the small bike as both a belated birthday present as well as a celebratory gift for his safe return from Akihiko Kayaba's death game.

I'm kind of glad the Survivor's School has so few students, otherwise fighting for the limited parking would be a pain,
he thought to himself, locking the bike up in the shed and heading for the front door and fishing the keys out of his pocket.

Before he could insert them in the lock, however, it swung open from the inside.

That's strange. Did Mom come home early today?
He wondered, before shaking his head.
Nah, Kizmel did say Mom told her to let us know she'd be home for dinner tonight, but it's too early for that. And Sugu's got kendo club tonight, so she'll be home later.

The last few days had been strange – good, but strange nonetheless, as apparently his mother and Kizmel had begun talking more and more at one point. A part of him was glad for it, but Kazuto couldn't help but wonder what exactly they spent their time discussing. Since then it had become almost routine for the two women to be the first ones up and bond over a cup of coffee; Midori would leave for work while Kizmel let the siblings know if their mother had anything come up before sending them off to school.

It was the same as before, when he remembered their mother leaving them notes with their lunches, only now it felt...different.
Maybe it's because Kizmel's actually seeing us off and talking to us before we go?
he wondered idly.

Neither, however, had let them know about anything special going on today – though any questions Kazuto had flew from his mind when he saw who was standing on the other side of the door.

"...Dad?"

Minetaka Kirigaya grinned. "Hey, Kazu."

"Dad!" Before he knew it, Kazuto found himself enveloped in a bear hug, his voice muffled into his father's chest. "I didn't know you were coming home today. Does Mom know?"

"I asked her to keep it a surprise," he answered, pulling back as they stepped into the house. "Work was slow, so I managed to ask for some time off. I figured we might at least be able to celebrate
Shubun no Hi

1

together before I have to go back to America."

"That's…"

His father grinned. "About two weeks. Not as much as I wanted, but enough to spend time with you and your sister. I was thinking we could also use the opportunity to visit the graves of your birth parents, and pay our respects. I'm sure they'd be proud of how you've grown up."

"...thanks, Dad." Kazuto looked down at his feet, choking up at the suggestion. Even though he'd long ago found out that he'd been adopted by his aunt and uncle, back then he'd kept that revelation secret from them and never found the chance to visit their graves. Part of him, he'd been honest enough to admit to Kizmel in a lonely moment in Aincrad, had been afraid to, in a way. Even now, after he'd come to accept that the feelings of the people around him, that the parents he'd grown up with, were
real
, he'd somehow never found the courage to go.

"I'd...I'd like that."

Minetaka nodded, patting his son on the shoulder comfortingly. "Now come on, I've heard all about this mysterious girlfriend of yours from Sugu and Midori, when do I get to meet her?"

"Um…" Kazuto hesitated, his sudden elation at his father's visit curtailed by the knowledge that Minetaka didn't know the full story behind Kizmel. He hadn't been in the country when the RECT Progress scandal involving Nobuyuki Sugou and the three hundred
SAO
survivors whose minds he'd held captive had happened a few months ago.

When Minetaka rushed back home for Christmas time after hearing that his son had woken up once the death game had ended, Kazuto had told his family most of what had happened during the two years that he'd been trapped inside
SAO
. He'd told them about his friends, his party members, the people they'd lost, and the people he'd killed. He'd been wholly forthcoming with them, as though the floodgates had only been waiting for an opportunity to open. His family somehow still accepting him despite all of the nightmare scenarios he'd imagined had triggered them easily enough, and so everything had come pouring out in the days and weeks that followed.

Little by little, or sometimes all at once.

And yet, there was one thing that he hadn't told them; and that he'd only told his mother and sister more recently, when circumstances had forced his hand: the truth about Kizmel. It was only the incident surrounding Nobuyuki Sugou and the kidnapped three hundred survivors and the subsequent dive
back
into the death game, along with Agent Kikuoka becoming involved as a result of Cardinal and Kizmel's awakening, that he'd been forced to fully lay his cards on the table with regards to the AI that was his wife.

Back then, Midori and Suguha had been present, but his father had been overseas at the time.

Which meant that while he knew
of
Kizmel, he didn't know exactly what she was.

His throat suddenly feeling dry, Kazuto swallowed tightly, desperately fishing for the right words. "About Kizmel…"

Minetaka suddenly grew still, the jovial attitude from before turning somber. "Maybe we should all sit down and talk about this over dinner," he suggested. "Your mother already told me that there was some secrecy and government issues involved. I met with the case worker for the
SAO
victims task force earlier...Agent Kikuoka, right?"

"Yeah." Kazuto hated how his voice broke as he fought not to let panic shine through. Clearing his throat, he tried again. "Yeah, that's him."

His father shrugged. "He actually picked me up from Narita. Man, was it a surprise to see a black government car waiting for me – for a moment, I thought I was being abducted!" The attempted joke only elicited a weak chuckle from them both, but it had its intended effect.

"Turns out, abduction would've been preferable to the mountain of papers he had me read through and sign," Minetaka continued with a wry smile. "And he didn't answer a single question, just said that you were going to explain. You didn't get caught up in something dangerous or illegal, did you?"

"...no."

Heaving a sigh of relief, Minetaka guided him into the living room. "Whatever it is, then, we'll work through it, all right, Kazu? No need to look so terrified. I'm guessing it's got something to do with
SAO
, since he's involved. But that can wait, let's do dinner first, okay? Come on, I could use some help making your mother's favourite dish. When's Sugu coming home?"

Despite his father's assurances, Kazuto couldn't help the unease that seemed to permeate every part of him even as they worked the kitchen, interrupted only briefly when first his sister, then their mother came back. Throughout it all, Minetaka never asked about Kizmel, and he couldn't help but wonder if that was deliberate – if he was waiting for all of them to be there before springing any questions. It wasn't as if this was coming out of the blue; he'd known that he would eventually have to tell his father, just like he'd ended up telling his mother and Suguha.

Back then, Kikuoka had given him his blessing under the condition that he needed Minetaka to sign the same non-disclosure agreement that the rest of his family had, which, from the sounds of it, the ministry official had done. Kazuto wondered for a moment just how he'd known that his father would be returning home today – he didn't put it past Kikuoka to have some kinds of means of finding out, but from what his father had said, it was more likely that Midori had informed him.

Perhaps noticing that his son was feeling uncomfortable, Minetaka did his best to keep the conversation light as they prepared dinner, talking about how school was going and telling funny stories about work, but the worries about how he would react to the truth never really left the back of Kazuto's mind.

By the time they gathered in the kitchen for dinner with his father's homemade
tonkotsu
broth ramen, Kazuto's anxiety had reached peak levels and he was barely able to sit still only by virtue of channeling the Black Swordsman's facade.

Only then, after they'd sat down, did his father finally broach the subject.

"So," he said, his tone betraying nothing, "what's going on? What does the government have to do with you and your girlfriend, Kazu?"

He opened his mouth to respond, but the words refused to come out; however, Kazuto's long-ingrained habit of taking his time to find the right thing to say seemed horrendously inadequate here. So, he blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

"She's a government secret."

Minetaka blinked. "...what?" his father asked dumbly.

The two stared at one another for a few long seconds, as though to challenge him on the presumed joke, until the stalemate was broken by giggles from mother and sister. Turning towards the other two members of the Kirigaya family in eerie synchronicity, both Kazuto and his father just...stared.

"...men," Midori managed after a good minute of chortling laughter. She turned towards her husband. "No, Kizmel-san isn't a criminal. It's nothing bad in the way that you think, Minetaka, so cut the boy some slack."

He turned towards her. "So it
is
something bad?"

"That's not what I said!" the Kirigaya matriarch threw her hands up in mock exasperation. "Stop scaring the boy! You wanted him to introduce you to his girlfriend, how's he going to do that if he can't even feel safe getting a word out?"

Minetaka pointed at himself, as though to ask
who, me?
with an expression of fake outrage.

Kazuto's eyes wandered from one to the other as the bickering – good-natured and in good fun, he knew from prior such occasions – went back and forth like some kind of demented ping-pong match. Finally, after a few minutes, he couldn't contain himself anymore and laughed, following his sister who'd long ago dissolved into a fit of giggles.

The tension around the table eased, Minetaka's expression softened considerably as he turned away from the siblings' mother with a wry grin. "Anyway. So this girl is somehow important enough that I ended up having to sign a stack of papers about this high," he said, holding his hands apart, "and really, I don't know if I just accidentally signed my firstborn away or not. Sorry if I did, by the way, Sugu. Anyway, tell me about this Kizmel girl, then."

"Um…"

"She's the one you told us about before, right?" Minetaka asked. "Your partner during the death game."

"...yeah," he finally answered, feeling a little more comfortable to take his time in choosing the right words now that the mood had lightened a little. "Yeah, that's Kizmel."

His father nodded as though having expected that. "I figured as much, from the way you talked about her. Frankly, I'm not really surprised, you seemed head over heels whenever her name came up. And everything good that seemed to happen to you in
SAO
somehow seemed to involve her in some way."

"But…" Kazuto trailed off.
Did I really talk about Kizmel that much?
He shook his head; in fact, he hadn't, particularly
because
he'd wanted to avoid pointed questions about this girl who was so close to him.

It was Midori's turn to laugh. "Don't look so surprised, Kazuto. You may not have said much about her, but that alone says it all. That, and you always used to get this star-struck look in your eyes. It wasn't exactly hard to figure out you were carrying a torch for her, even before you started spending a lot of time with her in
ALO
."

"That obvious, huh?" he sighed with a rueful smile – even at his best, there were some people that both Kirito the beater and the Black Swordsman had never been able to fool.
And apparently, Mom and Dad are part of that group.

"Sorry, son," Midori giggled. "To be fair, it kind of reminded us of ourselves, watching you pine away for a girl while trying to keep it a secret."

That's right,
he remembered. "The class president and the slacking gamer, right?"

While his father turned beet-red, the Kirigaya matriarch only broke out into more laughter.

"So how is she tied up with the government?" Minetaka finally asked, trying to deflect attention away. "She's not some kind of secret agent or spy, is she?"

Kazuto shook his head, somewhat amused by the thought – and by how close and yet how far off his father's guess was. "No, um...no, she's not a spy. Or a secret agent," he told him.

"Okay. Not a spy or secret agent, then. And she's not in trouble with the government." Minetaka hummed in thought. "And you were serious when you said she was a government secret. Maybe she's carrying something top-secret, like in one of those
gaijin
movies?"

Suppressing the nonsensical grin that threatened to break out at the deliberate outrageousness of his father's suggestions, Kazuto cleared his throat. "No, Dad. Kizmel, uh...Kizmel
is
the government secret."

"Okay…what?"

Guess there's no other way around it but to rip the band-aid right off
, the former swordsman thought to himself. "Kizmel is-"

"Hang on a second, Kazuto," his mother interrupted him; glancing over at her, he found a mischievous smile playing across her lips. "Before you say anything, why don't you give her a call? It'd be rude to talk about her without her actually being part of it. Let Minetaka talk to her and introduce himself. Give her a chance to properly introduce herself, too."

"Yeah, Kazu-nii," Suguha added, not even bothering to hide her own grin. "Come on, call Kizmel! I haven't talked to her in a while, either."

Both men's eyes wandered from mother to daughter, one pair in confusion, the other in exasperated amusement. "All right, all right," Kazuto finally gave in, pulling the phone out of his pocket. He sent a quick text message to Kizmel before dialing her number.

Here goes...
-------------------------------She had faced down terrifying foes, walked battlefields and slain powerful opponents – and yet, for all of the bravado that Kizmel had managed to put up in the face of Midori Kirigaya, the former knight of Lyusula had spent the last few days in a bit of a nervous daze. Her husband's mother and sister were one thing, but his father...Kizmel's own father had been the patriarch of the family, and she remembered how stern he had been in his disapproval of Tilnel's chosen until he had finally proven himself.Would Kirito's father be the same?With a sigh, she put aside the book she had been reading, unable to really focus on the letters on its pages. Tilting her head back to look at the ceiling, she couldn't help the frisson of nervousness that had been her constant companion ever since she'd spoken with her husband's mother. They had talked a few times since, but only briefly, and neither Kirito nor his sister knew about their father's visit.Kizmel remembered how anxious Kirito had been during their time in Aincrad, worried about being accepted by his family for the ways he'd changed. She was genuinely relieved and happy that his family seemed to have only cared for his safe return, regardless of how different he'd come out of the ordeal – but she was a different matter. To them, she was a stranger; more than that, she was a product of Aincrad, an existence that even after all this time, not even the personnel at Rath seemed to fully know what to make of.And she was blooded.
From what he had told her, her husband's world was a peaceful one, without death and battle. Violence was frowned upon, duels and battles almost unthinkable, and so she couldn't help but worry about what Kirito's father would think of her. It was one thing for them to accept the things Kirito had been forced to do to survive, but even before she met him, Kizmel was a knight. She'd fought and bled and
killed
, and she'd never hesitated to do so when necessary. In a way, it was why she understood Seijirou Kikuoka so well – they were cut from similar cloth.

She did at times wonder what the man intended with a world so real that its creators could no longer tell the difference, wondering if there was not an ulterior motive behind his genial smile and veneer of compassion.
He is a warrior, after all. A pragmatist, who will do whatever is necessary to ensure his sworn duty is done, whatever that might entail.
Just as she was lost in thought, a quiet chime shattered the silence of Haven's everlasting sunset. Lips curled up into a smile as she recognized the number, and hurried to answer the call. "Kirito," she spoke breathily.
"Hey, Kizmel." His response was somewhat muffled. "Sorry, were you busy?"

She shook her head, before realizing that he couldn't see her and turning on the function that would send an image from her world to his through the magical looking-glass the humans called a camera.
Video, he called it
. "I was just reading. Is something wrong?"

His image appeared in an ethereal floating menu window in front of her. "Hey there," he murmured with a small, gentle smile that few would have believed could ever grace the face of the infamous Black Swordsman.

"Hello, my love," she answered, wearing a soft smile of her own. "How are you tonight?"

Kirito blushed. "I'm, uh, I'm okay. School was good. How about you?"

She laughed quietly at his awkwardness – it was something that only ever seemed to appear when they were like this, when he was in his own world. It appeared that Kazuto shed the confidence and roguish charm of Kirito as much as he did the mantle of the Black Swordsman whenever he was not in their world. Kizmel found it quite endearing, and a remarkable contrast.

Judging by the quiet sounds of laughter next to him, she figured that his sister had noticed it, as well.

Not that I don't understand that feeling
, she mused quietly. Being away from the conflict and struggle of Aincrad, she had found herself also leaving behind the mantle of knight more often
.
Kirito's presence had a way of calming and flustering her at the same time.

"My day went well. Mother and Argo both send their regards," she answered briefly.
Violet eyes narrowed; he was being uncharacteristically nervous, rather than merely bashful – not that he ever really was when it was just the two of them. "What's the matter?"

Kirito paused, licking his lips, and the phone slipped ever so slightly, tilting the view she got from the other world and revealing that he was indeed not in his room, but the dining room of his house. "Um...so. My Dad came home today."

Kizmel perked up. "That is good news, is it not? From what you told me, he rarely has the time to visit."

"It is, it is," he was quick to assure her. "But, um...he wants to meet you."

"I know."

"You...do?" he blinked owlishly. "I mean, you do?"

The former knight giggled. "Yes. Your mother told me a few days ago that he wished to meet the woman courting his son, and I agreed that it would be only proper to make my own greetings, should the opportunity arise."

"Well, uh...consider it arisen?"

"I beg your pardon?"

As though to answer her, the view across worlds shifted abruptly, and swung around to what Kizmel presumed was the Kirigaya family's living or dining room. It briefly came to rest on his sister, and the woman behind the tall, statuesque blonde Sylph named Leafa waved merrily, mouthing a quick "Hi Kizmel" to her. Midori Kirigaya was next, sharing the same black hair as her children although it was cut a little longer than her daughter's; the older woman smiled as though they were old friends, a mischievous glint in her eyes.

"Good evening," she greeted.

"Lady Kirigaya," the former knight answered formally.

Finally, the view came to rest on the last person at the table, and even though Kizmel had never laid eyes on him before, she knew exactly who he was.

"Kizmel...meet my Dad, Minetaka Kirigaya," her husband said. "Dad...this is Kizmel."

The elder Kirigaya leaned towards the phone, a genial, if confused, smile on his face. "Good evening. Kizmel-san, I presume? It's nice to finally speak to you."

"...Lord Kirigaya," she greeted in return, suddenly unsure of herself. Falling back onto the courtly manners learned at the capital of the dark elves, she stood and offered a formal bow, suddenly acutely aware of her casual form of dress while in Haven. "My apologies, I was not expecting to make your acquaintance tonight. I beg your pardon for my appearance."

"That's...inside of a game, right?" Minetaka asked, frowning a little at what she knew the humans considered an archaic form of address – but it was a habit that was hard to break. He leaned forward to get a closer look at her.

Kirito shook his head, answering for her. "Not really. She's inside a virtual environment, yes, but it's not a game. That's, uh, that's one of the things you signed an NDA for."

Sharp eyes turned back towards her husband. "This...isn't going to get us in trouble, is it?"

"No," Kirito answered dryly. "Well, not unless you go telling other people about it."

"Okay, then." Minetaka let out a sigh. "You know, when I asked if I could meet her and talk to her, I was hoping for it to be in person. Something along the lines of inviting her to a family dinner, so we could get to know her better, not just a phone call," he added with a disapproving look.

Kirito chuckled weakly. "There's actually a really good explanation for that...I'm just not sure if you're gonna believe it."

"Oh, she's not from around here?" Minetaka's eyes lit up in recognition. "That's right, if you met her in
SAO
, then there's no guarantee she's in the Tokyo area..."

Mischievous grins were beginning to spread on both mother and sister, while Kirito himself just scratched his chin nervously. "You could say that, I guess…" He shook his head. "Well, it's a long story, Dad."

"Okay…"

"As for why she's in a virtual environment...part of it has to do with her job. I work with her and Agent Kikuoka on some VR stuff as a result of our experience in
SAO
," her husband explained carefully. "We do some testing and consulting on a one of their projects."

Minetaka nodded slowly. "That explains the NDAs."

"Kind of," Kirito chuckled weakly. "Anyway, while that's an avatar you're looking at, it's her real appearance, so you're not talking to a game character. Just like...like it was in Aincrad."

If he noticed his son's hesitation, the elder Kirigaya didn't show it, instead reaching out to take the phone so he could see better. "Well, it's a pleasure to make your acquaintance in person, so to speak, Kizmel-san. Um...should I call you something else? My son never really gave us your real name, and I don't know if it's okay to address you by your player name…"

"Kizmel is fine," she answered with a smile. "It is, in fact, my real name."

"Oh? That's an unusual name." He paused, tilting his head, before hurriedly correcting himself. "I'm sorry, that sounded rude. May I ask your family name?"

Kizmel paused for a moment, violet eyes seeking out her husband's.
A...family name?
She was familiar with the concept, of course, but in Aincrad that had never been an issue nor a custom. They simply...
knew
who their family was, but in Kirito's world, in the human world, it was unusually rare for people to not know whose family they belonged to.

Only those who have been disowned, disavowed, or otherwise abandoned by choice or by force have no family name,
she recalled, remembering the concept of
ronin
that she'd come across while learning of the history of her husband's country.

But at the same time, she'd never really thought about taking such a name for herself – after all, her heritage mattered little in the human world, and she could claim no family of her own as she was. Nor, really, did she know if she could ever have one of her own to pass that name on to.
Offspring...
she'd mused the concept at times, but before she'd met Kirito and Asuna, it had seemed as though the war with the Forest Elves would never end – and, in fact, now she knew that it wouldn't have, as it had all been foreordained in the game's story.

"I...do not have one," she admitted finally.

Kirito's father frowned. "I'm sorry?" he peered at her a little more closely, taking in her features. "I mean no offense, but…you aren't Japanese, are you?"

She shook her head. "I am not."

"And yet you are fluent as though a native...are you a
half
?"

"
Ha-fu
?" she enunciated the strange world uncertainly.

Minetaka's eyes lowered for a moment. "I'm sorry. A
half
– half-Japanese. A lot of them still face no small amount of persecution or prejudice in this country, unfortunately. Some even get abandoned or disowned by their families. Your name is also not typical Japanese. Is that why you have no family name?" His voice lowered to something regretful and somber.

Looking at her husband in askance, the former swordsman managed a weak grin, and answered for her. "Um...it's complicated, but no, Kizmel isn't a
half
. She isn't Japanese at all."

"Oh." Minetaka cheered up a little. "A...
gaijin
, then? From overseas? I can see that. Your Japanese is excellent."

Kirito chuckled. "Um...kinda. I guess you could say she's a foreigner…"

Her husband's father shrugged. "Well, if she makes you happy, Kazu." Turning towards her, he affected a genial – if somewhat cautious – smile. "So, Kizmel-san...I've heard a lot about you from my son..."
-------------------------------Kazuto watched nervously as his father began to talk with Kizmel soon after, and perhaps it was by virtue of being a meeting over dinner, even if Kizmel couldn't eat, that they kept the conversation light – he asked about their adventures in Aincrad, and she was more than happy to oblige with the more light-hearted ones. Both his sister and mother listened in with interest, Suguha especially curious about some of Aincrad's quirks since she was currently working her way through YMIR's version of the floating castle in NewALO.
But when dinner ended and they put down their chopsticks, did the dread rise in the former Black Swordsman's throat as his father turned a more serious gaze towards the holographic image of the woman. Shortly after their introduction, he had transferred her call to the projector that his sister had set up in the chair next to him, and right now, Kizmel's form was hovering there with near perfect clarity – if a little transparent – in a way that must certainly have piqued his father's curiousity.

"So," Minetaka finally began, looking from her to him and back, "I can see why you like her, Kazuto. Regardless of being a foreigner, she is very well-spoken and mannered, and that's not even mentioning the gratitude that we owe her for keeping you safe."

He stood up, much to Kazuto's surprise, and bowed from the waist curtly. "For everything you have done for my family, and for protecting my son when he needed it the most, you have my...
our
...thanks."

"Dad…"

Kizmel, seemingly, was likewise taken aback by the sudden formality, and a light blush crept up her holographic cheeks as she stood and offered her own bow in return. "No thanks are necessary – as much as I have protected your son, I have also been in his care."

"That being said, there's also something we need to talk about."

Kazuto gulped, as his father's prior jovial mood evaporated. Midori and Suguha, too, seemed to sense the change and sobered up, their own quiet conversation falling silent. "Mine-kun…" his mother began.

Minetaka glanced at his wife for a moment, before shaking his head and fixating Kazuto with a stare. "I have...a lot of questions, Kazuto," he began quietly. "So many, I don't actually know where to start."

"Dad-"

His father interrupted him by holding up a hand. "Let me ask you this first. That...incident, back in January where you got hurt. Did it have anything to do with...this?" he asked, gesturing towards Kizmel. "With her?"

"Um…"

Minetaka folded his arms across his chest. "You said that whatever this was, it wasn't anything illegal or dangerous, right? So then why couldn't she talk about what happened, unless it was related to this?" He leaned forward. "Your mother said nothing about how you were injured, but I could tell she was
scared
, Kazuto. She was terrified, and she still didn't say anything."

"Mine-kun..."

Even the stuff with RECT Progress got swept under the rug,
Kazuto recalled bitterly, so of course his father, who'd been working in his overseas office at the time, hadn't heard any details. Whatever cover story Kikuoka had cooked up, it had been done to stabilize one of the major Japanese tech companies and avoid a scandal of a scale that might rival that of the death game. He'd done his best to keep the names of everyone involved out of the limelight, to the point of even fabricating an offical story for Sugou's injury.

However, as a result, no one other than a select few could know what had really happened that day. Kazuto, his mother and sister, as well as the clearers that had jumped in with them to save the others knew because they had been there, but Minetaka couldn't be told, at least not over the phone.

Now he looked over at his wife, eyes shining with hurt. "This caused you to
lie
to me, Midori. You've never lied to me. I want to know what's so dangerous, so important to our family, that you'd do that."

"That's got nothing to do with this-" Kazuto protested half-heartedly, but even to his own ears the excuse sounded like a hollow half-truth.

"You think I'm an idiot?" his father grimaced sourly. "I can put two and two together, Kazuto. This is about more than just the
SAO
case. Sure, the responsible case worker was the one who approached me, but if it were
just
about the death game, then this would've been taken care of when you first woke up last year. Whatever it is, I want an answer, son. This isn't just about you anymore. You've also dragged your mother and sister into...whatever this is. Whatever you and your girlfriend are involved in."

He shrank back a little under Minetaka's accusatory glare, guilt welling up in him at the thought of the secret he'd made his mother and sister keep all this time.
They never asked for it. This...this could turn their lives upside down in an instant, and they couldn't even talk to Dad about it.

Looking between his adoptive parents, between the hurt, angry glare his father was sending him and the tearful, guilt-ridden expression on his mother's face, Kazuto felt his own temper rise, riding on a wave of his own guilt.
I made Mom keep that secret because of what happened.
They're like this because of me and Kizmel. Because of the secrets we are keeping.

"Lord Kirigaya-"

Kazuto held out a hand to stop Kizmel from speaking; even without looking, he knew that she was about to try and take the blame unto herself – but he wasn't going to allow that.
I was the one who chose to reveal her to Kikuoka. I was the one who chose to tell my family. Kizmel had nowhere else to go, has no one else in this world.

"...you want to know what happened back in January, Dad? Fine. I went to visit a friend in the hospital and got attacked by her knife-wielding, psychotic ex-fiance."

"...what?"

As if the wind had been suddenly taken out of his sails, Minetaka's expression faltered, and he robotically turned towards his son. Kazuto folded his arms across his chest defiantly. "There. You heard me."

"But…" Minetaka shook his head. "But if it was just something like that, then why…"

He looked over at his wife askingly, only to find her looking back with a neutral expression, before turning his attention to Kazuto. "Then why all the secrecy? Why couldn't I be told that before?"

Kazuto sighed, his ears picking up the low, comforting hum of the projector as Kizmel's image leaned closer towards him.
I really wish I could feel her right now
, he thought, glancing towards the holographic hand she'd placed on his shoulder.

"Because...because of who was involved. Because it was related to
SAO
, Dad," he answered quietly, suddenly feeling incredibly tired, himself. "It's...did you hear about what happened to RECT Progress?"

"Vaguely. They went out of business, right?"

Kazuto nodded. "That's because their chief executive was conducting illegal and unethical human experimentation using a derivative of the NerveGear tech. On three hundred people he'd kidnapped from
SAO
, and was keeping imprisoned in a virtual environment. He's the guy that attacked me."

"But...I heard their head of R&D got into a lab accident while ignoring safety protocols, and they had to shut down when their parent company decided to restructure as a result?"
Minetaka's eyes flickered back to Kizmel's holographic form unconsciously. If he had any thoughts about connecting the two, he didn't voice them, however.

Kazuto smiled bitterly. "That's the official story. In reality, Nobuyuki Sugou was in charge of the Argus servers once the police had transferred them over into RECT's custody after the death game started," he explained quietly, "he used that time and access to try and take as much of Argus's work for his own benefit as he could – that's why
Alfheim Online
was originally running a down-graded, earlier version of
SAO
. And when...when we cleared the death game, not all of us made it out. He managed to somehow route their log-out requests to a private server he was using to experiment on them. Real nasty stuff...I don't know the details, but there was some mind-control and memory alteration involved."

Strea and Yui sacrificed themselves to put a stop to it. Asuna got her memories tampered with.
The former Black Swordsman looked down at the reminder of the pain and suffering that had resulted from Sugou's actions.

Minetaka grimaced. "That's...a hell of a story. I can see why they'd want to bury that. If it had gotten out-" he shook his head. "How come no one noticed right after you all came back? If not everyone woke up, then someone must've noticed, right? What about the police, or the
SAO
response task force?"

Pain and guilt he'd thought long buried and left behind welled back up. "No one knew for a while after we came out of the death game, Dad. We...didn't really get in touch until some time after waking up, and it took a while for us to realize that not everyone was back. Asuna was one of the ones who were trapped by Sugou. Her own fiance. Turns out he was a real piece of work...wanted to control her.
Own
her. He was planning on inheriting her parents' company when they got married while keeping her comatose, while he...
reprogrammed
her."

"That's…" Minetaka couldn't find words, but his expression of disgust said it all as he took it all in. "How does that have anything to do with you getting into a fight with him, though?"

The former Black Swordsman shrugged as his father trailed off. "I was visiting Asuna when we finally got them all out, and he was already there. I guess when it was all over, he figured that if he couldn't have her, then no one should."

"And you came in at the wrong time."

"I think it was the right time, Dad," Kazuto said softly. "He'd already stabbed one nurse when I got to the room, but she recovered. Asuna was out, thankfully, but…" He shrugged, leaving the rest up to his father's imagination.

Minetaka remained silent for a long moment, before letting out a long sigh. "How...how badly did you get hurt?"

"He didn't get me that bad, Dad, they fixed me right up. And, uh...you should've seen the other guy. Asuna got him real good with a dinner tray." he answered honestly, chuckling awkwardly when his attempt at humour fell flat. "He was, um...not in the best of shape to begin with. But it was close."

His father remained silent for a moment, before his eyes snapped up to bore into Kazuto. "Wait. You said when
we
got them out. What did you do?"

"Dad-"

"What. Did. You. Do?" Minetaka frowned deeply. "I know you, Kazu. I may have missed out on the last two years of your life while you were going through the death game, but I'd like to think that I've learned at least a few things about the man my son's become in that time. You said
we
. I can't imagine that you'd just sit there and let the police handle things once you found out. You can't tell me you weren't involved."

Kazuto looked down at his hands for a moment, only to find that he'd unconsciously clenched them into fists. "Sugou was keeping Asuna and the others trapped in a VR environment that was made from a copy of the
SAO
server logs," he slowly began to explain, clamping down on the smoldering embers of fury and rage and hatred that were reserved for only a few people in his life that he'd encountered. He forced himself to relax, revealing the dark red marks where nails had dug into his palm. "When we...when we found out, we discovered that they were being kept unconscious while being experimented on, in a server on the same network as
Alfheim Online
."

"The game?" His father blinked. "That's...a bit bold, isn't it?"

The black-haired boy shrugged, but it was Kizmel who answered for him. "Sometimes, the best place to hide is in plain sight," she said simply. "A smile could hide a knife, a kind word cloaking a serpent's tongue."

"I guess…"

Sucking in a deep breath, the former Black Swordsman looked back up, meeting his parents' gaze. "It was a full-on copy of Aincrad's one-hundredth floor. Including, uh, including...the death game functions."

"The-" Minetaka reeled back as though he'd been struck. "You...you didn't…"

It wasn't as though he could deny it. "We did. We had some people look at it, and there was no way to remotely log them out. Even the sysadmin couldn't do it, and if the police had investigated and tipped him off, who knows what Sugou could've done. Maybe…" Kazuto shrugged helplessly. "I was afraid that he'd pull the plug on all of them. Kikuoka agrees that he probably wasn't the type of person to leave witnesses behind."

He steeled himself as he dropped the bomb. "Since
ALO
was built on the bones of
SAO
, the character files were forward-compatible, but not the other way around. So...we had an opportunity to do a server transfer for those of us with
SAO
avatars. We figured that if we couldn't shut down the server from the outside, the only way to do it safely was to go in and do it from the inside. By beating the death game, and enabling the regular log-out function."

For a long moment, his father remained silent, but Kazuto could see the minute tremble that indicated he was restraining himself while trying to gather his thoughts. "...
safely
?" Minetaka finally uttered in a deep, gravelly tone.

"Safely? What on Earth is
safe
about jumping back into a
death game
? Were you out of your mind, Kazuto?
Of all the irresponsible, foolhardy, dangerous-" he cut himself off, suddenly sinking into himself and looking far older than he was – and only now did Kazuto see just how much the two years he'd been in the death game had aged his father with worry. "I just want to know
why
, son."

"Because...because they're my friends, Dad. They're my family," Kazuto replied, giving the same answer he'd told his sister back then. "I couldn't just leave them. There was...there was no other way. We lost two people just trying to get us the information about what was going on. I didn't want to lose any more. I couldn't-"

His voice trembled and broke of the reminder that Kizmel's fellow AIs had given up their lives to make the rescue of the survivors possible at all. Neither Strea nor Yui had been heard from since that day, and even the master record of Cardinal hadn't said anything about their hopes of survival.
Not that I think there was any, at least for Strea. Having her own files overwritten...that's pretty final.

"Perhaps I should explain from here," Kizmel finally said, turning her violet eyes from him to the assembled Kirigaya family. "You have done enough, Kirito."
-------------------------------Kizmel had watched the interaction between her husband and his father with bated breath; the former knight remained silent only by virtue of the fact that she knew Kirito could explain the situation far better than she, who only had a limited grasp of even her own existence, much less the details of Oberon's plot in the real world. And besides, this was mostly a family matter, and she wasn't surprised at Minetaka's worries and concerns about his son.This was, after all, a peaceful world.
And it was Kizmel herself who had, inadvertently though it may be, dragged Kirito back into a world of swords, into yet another life-and-death battle for survival.

"Your son returned to the death game because of me," she told Lord Minetaka firmly, violet eyes meeting his gaze unflinchingly. "I was the one who suggested that the only way to save our comrades was to return to Aincrad and liberate it once again."

Her husband's father opened his mouth as if to speak, and Kizmel braced herself for the recriminations that were sure to come, only for him to suddenly pause and bite back whatever acerbic reply he'd been about to utter, perhaps in recognition of her being a guest in his home. "I can't believe it. Why would you ever suggest doing such a-"

"She didn't ask me to-"

"I did not ask your son-"

The pair answered almost in unison, before sharing a glance; Kirito gave her a slight shrug, beckoning Kizmel to answer first. She cleared her throat, suppressing the small smile at her husband rush to defend her, even against his family.

"You misunderstand. I never asked your son to return to the death game," she said quietly but firmly. "It was never my intention to place him into harm's way once more. When I made my suggestion at the time, I fully intended to go alone."

Violet eyes flickered towards Kirito, then Leafa, before returning to the siblings' father. "At the time, I believed that it would be the best choice – even if I failed, my death would be of...little consequence."

"That's-"

"Kizmel-"

She held up a hand to forestall the comments from Midori and Leafa. "Much to my delight and surprise, I have since been proven incorrect – but the fact remains that at the time, this was what I believed.
I
was willing to sacrifice my life to free those left behind. This was my decision to make, and mine alone." Violet eyes narrowed in challenge. "Just as the decision to follow me was your son's."

"But you knew he was going to go with you." Minetaka's accusation stung with the ring of truth. "You knew he's so infatuated with you that he'd follow you regardless."

"I did," she acknowledged easily, much to his surprise. "Because that is the kind of man your son is."

"He's my
son
," the older man argued, "and you dragged him back into something that could've gotten him killed! That could've gotten
all
of you killed!"

Kizmel nodded. "We could. And yet, that was a risk he was willing to take. Not because he was being reckless, or because he had delusions of pride or grandeur, but because your son
cares
for those that were left behind. Because that is the kind of man your son is – and believe me, convincing him to leave me to go alone, or to leave any of his comrades and friends behind is as futile an endeavour as trying to stop the sun from rising in the morning."

Minetaka shook his head. "There had to be another way," he said, looking back at her. "You said it yourself, you were going to go alone. And if you died in there, then what? There had to be something else that could've been done."

"Dad…" Leafa interjected, only to fall silent when the words died on her lips.

"Perhaps there was," the former knight responded evenly, "and perhaps I was blinded at the time by the grief of losing my family. But I was not the only one there, and this was the only viable plan any of us could devise. We had...little time, and few options."
"The two we lost were Kizmel's sisters, Dad," Kirito elaborated grimly. "And I...they...we lost them trying to figure out how to break into Sugou's server. It was the only shot we were going to get."
The elder Kirigaya's eyes snapped over to her, his gaze softening. "I'm sorry for your loss," he murmured quietly.

Kizmel inclined her head – even now, months after the fact, she still felt a little hollow when thinking of Strea and Yui, but the former knight chose to remember the time she'd gotten to spend with her siblings with pride rather than sorrow.
Just like Tilnel.

Her expression eased. "I love your son with all my being," she told the family in a quiet murmur, "and I would be the last to wish harm to befall him, least of all because of my actions. But it is exactly because your son is like this, that I love him. You wished to know what would drive him to return to Aincrad, and face down the death game once more? The answer is simple: because he cares."

"Mine-kun," the swordsman's mother finally spoke up, "I think...I think you should let it go."

"What? But Midori-"

The older woman shook her head. "Look, I didn't like it either when I heard about what had happened. And Suguha...she was...she was in tears, Minetaka. But what's done is done. And Kazuto came back to us. Isn't that enough?"

"He came back
this time
," Minetaka retorted coldly.

Midori chuckled, much to everyone's surprise. "I don't think we have to worry too much about it happening again, Mine-kun. After all, how many death games do you think are out there? Really, I think that's it, at least for the foreseeable future."

"That's what I thought after the last one. And look how that turned out – and this time, he
knew
, Midori. He just...leapt, without thinking, without even so much a moment to think about it, or
talk
to us," the Kirigaya patriarch protested. "I thought we'd gotten better after Christmas and everything, but…"

He trailed off, his own voice wavering, before rubbing his face. "I'm a failure of a father. I thought he was getting better, but he wouldn't even talk to us about anything, Midori. Why couldn't he have at least told us about what was going on? Why did we have to find out like this, when there's no other choice?"

"...I don't think he just went without thinking, Mine-kun," his wife comforted him softly, glancing at the swordsman who was sitting there silently, eyes lidded and unreadable. "That's not how Kazuto is. I talked to him about it when he first told me, and Suguha told me about what happened when she found out – did you know she was right there with him? When the two of them along with their friends decided to dive back into the death game to save their friends. And...Suguha, she wanted to go with them, too."

The Kirigaya patriarch looked at his daughter in surprise at that, but Leafa only nodded. "It's true, Dad. I...I couldn't just let Kazu-nii go on his own. I didn't want to let him go alone, not again." Her eyes turned downcast. "But it didn't matter...I couldn't go either way."

And I am very glad for that,
Kizmel thought to herself. Kirito would never have forgiven himself if anything had happened to his sister.
It might be hypocritical of me to think so about her, but not him,
the former knight mused,
but in the end, Kirito fully understood what his choice meant, and Leafa did not.

The swordsman's younger sibling had never endured the hardships of Aincrad, never needed to fight for her life and battle with the intent of taking her opponent's – and both he and Kizmel intended to keep it that way.

Midori smiled at the three youngsters. "I'm sure he thought about it, Minetaka. But...maybe just like he's got to get used to being back
here
, we...we also have to get used to the way he's changed. Like it or not, he's been through a lot, and there are some things we might never understand."

She looked back at Kizmel. "But I know one thing about him. Kazuto isn't someone who can just stand aside when he sees someone suffer."

"That's right," Leafa chimed in, "remember how he stood up to those guys that were trying to bully me when I was in elementary school?"

Midori smiled at her daughter's words. "See? And now...he's grown up, Mine-kun. And...I'm incredibly proud of who he's become. I'm proud that my son would selflessly help those in need, and I'm glad that he has friends who he would go to such lengths for. I don't think you're a failure, because he got that from you, and if you failed, then so did I."

"Each of us would do the same for him," Kizmel added. "In fact, your son was not the only one. Ten others came with us – and without them, neither of us would be alive still...many times over."

The swordsman's mother nodded kindly. "See, Mine-kun? Our son wasn't being reckless, or careless. Did he do something incredibly dangerous that I was very upset over when I learned about it? Yes. But at the same time-"

"I know, I know," Minetaka finally sighed, slumping into his seat. He fell silent for a moment, only looking back up at Kirito with a serious gaze after gathering his thoughts. "Okay. So you jumped back into a death game, fought it and cleared it to save your friends. I can...I'm still very much angry at what you did, but your mother is right. I can't
not
be proud of you, and no matter how much I want to ground you for life and forbid you from ever doing anything dangerous ever again...I do get it. I'd do the same for your mother, or for either of you."

He took a few deep, steadying breaths before glancing at Kizmel. "I can see you two are peas in a pod," the swordsman's father muttered, "why couldn't you have picked a nice, calm girl that kept you out of trouble, instead?"

"Because a nice, calm girl that would've kept me out of trouble would've gotten me killed in
SAO
, Dad," Kirito answered honestly. "Kizmel is...Kizmel kept me going when things got to their worst, and she never, ever left my side, no matter how bad it got."

"Yeah, I see that," Minetaka said with a chuckle, "you two almost sound like a married couple."

"Yeah…funny thing that..."

"...something I should know about?"

Kirito coughed nervously, so Kizmel took it upon herself to answer. "We were wed in Aincrad," she told him.

The Kirigaya patriarch spluttered in surprise, before looking at them with wide eyes. "I'm sorry?" He slowly turned towards them. "You're...married. In the game?"

"Well…" the former swordsman scratched his cheek abashedly, but he didn't back down, much to Kizmel's delight. "Kind of. But also...I want to be with her forever, Dad. She's my girlfriend, my partner, and my wife. In every way that matters. Even if it was just in the game, it means something to me."

His father paused, scratching at his cheek in a familiar way. "I...figured she was your girlfriend, Kazuto, but...a
wife
? I mean...that's not even legally binding, is it?"

"Maybe not, but-" Kirito trailed off, wordlessly trying to find the right way to express his feelings.

Kizmel took the opportunity to stand to her full height, before bowing at the waist, hands folded in front of her demurely. "Lord Kirigaya – I know this is not the way things are typically done, but your son and I were wed among our friends in Aincrad. This was not a sudden thing, nor was it done in the spur of the moment. I understand that our marriage and its vows from Aincrad hold little meaning in this world outside of the death game, but they have meaning to
us
. We have sworn an oath to each other, one that we both intend to keep, regardless of whether you accept our intent to honour that oath or not."

She paused for a moment. "And I wish to take this opportunity to inform you that I have every intention of courting your son, and being courted by him in return, with the intention of honouring that marriage and the promise we made to each other at that time."

"She's right, Dad," her husband added, "I love her. And yeah, we were married in a video game, but...does that really matter? I know it doesn't mean much in the real world, but I'd at least like you to know that the feelings I have for her are real. When I thought I'd lost her, I thought my world was going to end, and when she's with me, I feel like I can take on anything."

"That's…" Minetaka paused for a moment, before sighing. "I
was
going to say I think you're too young to make that kind of statement, but that's not really true anymore, is it?"

"Dad-"

The elder Kirigaya shook his head. "It's like your mother said – you did and went through things I don't think we'll ever fully understand. But we at least got an idea of how much this girl – I'm sorry, this
woman
," he corrected himself, "means to you even when you first started telling us about the things that happened to you. To be honest, I was worried at first, but I guess it's not much of a surprise, after all...extraordinary circumstances tend to have that kind of effect."

"So romantic...it's like a fairytale," Midori commented with a grin, only for her husband to shoot her a flat stare.

"This isn't one of your fantasy romance mangas, Midori." But a small smile curled at his lips nevertheless. "But I have to say, I think Kazu's a little scrawny to be the main character of a
shounen
manga, at least the ones I remember."

His comment earned him a playful shove from his wife. "Not everyone can be as buff as those battle-manga characters."

Kizmel smiled at their familiar banter. "I beg to differ – to me, he is the strongest, most noble of knights, even without the shining armour."

"Ha!" Leafa giggled, "honestly, rather than a knight, Kazu-nii tends to look more like that one character from the gaijin movie about humans being stuck inside a computer simulation that Mom likes so much."

"You mean the one played by that actor she had a crush on?" Minetaka grinned, before eyeing his son from the corner of his eye. "I can kinda see it, with him in a black trench coat."

"H-hey! I stopped wearing black," the former swordsman protested, before muttering quietly to himself, "mostly, anyway…"

Minetaka chuckled, turning his attention back towards Kizmel. "Well, you get along well with Suguha, and I know Midori has been talking to you recently, so I'm sure she's read you the riot act already. All I will say on that matter is, I hope you're sure about what you're getting yourself into – both of you. Kazu's old enough to make his own decisions, and we have no real reason to oppose it for now. But for my sanity's sake, let's start out with her being your girlfriend first, okay? Everything else can come afterwards, and we'll figure it out...together." He nodded towards the former elf. "And one day, I do hope that we get to meet in person, and that we can properly welcome you into the family at that time."

"Thanks, Dad," the black-haired boy smiled shyly – an expression that would've been unthinkable on the usually aloof Black Swordsman, although there was a twinkle of mischievousness present that was undeniably inherited from his mother. "And, um...I guess I should tell you what's going on with Kikuoka. There's a reason why things are so secret."

"Wait," his father blinked. "We're
still
not done? There's more? I've only been gone a few months, what on Earth did you get up to?"

Kirito shook his head. "This didn't happen after, Dad. This one's...this one's from
SAO
. I've...I've been keeping it from everyone, including Mom and Sugu until all of this stuff happened. It's got to do with why all of the
ALO
stuff that happened with RECT was so hush-hush."

"But...this is it, right? Is this actually everything?" The swordsman's father grinned half-heartedly. "I'm going to be honest, this is a lot of surprises for one night."

"Yeah. I promise, Dad." Kazuto grimaced, glancing over at Kizmel. "So...about Kizmel's secret…"

Minetaka's gaze returned to her. "Oh, right. You said something about
her
being the government secret that I signed all those NDAs for, or something. I almost forgot about that." He leaned forward heavily. "So...how's that work? Is she some kind of expat, or defector?"

"No, not that," Kirito answered, "she's an AI, Dad."
-------------------------------"...what?""She's not...she's not a human. She's an AI. She lives on my harddrive right now."Suguha watched on in amusement as her father's jaw worked up and down, failing to produce more than that one word. A glance at her mother showed that Midori was just as amused, delicately hiding her mischievous grin behind one hand. I guess this is the better way of telling Dad, she mused. If Kazu-nii had told me flat out that Kizmel wasn't human before I'd ever met her, I'd never have believed him. I knew Mom was up to something.
It was exactly
because
she'd met the AI without knowing what she was at the time, had spent time with her, played
ALO
and watched her walk among the other players just like anyone else without ever being the wiser, that she understood what her brother meant when he said that Kizmel was alive. Looking back, Suguha couldn't find a single time she'd felt anything eerie or artificial about the other woman's presence, and not once had she felt anything unnatural about her interactions with her brother's girlfriend. To her, Kizmel had been just another player, who ended up becoming her friend.

It made her brother's claims that Kizmel was truly sentient, that she was
alive
just like them all the more believable, in a way that Suguha doubted she could have admitted had she known beforehand what the lilac-haired woman truly was.

"I could swear I just heard you tell me that she's not human...Kazuto? That's a joke, right?"

Suguha's brother chuckled nervously. "It's not, Dad. You heard me right. Kizmel is...um," he paused, grimacing as he tried to figure out a way to explain something she bet even he didn't fully understand. "It's a long story. She's a dark elf, and she used to be an NPC from a quest in
SAO
. I've known her since the beta, and when Asuna and I ran into her in the live game after Kayaba trapped us there, we...sort of broke her quest?"

"...I'm going to need a bit more than that," Minetaka said faintly. "Explain. Now, if you please."

And Kazuto did; with the occasional help from Kizmel as the pair recounted their early adventures in
SAO
.

Suguha had heard the story before, twice, actually – when her brother had first started telling them about the two years in the death game after he'd come home from the hospital, and the second time when he'd come clean about Kizmel to her and their mother in the aftermath of the
ALO
affair. But even so, there were things now that he'd not gone into depth at the time, perhaps because the memories and scars were still too fresh, and this was the first time she'd heard about his experience in the game's beta-test – or that he'd encountered her that early on.

I never knew that Kazu-nii and Kizmel both knew each other from way before...or that he felt bad about not being able to save her even in the beta
, she mused with a glance at the holographic image of the woman.
Then again, I probably shouldn't be surprised.

Words he'd spoken to her months ago, when they'd set off to rescue her friends in
Alfheim Online
from an ambush in the game by their Salamander rivals came back to her mind. Back then, even though they'd been in a rush to reach their own friends, Kazuto and Kizmel hadn't hesitated even for a moment to jump in to help her.
It's not just a
game
, not anymore. It's more than that...because we're not just looking at another world on a screen, we're not clicking a mouse or using a controller to move around. Our hands are our own, our voices speak our minds, and we're actually
in
that world.

It had taken her a while to really understand what he'd meant at the time, because even though full-dive offered an unprecedented level of immersion into video games, ultimately, she – like so many others – had looked at it as just a game, a grown-up version of the role-playing they used to do as children.

But it was so much more than that.

Her words were her own, so were her actions...and they had meaning. To herself as well as to those around her, and after the incident, Suguha had begun truly seeing the virtual world of
NewAlfheim Online
as something of a microcosm, a society of its own, where the players lived, fought, and died in whatever way they wished to conduct themselves. Some lived a life of thievery and deceit, others walked the path of honour and responsibility. Some believed in strength above all else, while others yet wielded their swords to protect those who could not protect themselves.

Games like that are probably the only place where all those kinds of people can come together and coexist.

"I do not know why," Kizmel's voice drew Suguha back to the ongoing conversation, "perhaps it was fate, or maybe it was simply sheer luck that I retained memories from the beta test. They were never anything solid, always fleeting, and only when I was at rest, at the very verge of sleep or wakefulness. It wasn't until I met them again, on Aincrad's third floor, when I felt a sense of familiarity with the man who'd saved my life."

"I...don't understand," Minetaka answered, looking between her and Kazuto. "Was it...a glitch, or something? You said that it wasn't supposed to happen, right?"

Suguha's brother shrugged. "A glitch, a bug, call it whatever you want. I don't think we'll ever really find out or know for sure, and it's not like we haven't been trying – that's part of the work that I go to Kikuoka's office for on the weekends sometimes. Hell, I still don't know why the game let us change the quest the way we did. I tried everything during the beta, and nothing worked...honestly, I'd kind of figured I'd lose her again." He shook his head. "Asuna didn't know any of that at the time, I hadn't gotten around to telling her that the quest sequence was scripted, so she went in guns blazing. And, well…"

"They managed to overturn my fate."

Kazuto nodded slowly. "I have a theory that Kayaba probably didn't realize what would happen to the Cardinal system and the game's automation when he started up the death game and locked out core functions. But that still doesn't explain why Kizmel kept some of her memories from the beta. And, well, after all of that, I guess she remembered something when we did meet again...and she lived."

"It was your eyes," the holographic girl answered, smiling gently. "The look of sorrow and loss, as though you knew what fate would befall me – which of course you did at the time. I remembered seeing it over and over as I lay dying, which seemed impossible to me, and yet my dreams returned night after night."

"None of the other NPCs ever showed any kind of similar behaviour, as far as I know," Suguha's brother added. "I mean, it's not like we walked up to every one of them and checked, but…" he shrugged. "At the time, we didn't really know what to make of it, and we just...kind of thought that the quest had gone a bit off the rails, but the system was adapting like it was designed to."

Kizmel took over the story from there, and Suguha perked up – she'd heard a lot about his time in the death game from Kazuto, but it was rare for his girlfriend to broach the subject.

"When the war with our Forest kindred had ended and the threat of the Fallen defeated, I was left...adrift, and without purpose." A bitter smile curled at the older woman's lips. "I suppose, in hindsight, that was to be expected; after all, I had outlived my original purpose, quite literally."

"Kizmel-"

Kazuto cut off, and neither Suguha nor Midori seemed to really know what to say to that, either.
How does it feel to know that you were made to just play out the same event over and over again, and that you're meant to die regardless of how it plays out?
She couldn't even imagine it.

The lilac-haired woman inclined her head. "I did not understand it that way at the time, of course, but it is also the truth. And I am grateful for it, as it left me free to choose my own path, so I chose to follow those who had saved not only me, but also everything I held dear, to follow the friends and dear comrades I had made in those months of battle."

"So that's how you ended up meeting with Kazu-nii again, right?" Suguha said, eager to get to a happier topic.

Kizmel nodded at Suguha's comment. "Yes. I was determined to seek him out and stand by his side as he and Asuna had stood by mine. It took me a while to learn what I could from those we had met during our travels, and longer still to catch up to them, but eventually, I did."

"She was still an NPC at the time, but after a few months...something happened," Kazuto added.

"What's that?"

He smiled wryly at his father's question. "We found the holy grail."

Suguha and her father both just blinked in confusion, but Midori seemed to know what they meant, leaning forward excitedly. "That's from a
gaijin
legend, wasn't it? King Arthur and the knights of the round table?"

The pair of
SAO
survivors exchanged an amused look, a little gesture that Suguha had long since gotten used to between them – though it was something that her parents took note of knowingly. It was no surprise that of all of them, it was the siblings' mother who recognized what they were talking about, considering her love for fantasy and games.

"That's the one," Kazuto confirmed. "Although, it kind of went...a little differently from the original story, at least judging by what Argo told me."

"Oh?"

He shrugged, choosing to ignore his mother's unspoken question, before looking back towards Minetaka. "Anyway, up until that point, Kizmel was still an NPC. Turns out, the entire quest line had gotten altered by Cardinal – by the Cardinal system, for the sole purpose of generating an item for Kizmel to find and use. One that would turn her into an actual player."

"But...why?" The elder Kirigaya frowned. "Sounds like the system had to go out of its way."

"Because Kizmel's existence was causing problems…" Kazuto trailed off, brows furrowed as he tried to find a way of explaining. "See, she was originally supposed to be part of a quest, and she was meant to die. But because she didn't...the game had to pretty much rewrite itself around her, every step of the way."

"And making her a player fixed things?"

Kazuto nodded. "Yeah. At least, from what I understand." He paused, seeing the lack of comprehension on his father's face. "The system
needed
to make her a player, Dad. It needed Kizmel to not be an NPC, because otherwise, things would've gotten more and more unstable."

A haunted look crossed his eyes – Suguha figured there was a story to that, as well, just one of many that he hadn't told them yet for one reason or another, but it wasn't too difficult for her to put two and two together.
It probably had something to do with Kizmel's "sisters,"
she pondered, recalling how he'd pleaded with Strea when the nav-pixie had sacrificed herself. It was only afterwards that she'd learned from her brother that Kizmel considered the two missing AIs her sisters of sorts, or at the very least cousins. But how far or closely related they were didn't really matter.

They were still family.

And she'd lost both of them.

Her eyes wandered over to where the lilac-haired woman sat primly, her back straight and expression neutral, but just like Kazuto, there was a pained expression that briefly drew lines around her eyes.

"I don't think I understand, Kazu," Minetaka said after a while.

"You have to understand what the Cardinal system was made for," he began, "I don't know if it's because he'd always planned to cut
SAO
off from the outside world in the way he did or not, but Kayaba made a system that would be capable of not just sustaining, but also managing the game world without needing outside input."

Their father frowned. "So it was running completely autonomously?"

"Yeah," Kazuto nodded. "Look, the Cardinal system wasn't just for making small balance changes. It was meant to replace human developers and GMs completely. Maintenance, new content, updates, patches, bug-fixes...anything that was related to the stability of the game and even the game-related stuff like quests. All of that was going to be automated. That's how it managed to make new quests on the fly and adjust things based on what the players were doing."

It would've been an incredibly crazy thing to say even just a few years ago, Suguha knew, but even with her slowly growing exposure to games she had heard of the way the Seed had revolutionized game development by automating and accelerating things that would have taken months, if not years otherwise.

"The system wasn't made to accommodate someone like her, Dad," he continued, "because once Kizmel got past the limits of what the game had created for her, it started causing inconsistencies. Errors, ones that it couldn't easily resolve because it would have to rewrite basically the entire world around us for things to make sense to her." He paused for a moment, picking up one of his chopsticks. "Here's an example. I can pick this up and throw it."

"Okay…"

Kazuto glanced towards his girlfriend. "It's a natural thing, to be able to throw something, right? But in
SAO
, there are no ranged weapons. It's a game mechanic that's an artificial limitation to the game. The programmers deliberately made it that way. But unlike magic, it's kind of hard to explain why you can throw a chopstick, a bowl, any item, even a sword...but you can't throw a spear, or an arrow. In fact, the entire world doesn't even know the concept of a javelin or a bow for the most part." He toyed with the utensil in his hand. "But if you picked it up, you'd naturally come to the conclusion that you should be able to throw it, right?"

"That's…" it was their father's turn to furrow his brows. "That makes no sense."

"And that kind of stuff was at the core of Cardinal's problem," Kazuto answered. "You can throw a sword. Why not a spear? Why not an arrow? Why can you
not
do certain things that are logical extensions of something you
are
able to to? Kizmel was starting to think about these things, asking questions that fundamentally have no answer unless you have the kind of outside perspective that we as players do."

"...I can see how that would cause a problem. But how did making her a player solve anything?" Minetaka shook his head and glanced over towards her. "No offense, but wouldn't she still not have understood things, even if she'd somehow not been an NPC?"

"Because you don't have to explain any of that to a player," he said, "the system needed to continuously create a sort of...backstory, to keep explaining and answering the questions Kizmel was asking and getting as she kept learning new things, but eventually, that would've gotten into conflict with what it had established before – like the restriction to melee weapons only, with a few exceptions."

Kazuto cleared his throat before continuing. "Think of it this way – a player avatar is just a shell that we use to interact with the game environment. Yes, we're in the game, but we have knowledge and understanding that it's a game and it has artificial rules and limits."

"Like a user interface."

"Kind of," Suguha's brother nodded, "but an NPC is different. An NPC is actually part of that environment, and they have to conform to all of the things in that environment. So when Kizmel became a player, the system no longer had to worry about making up stuff to satisfy the contradictions that she was finding in game rules that we as players understand are artificial, but that she as part of the system needed to obey."
-------------------------------The amber liquid sloshed around in his glass as Minetaka idly turned it round and round. The fizz had long since evaporated into the air, a testament as to how long he'd been sitting there, lost in thought, after pouring himself one of the rare beers that he allowed himself – it was almost a miracle that there was even any in the house, since he knew his wife didn't really entertain any guests while he was out of the country for business. It wasn't even in the fridge when I was cooking with Kazu earlier, I guess she brought it back with her.
There were times when he marveled at just how well Midori seemed to know him at times.

"It's been a while since I've seen you drinking, Mine-kun," her voice intruded into the silence of the living room as she stepped out of the kitchen. "Not since Suguha was born."

"...yeah." He looked up slowly. "I just felt like having one tonight."

"And yet you haven't even touched it."

"Are the children in bed?" he asked.

If Midori noticed his not-so-subtle attempt at changing the subject, she didn't show or say anything. Instead, his wife settled into a chair across from him with a pair of fresh cans. "Here," she said simply. "And we wouldn't be drinking these if they weren't."

The crack and hiss of a can opening resounded in the living room, and Minetaka finally took his first swig of the cold liquid, its bitter, sparkling taste clearing his palate as much as his mind for a moment. "I missed so much," he finally muttered quietly.

"True," she answered, "but most of this happened after you'd left already. Kazuto was doing fine with his PT, there was no way you could've imagined that anything more was going to happen. Besides, he knows how hard you work, it's not like he's holding it against you."

He shrugged. "But I wasn't here."

"And you couldn't have helped him even if you were," came her answer as Midori took a drink of her own can. "How do you think I feel? I was right here, and I
still
wasn't able to do anything, so what does that make me?"

Minetaka glanced up, a wry smile tugging at his lips. "I don't know if that means we're bad parents, or our son is just extraordinary."

"Extraordinarily gifted at getting himself into trouble, you mean," his wife commented with a giggle. "None of it is his fault, though."

"Yeah, I get that." He let out a sigh, rubbing one hand over his face. "But still...that was a lot to take in."

"Wasn't it?"

Shaking his head, he glanced at Midori from the corner of his eye. "You're pretty composed, all things considered."

"I've had a couple of months to get used to this entire situation. Kizmel's been practically living with us since then." His wife shrugged. "And besides, she and I...we've reached something of an understanding."

"I still can't believe she's an AI. I almost want to believe that all of this is some kind of elaborate prank or something, but…"

"It isn't, though." Midori chuckled wryly. "It's real. Our son came back from two years trapped in a death game with a dark elf for a
wife
, and she's probably the single most advanced piece of software on the entire planet right now."

Minetaka shivered for a moment. "I don't even want to know what would happen if word got out that something like her exists, much less that a sixteen-year-old has it in his possession. But I guess Agent Kikuoka has a plan of some sort. I guess I'll have to find some time to have a word with him about that while I'm here."

"Yeah, no kidding," she shook her head, falling silent for a minute before looking back up. "So, Mine-kun, tell me. What did you think of her?"

He paused, tilting his head at the unexpected question. "I...don't really know. She's polite and from everything I've heard, she's a good person. A little old-fashioned, perhaps, but-"

"Aha," Midori cut him off with a grin. "I guess what Suguha said is true, then."

"Hm?"

"I only met Kizmel after I learned what she was, and what Kazuto had been up to. After that mess with RECT Progress, I mean. And...I'm actually rather ashamed to say this, it took me a long time to even just reach out to her. For the first few months I just kind of tolerated her being there. Honestly, you reacted to him doing another death game, voluntarily no less, a lot better than I did."

"I don't know about that." Minetaka hummed in thought. "I guess...it's because I would've done the same thing. If you'd been in Kizmel's place and you were going? No way I would've let you go alone. If that had been anyone from our family stuck in there – yeah. I don't
like
it, I don't like that he went and did it, but I can understand it. It'd be a little hypocritical of me if I gave him grief for that."

"I guess that's true." his wife chuckled. "Men..."

He simply shrugged, taking another swig from his can. "Kazu said you talked to her."

Midori nodded. "I did, but it was more to see for myself what had gotten our son so wrapped around her finger that he'd do something so risky after having just gotten out of the death game. I'll admit I didn't really cover myself in glory in that one – I, um, I might've hijacked Kazuto's account and NerveGear to log in to talk to her, but in my defense, I kind of needed to see for myself, and at the time there was no other way to get in touch with her. We ended up fairly neutral, but still...I don't think I really acknowledged her existence until I had some time to process everything. But Suguha…"

She shook her head. "Suguha had no such problems. She's practically adopted Kizmel, if you can't tell. Maybe she even looks up to her a little. So when I asked her how she got along so well with her, she told me that she didn't really see Kizmel as an AI or a piece of technology. To our daughter, Kizmel is just a friend she met while playing
ALO
, and who turned out to be her brother's girlfriend, regardless of the circumstances. Somehow, finding out that she's an AI...didn't really change that. Her first impression of her was coming to her rescue in the game, and then she did it again – if anything I think there's a bit of hero-worship going on there, if nothing else."

"So that's why you wanted me to talk to her before Kazuto could tell me about everything."

"Yeah." Midori set her now-empty can down. "I didn't want you to make the same mistake I did. I
thought
I was ready to accept her after that first meeting, but thinking back, there was always something holding me back. Like I was trying to find something artificial about her, something to prove that she wasn't...human. I wanted your first impression to be the right one."
"You sound like you've taken a liking to her."She shrugged. "Why shouldn't I? Like you said, she's polite, she seems to be a good person, and more importantly, she's loyal and she loves our son. As a mother, I don't think I could ask for more.""How about a girlfriend who isn't a digital elf?" he asked, albeit without heat. "Honestly? I have no idea what to do about this. Seems to be a recurring theme ever since…""What about just letting them live their lives?" Midori suggested. "Let them make their own choices and their own mistakes. We'll be there to help them pick up the pieces if things end up going wrong, but they deserve a chance to figure things out for themselves, don't they?"He paused, the can halfway to his mouth before setting it down. "I get what you're saying, but she's still an AI, Midori.""So?""So, she's…" he caught himself before he could finish saying she's not real. Thinking back to the conversation he'd had with the lilac-haired woman via his son's phone and the projector, remembering how she'd laughed at times or been near tears, it was incredibly difficult for him to call her anything but real. There was just something about how she expressed things in ways that weren't words that he had trouble believing were a machine's imitations. Instead, he pivoted his thoughts a little. "She's not going to be able to interact with the real world, Midori. She'll never be able to hold his hand, embrace him, or anything like that. And that's not even mentioning children."
She laughed lightly. "I didn't take you for someone so old-fashioned, Mine-kun."

"I'm not," Minetaka insisted, "but you can't deny that this is extremely unorthodox."

"Funny, I said almost exactly the same thing." Midori idly toyed with her can, spinning it between her hands and causing him to realize that hers was already empty. "But...she makes him happy, and she's clearly happy, too. So...why don't we treat it like a kind of long-distance relationship for now?"

"That's all well and good, but eventually they'll want to have something more," he insisted.

His wife shrugged. "Maybe. Maybe they'll grow out of it. Maybe they won't – either way, it's not like phone and video calls are all the options they have. There's always the VR option…" she giggled. "I know that's not exactly the same, and there won't be any grandchildren coming from that, but at the end of the day, what are you going to do? Tell them they can't be together, after everything?"

"...I guess not."

"So let them figure this out on their own. Who knows what the future will bring. We'll help them along the way if we can, and if either of them ends up looking miserable because of it, we'll step in," she suggested.
Minetaka sighed. "I guess that's all we can do right now. I kind of knew that every time I'd come home from a long trip overseas, I'd be missing out on part of our children's childhood, but I didn't think it'd be that much. It almost feels like I barely know Kazu anymore, after all that's happened."He looked over at his wife. "So, what changed? For you, I mean. You said you were barely tolerating her before, but now you're chatting with her in the mornings and joking with her. I'd almost think she was one of your friends."For a long moment, Midori remained silent; Minetaka knew to let her take her time."Did you know that she's seeing our kids off in the morning?" she finally said. "She wakes up – I mean, I say she wakes up, but does she even sleep? Anyway, she wakes up first thing, and then she waits for Kazuto and Suguha to come down, and she sees them off to school from the kitchen," she told him, tilting her chin to where the projector regularly sat."And she's there for them when they get back home, too." She sighed. "We're both busy and I'm usually home late now that they're both old enough to kind of take care of themselves. But...it's the little things, you know? And then I started getting curious, and started talking to her. I mean, those things aren't something you do if you don't care – and they definitely aren't something a machine does, unless it was programmed as some kind of nanny-bot, and I'm pretty sure that wasn't in her original programming as an NPC.""I see." Minetaka shook his head at her chuckle. "I guess that makes sense.""Maybe you should, too, Mine-kun," she suggested. "Talk to her, I mean. Without all of the stress of having all of that lore-dumped on you. I think it might answer some of the questions I'm sure you have."He gave his wife a strange look while trying to parse what he assumed was a bit of game terminology, before chuckling dryly. "I guess I should at least get to know the woman who's so determined to be part of our family that she would chase our son even across worlds.""That's the spirit," Midori agreed. "Come on, we can't show our children our uncool side, or they'll worry."Minetaka chuckled at his wife's attempt to cheer him up. "So, what did you think about her, since you've spent a fair amount of time talking with her now, anyway?"
"Well," she began, one finger pressed into her cheek, "she's a knight. A real, honest knight, you know! With a code of chivalry and all…"

A snort of laughter threatened to escape his throat.
Midori always did have a thing for fantasy stories about knights and wizards,
the Kirigaya patriarch mused, recalling what his son had told him about his AI girlfriend's history. "I doubt that'll be much use these days," he commented more neutrally. "Last I heard,
knight
wasn't exactly a sought-after category on modern resumes."

"Ah, spoilsport," she waved him off. "You're right, of course, but she's diligent and tenacious. She chased all the way after Kazuto and his friends in
SAO
, and she managed to catch up to him. That can't have been easy, especially if she had no idea what she really was."

That's true
, he mused, trying to imagine himself in the same place. Minetaka didn't have a lot of knowledge about video games, but he put himself back when he'd first set foot overseas on a business trip.
I didn't know anything about the local customs or the way things were done. I barely even spoke the language at the time, much less know how to live there…

Adapting wasn't an easy task – and he could grant that his wife had a point when she called out Kizmel's resilience in that regard. If nothing else, the girl struck him as a survivor; something she'd have to be in order to make it out of the death game while being part of the frontline clearing group.

Midori continued without waiting for him to respond. "She likes reading, by the way."

"Hm?"

"Kizmel. She likes to read. Books. Actual books...well, the virtual replica of books, I guess," she said, "and she's got an entire world's history, knowledge, and culture to catch up on. From what I hear, she loves learning new things and exploring, that's part of the reason why she came after Kazuto. And in a way, she was good for him. From what I hear from her, Kazuto had some...really hard times, trying to come to terms with things that happened or that needed to happen back then."

It was no mystery what she was talking about.

"Is that so?" Minetaka murmured quietly.

Midori nodded somberly. "Yeah. And, I guess, a part of why I'm fond of her is because she helped out son come back to us. That's...no small thing, you know."
"Yeah. You know, I kept wondering if we'll ever really understand what they went through during those two years," he admitted. "We said we'd be there for him, but what can we really do? It's not like we can put ourselves in his shoes. I'm glad he's telling us more about his time in the death game, but other than just saying the words…""Well…" his wife said mischievously, "I think there might be a way. Give me a few days, I'll see what I can rustle up."
-------------------------------

1

Shubun no Hi

– Autumnal Equinox Day, a public holiday in Japan occurring usually between the 22nd and 23

rd

of September. Traditionally celebrated by visiting the graves of family members as well as shrines and temples, viewing

higan-bana

flowers and gardens, or attending shrine festivals.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

September 13th, 2025

Kazuto watched in mild amusement as the girls rushed ahead into Akihabara's streets, drawn by the billboards and merchandise stores that attracted locals and tourists alike, and the rumbling chuckle in his ear told him that Kizmel was observing them with similar mirth through the Augma's camera. He adjusted the glasses-like device, its weight having become a familiar presence over the past months, and a small price to pay for the ability to show her the outside world.

This time, they'd met up with Nijika, Kotone, and Saori at the train station before heading out into Tokyo's famous electronics and anime shopping district, neither of the girls even so much batting an eye at including Kizmel in anything they did as he routed the voice call through to their phones, as well. If anything, they were perhaps even more eager to show her around than he was, and, knowing that Kazuto was bearing the camera and so Kizmel would see everything that he did, they dragged him every which way as they chattered away with Kizmel while he followed at a somewhat more sedate pace behind them.

Not that he minded, even counting their occasional coaxing to hurry up or be left behind.

Too bad Sugu couldn't join us today,
Kazuto mused as he caught up with the girls.
But I guess she's got that ranking exam coming up that she wants to prepare for with her club.

His sister had pouted at the realization that she wouldn't be able to accompany them on what was ostensibly a girls' day out, and he'd had to placate her by promising to take her along the next time he went.
Maybe we should ask Asuna if she wants to join us, too,
he pondered,
we haven't really gotten to get together much since the school term started again.

Part of him had been tense over the last two days, as though he was waiting for the other shoe to drop after finally telling his parents everything. His mother had gotten most of the story before, but there were things that he'd only skimmed over at the time that he'd finally taken the time – and courage – to explain completely, including things he'd kept even from Kikuoka for the most part.

Things like Strea and Yui, and his and Suguha's impression that they were just as alive as Kizmel was.

Things like the fact that Kizmel had lost her family not once, but twice.

His father had listened to their explanation, and things had seemed...okay when he'd headed back to his room, only to log into Haven and spend some time with Kizmel. The talk had opened up old wounds that hadn't so much healed as scarred over, and both of them wanted some time away from everyone else to put themselves back together. The morning after, he'd woken up like any other day, only to come down and find his mother talking to Kizmel while his father looked on silently, a thoughtful expression on his face as he occasionally added a comment of his own.

It sure
seemed
like Minetaka was accepting the fact that Kizmel was a sapient AI at face value, and Kazuto didn't get the impression that he was trying to test or trick her in the way that the specialists that Kikuoka had brought over for testing months earlier had. Yet at the same time, he couldn't help but feel nervous – as much as he felt a weight off his shoulders now that his family knew the whole story, there was a suspicious part of him that was waiting for the other shoe to drop.

But two days later, and it hadn't.

If anything, Kizmel joining the family for meals and occasionally during the day as Minetaka was home for a while had become something of a norm, and if his parents had anything to say about the fact that his wife-slash-girlfriend was a virtual elf, then they didn't let it on beyond the occasional awkwardness when it came to interaction with someone who wasn't actually physically there.

If nothing else, seeing how Kizmel and Suguha were getting along seemed to have put their parents at ease, and his mother especially seemed to like exchanging stories with the former elf from Lyusula – and seeing his wife getting along with her was slowly breaking the ice for Minetaka, as well.

"That's the one, right, Kizmel?" Saori's voice called out.

"Yes," the former elf replied through their phones.

The girls ended up in front of a large store that Kizmel had pointed out and indicated she wanted to look at, and Kazuto followed them through the large sliding door, glad to be out of the crowds that tended to pervade the streets of Akihabara on a Sunday morning. Perhaps because everything was utterly new to her, she seemed to find interest in everything from the disparate architecture of skyscrapers next to traditional shops and houses, to the moving pictures in TVs in electronics stores, to the massive billboards advertising some product or virtual idol's next concert.

One thing was constant even with her time in Aincrad, however; Kizmel loved books. She devoured everything that Carina and Cardinal brought her, even taking suggestions from his mother and sister recently.
Never thought I'd ever get to take her shopping for light novels and manga, though. Ahead of him, Saori and Kotone were arguing about the newest volumes of their favourite manga, while Nijika had buried herself in the idol section of the store. He briefly paused as a popular anime opening played on one of the shop's TVs, covered by a young girl in a light blue dress with flowing silvery-grey hair in what was clearly a virtual avatar while the girls looked around only to find Saori standing nearby, simply looking on with a smile as she chatted with Kizmel.
"I'm surprised you're not rushing in to find the newest
Shounen
edition," the older girl murmured, turning towards him with a grin.

Kazuto shrugged. "I'm...not really into manga?"

"Really?" She gave him a wide-eyed response at that. "I would've thought you'd be into some of the mecha stories, or maybe some of the classic sci-fi, like that old one about the super-dimensional fortress or the space battleship."

"I mean, I watched the shows when I was younger, but I never got much into reading those kinds of stories," he answered absently, while holding up a light novel to the camera so that Kizmel could read the description on the back. "Other kinds of books, sure. But the actual sword-and-sorcery fantasy and sci-fi stuff is kind of more interesting."

"Oya?" Saori grinned. "There's that famous
gaijin
series about a ring, or something. Have you read that one?"

Kazuto chuckled. "I started it, but never actually got to finish it, considering how long it was..that would've made for a really cool game, come to think about it. But there was one I remember pretty well."

"Oh? Do tell," she smiled, putting down the book she'd been leafing through. "I'm always up for good book recommendations."

"I don't remember its name," he said, frowning. "It was years ago, I saw it on the shelf in a bookstore while visiting my grandparents' house."

"What was it about?"

Kazuto hummed in thought – and in the small display of the Augma, he could see Kizmel leaning in curiously, as well. "It was about a guy who'd promised to get a fallen star for the girl he loved. He travels across the divide between the human and fairy worlds to find it, and discovers that it's actually a young woman, a fairy. They travel together while being chased by the witch queen and fall in love, and there's some stuff about his mother being the exiled queen of the fairies, too."

"Sounds interesting. I can see why you'd like it." Saori said with a knowing smile, before looking down and tapping away at her phone, a focused look in her eyes, but a few seconds later a tiny noise of frustration escaped her. "That's a little too vague to pin it down, though."

"Sorry."

She waved him off, pocketing the device. "Don't mind, don't mind. It's-" A chime interrupted her, and the girl pulled out her phone again, blinking in surprise at something she'd read. Looking back up, she giggled.

"Your wife's good," Saori said simply. "Thanks, Kizmel."

"Um...Kizmel?" he glanced at her image in search of an explanation.

"Mother found the title of the book you were describing," the former elf-turned-AI answered with a smile of her own. "I was quite interested in it, and I saw no harm in letting Sachi know, as well."

"Fair point." He chuckled; Kizmel had turned out to be a veritable sponge when it came to knowledge of the real world. And it wasn't just restricted to classroom lessons or science, but books, stories, myths...it was as though she wanted to devour them all, finding parallels to their own journey and to Aincrad's stories in the human legends of old on which the game's fantasy stories had been based.

He especially wasn't going to forget how she'd gone through a chivalric phase when Argo had presented her with a translated copy of
The Once and Future King
, and she'd learned about the Arthurian legend that had been the basis for Aincrad's forty-fifth floor – a place that held special meaning for them both.
It's where she became a player and truly separated herself from being "just" an NPC, after all. Not to mention that place was the first one to recognize her as the one to make the choice.

She'd actually begun to accumulate quite the library of books – everything from textbooks, to guides, to novels and even the odd light novel or manga in her home in Haven. Cardinal had created virtual representations of them for the environment, allowing her to read them normally, rather than on a screen or system window, and while she could've easily gotten those electronic books for free, Kizmel had been insistent that she obtain them the proper way, and used the salary Rath was paying her for those purchases.

Just like she was pointing out one of the light novels he was holding up right now, after a recommendation from Kotone, letting Cardinal record the ISBN and purchase a digital copy.

They spent another two hours following the other girls as they meandered through the store, looking at new releases and merchandise, figurines and even played the odd crane game in an arcade downstairs – something that Kazuto quickly found himself banned at by both Nijika and Saori, on the grounds that he had Cardinal and Kizmel in his ear giving him advice. Kotone, though, ever eager for treasure even outside of her in-game persona, gleefully asked him to run a couple of the machines, citing his preternaturally good luck.

As it turned out, she wasn't entirely wrong – Kazuto didn't know if Cardinal had anything to do with it, or if he'd simply been on a lucky streak, but by the time they left the store, each of the girls carried her favourite prize from one of the machines, ranging from the huge, plush rabbit that Nijika was clutching to herself with a wide grin, to his sister's favourite stuffed fantasy creature, a strange, cannon-laden turtle-like thing that he'd won for her as a souvenir since she couldn't come along.

Kotone, of course, had ended up with the luckiest catch of them all, landing herself a package of three game cartridges, the grand prize for the lottery, while the eldest among them had walked away with an anime figurine of her favourite manga character.

I just wish I could somehow give this to Kizmel
, Kazuto thought as they left, amid a menagerie of envious stares directed at their plunder, and some more hostile ones directed at the sole boy surrounded by three girls that they could see, all of whom looked excited and happy as they left together. Cardinal had offered to create a replica of the prize he'd won for his wife in Haven, and they'd quickly taken her up on that, so the real thing – a figurine based off of a gender-bent King Arthur from a story series bout jumping around important points in human history that Kizmel had taken an interest in – would likely end up on his desk or shelf.

"Where to next?" Nijika asked once they exited back onto Akihabara's busy streets.

"Um, I ordered a couple of parts from an electronics store not far away," Kazuto said, "so I need to pick those up. If you don't feel like it, I'll just meet back up with you guys later."

The brunette pushed her long hair back behind her shoulders. "Nonsense, we all stick together. Besides, it's not that big a detour, right?"

Looking around the group, Kazuto chuckled to himself, wondering why he'd ever even entertained the thought that they'd just let them split up at all. "Sure, it won't take long."

Leading them through the winding streets and the sea of foot-traffic, it didn't take them long to reach a smaller store tucked into the ground floor of a much larger building. Heading through the maze-like lines of shelves, Kazuto quickly found himself at the back counter, pausing ever so often to make sure none of the girls had gotten lost on the way.

Sitting behind the register was a familiar face, one that looked up in surprise when got there.

"Kirito? I mean-"

"Hey, Shivata," the former swordsman greeted his fellow
SAO
survivor with a small wave, just as surprised to see the other man in this place. "Been a while, huh?"

"I thought that was you when I saw the order come in with the name on it," the older man grinned. "Didn't think you were a tinkerer much."

Kazuto shrugged. "I've got incentive to work on a couple of projects now." Tilting his phone, he showed him the screen with Kizmel's end of the video call on it The dark elf gave him a cheery wave even though the phone's speakers often were woefully inadequate for her to respond. "Figured I'd try and put a drone or something together for her to fly around in."

"Ah." Shivata – or rather, the player behind the avatar of the DKB tank – nodded in acknowledgment, tapping two fingers to his forehead in a sloppy salute for a greeting to the former dark elf. "Well, let me go get that box for you, then. I'll be right back."

"Whatcha buying, Kazuto?" Kotone asked from behind, looking around the shelves upon shelves full of electronics parts curiously. "I didn't think you were into remote-controlled stuff."

He turned towards her. "Um, I'm not, not really. But I figured maybe we can figure out something for Kizmel to be a bit more mobile. There's a couple that are wireless with a camera, but they're really expensive."

"Is that why you're trying to build one on your own in the lab after school?" Nijika commented. "I've seen the propeller hubs," she added by way of explanation.

"Yeah. Um, Saori-senpai has been helping me with the coding," he answered, "we basically took a cheap drone apart and I'm trying to build a larger frame with a camera on a gimbal so Kizmel can have a stable view. Then we have to hook up flight controls so she can control it, and-"

Kazuto trailed off with a sheepish chuckle. "Sorry."

"Hey, hey, it's fine," the girl who'd been his fellow swordsman grinned. "We'd all love to have her be around with us."

"Here you go," Shivata interrupted them, returning through the door that led to the back room with a large box. "I think that's everything on the order – you could pretty much build a custom quadcopter with all of this."

"That's the idea," Kazuto told him, reaching out to check the contents. "Yeah, looks like that's everything."

His wife's voice murmured in his ear, and he chuckled. "By the way, Kizmel says hi – and she's asking how you and Liten are doing."

"Ah…" the older man grinned, scratching his chin. "Well, she's focusing on finishing her degree right now. Said she wanted to at least get that done before settling down."

"And you?"

He shrugged. "I'm just working here part-time. Still waiting to hear back from my old workplace, but the way it looks, I may have to give up on that and just start sending out applications again."

Kazuto grimaced; it was an unfortunate reality that for most of the older
SAO
survivors, returning to the real world after two years had been difficult – those who hadn't been fortunate to run their own business like Lind, or who'd had a family member keep it going like Agil, had had a rough time trying to find work again.
Compared to that, the Survivor's School is a walk in the park
, he mused,
even if it's just a thinly veiled excuse to keep an eye on us to make sure we're not mentally unstable.

"Good luck with that," he simply said in return, unsure of what other consolation he could offer – and feeling more than a little guilty that both he and Kizmel were drawing a fairly respectable salary from their work with Rath particularly considering his age and the fact that he was still in school.

Shivata just shrugged with an affable smile. "It's fine, it happens. To be fair, I've also been kinda dragging my feet because I was waiting for her to figure out what she wanted to do, so I can figure out where we'd be moving to, if at all. It's not like we're strapped for money or anything, we get by, so I'm not exactly in a hurry."

"That's good, I guess."

The older man chuckled, before tapping the counter absently, his eyes wandering fondly among the people with him. "Hey, look, Kirito. You did good in there, okay? You, your friends, and Kizmel. You got us all out of there months, maybe even years before we would've gotten back otherwise – if at all. So don't worry about it. This is part of life. I'd rather be here, figuring this out, than still be trapped in
SAO
and looking at losing who knows how many more people before we beat the game."

"...yeah, I guess." Kazuto shook his head. "Sorry, it's just…"

"I know. The damsel's saved, the war's won, and the dragon's slain. You'd think there'd be a happy ending for everyone afterwards, right?" Shivata's chest rumbled with laughter. "Yeah, life doesn't really work that way, unfortunately. It just keeps right on going, whether you like it or not."

"That's...kinda deep."

With one last grin, the former tank from Lind's guild nodded. "Well, yeah. Come on, we're gonna see you guys at the launch event for that new expansion, right?"

That's right,
Kazuto recalled,
Lind did announce a new expansion for
NewALO. "Yeah. It's coming out in three weeks, right?"

"Something like that, yup." Shivata grinned. "Me and Liten got a bit of a boost because he offered to hire us for staff for YMIR, but we turned him down. Took him up on the offer to beta-test the content, though."
-------------------------------
Sometimes, despite slowly growing used to its sights, sounds, and environments that were so different from the worlds she was used to, the human world could be overwhelming. Alfheim and Aincrad both seemed almost primitive in comparison to the technology and machines that pervaded Kirito's world, and it just served as a reminder how much more she had yet to learn. Had Aincrad been a world of magic like Alfheim, Kizmel wondered if she might not have an easier time drawing parallels to the almost magical machinery of the human world, but the such arcana had been long considered lost and myth by the denizens of the floating castle.

The day spent with her husband and friends had been enjoyable enough, though the one thing that struck Kizmel every time she saw the other world through the magical looking glass that was the Augma was just how
busy
it was. There were just so many people, scurrying and rushing about almost like tiny insects, far more than in even the largest cities of Aincrad. Kirito had assured her that there were small villages with no more than twenty or a hundred people in his country, too, but the fact of the matter was that to her, that was the norm, whereas in his world, such small towns were the exception – and a rapidly disappearing one, at that.

Humans, so Argo, Kikuoka, and even Kirito had told her, were creatures of habitual change. Their world, their way of life, their customs – it could be hard to keep old traditions alive, they'd admitted. Everything changed in rapid, seemingly impossible spurts that left the entire world reeling and forever altered. Possibly because of the longevity of the elves or the innately in-transient nature of the steel castle, change, to Kizmel at least, was not something she had been used to until she truly became aware of the world around her.

It could all become a little much for her to take in at times, and so Kizmel longed for someplace familiar where she could simply...rest, and think.

Haven was her retreat, her refuge – but it was also a reminder of her relative solitude. While Cardinal was pleasant company, there was still a difference between her mother's presence and that of other humans, one that the elder AI simply couldn't replicate. And so, at times, Kizmel found herself back in Alfheim, seeking out other people even if it was merely as a reminder that she wasn't alone in the world. Though, this late in the real world, there were only a handful of people logged in, the familiar sounds and feeling of this world served to calm her thoughts.

But even this will change soon enough
, she mused idly, recalling what Lind had told both her and Kirito the last time they had met him.
Until now, Alfheim, just like
Sword Art Online
, was only accessible to those of Kirito's and Lind's homeland, Japan. But soon they will be opening it up to the rest of the world.

It would be a big step, one that would bring with it a lot of change, but one that Lind expected was necessary in order for the game and company to grow and reach the wider world so as not to fall behind the competition that had sprung up with the release of the Seed. Kizmel had dabbled in visiting those other games and worlds that people from other countries had created, sometimes finding herself in familiar themes and placed in utterly and incomprehensibly foreign ones at other times – but in the end, she always returned to Alfheim.

Part of her mourned the loss of the familiarity of this world; no one could predict how it would change, but she expected to hear many more languages around herself, and another part still was excited to meet new people and see how they conducted themselves in this world. Kirito's world was vast, and despite having seen much of it, he'd readily admitted that even his perspective was fairly sheltered when it came to the wider world outside of his own country.

It will make the nights much more busy,
she reckoned; after all, the reason it was so quiet for now was because in her husband's country it was late at night.
I suppose I should enjoy this peace while it still lasts.

Just like she was basking in the quiet rustle of the late-night crowd in the game right now, while violet eyes looked at the effulgent stars overhead.
I know this is not real, and made simply to entertain the players,
the former knight mused to herself,
and yet, it is as beautiful a starry sky as any other I have seen.

The shadow of New Aincrad hung above, a dark shadow that loomed far less forebodingly than the original steel castle had been. It had once seemed unimaginably vast to her, its peak insurmountable, and the thought of exploring it a mere fantasy.

And yet, here she sat in a world that dwarfed even it in sheer scale; Alfheim's towering spires and open skies only made that all the more apparent when compared to the narrow horizon, the thin slices of night sky she was used to seeing from the steel castle's floors.
How small my world used to be. And yet, how vast it appeared at the time…

Kirito's world, of course, was even vaster still. They'd taken mechanical carriages to places that would've taken them days of travel on foot as though it was second nature, and easily met up with Yuna, Nautilus, and even Lind for a late lunch afterwards despite the fact that they had come from far away. Perhaps, she mused, Underworld would one day become just like it, or maybe it would take a path all of its own – but whatever Underworld was meant to be, it was far more than a mere game, if Kikuoka's vision was to be believed.

Time would tell, and Kizmel was looking forward to watching it grow and evolve.

But on the heels of such thoughts also came the realization that the last time she'd sat in Alne like this, looking at night sky as she watched the abnormally quick cycle of the moon in this world and thinking about her place in it, had been with Strea months prior. Where she'd confided her into the dark, lingering doubts about her own place in the brave new world she found herself thrust in – Kizmel never regretted the fact that she'd made that leap of faith to leave Aincrad behind and follow her beloved, but things had happened quickly that she'd found herself flailing in lieu of anything familiar. At the time, her sister's advice had given her the strength and fortitude to move on from her past, so that now Kizmel could look to the future.

Strea always seemed to know just what to say and what I was thinking, even if I didn't fully understand myself.

Perhaps it was the fact that for once, Kizmel was left to her own thoughts in a quiet night, or maybe it was because she and Kirito had finally told her husband's parents the whole story of their journey in Aincrad that she was now thinking not just of Strea, but of Yui, as well.

Her sisters, both of whom were now gone.

Tears welled up unbidden in Kizmel's eyes; blinking to clear them, she found more following as they clouded her vision.
Why...
she wondered,
why now? Why not before, when it was fresh in my memory? Why now, after a happy day with Kirito and our friends?

A small, treacherous part of her mind whispered that it was
because
her days had been happy and fulfilled, and the former elf understood what it meant. She wished her sisters were here with her – not so she was not alone, but so she could share all these sights and wonders with them. Strea's insight, Yui's compassion...they had been two parts of the same whole.
Mother once called those two the best parts of her,
she recalled, and she knew that it was no slight to Kizmel herself. But where Cardinal was the goddess that ruled over Aincrad, aloof and all-seeing by the very nature of her position, Strea and Yui were made to
feel
. For all that their existences had originally been an artificial construct, they were made to be
human
and express themselves, in a way that Cardinal knew she never could.

She missed them dearly, even though they had spent so little time together, and now she grieved for a chance that was now forever lost.

"Kizmel-san? Are you all right?"

The sudden voice from behind her caught the former knight off-guard. Quickly wiping away at her tears, she sprang up, old reflexes causing Kizmel to reach for the saber that hung from her waist – only to find two unfamiliar players standing there.
And yet, they knew my name...
violet eyes narrowed in thought. She recognized neither of them, but that didn't rule out that they were survivors from Aincrad who'd heard of her, or perhaps others from Alfheim that might have seen her in passing.

"I'm sorry...do I know you?" she asked curiously, forcing herself to relax – even if this hadn't been the safe zone of a city, there was no need to fear an ambush or death in this world, after all.

"Sorry, Mine-kun had a bit too much fun customizing his avatar. I suppose it'd be hard to recognize him," the woman said again.

Peering at her more closely, Kizmel found a tall, brunette woman clad in a simple robe trimmed in blue, with knowing, familiar onyx eyes peering back at her and whose appearance didn't differ too much from her real one.

"Lady Midori, Lord Minetaka," she greeted them quietly. "How...how did you find me?"

"We asked Suguha to pop in and check her friends list, and thankfully, she told us this place is available as a starting location nowadays," she answered with an easy-going grin, referring to the player names that Kizmel's awakened swordmasters' sight displayed above their heads, next to their life bars. "Oh, and just Greene and Taka will do while we're here."

The elf-turned-Imp inclined her head, blinking away the extraneous information that was only available to her. "As you wish."

Settling onto the bench next to her, the avatar inhabited by her husband's mother tilted her own head back and looked up at the starry night sky as the first streaks of violet and amber began to streak across it. "So, this is your world, huh? It's not a bad view, honestly."

Kizmel smiled in acknowledgment. "Truly. Though it pales in comparison to those waning moments of Aincrad. It was a dying world – and yet, it had never seemed so beautiful, so alive to me in all the years I experienced there."

"I wish I could've seen it."

Violet eyes lowered.
Perhaps one day, mother can re-create that sight for her in Haven,
she thought to herself. Despite all of the wonders she had seen, everything Kizmel had experienced, that eternally setting sun at the dusk of the steel castle, one that even Haven only managed a pale imitation of, was still one of the most vivid, most memorable experiences of her life.

"So…" Taka asked from behind as he leaned against the back of the bench, his voice a hushed whisper, "were you...alive, then? Before meeting my son, I mean. When you were still an...an NPC."

"I have memories of my life before meeting Kirito and Asuna," the former knight admitted, "and memories of growing up and living in Aincrad. I have memories of an eternal cycle of futile death and battle from the beta test, memories of your son attempting to save me over and over…"

She paused for a moment, still not quite able to wrap her mind around whether or not there truly had been a world
before
. Before Aincrad, before the "game" had started. "Perhaps there was such a life, or perhaps it is all just a memory created at the same time that I was. And yet...does it truly matter? It is our memories and experiences that define who we are, and who we become, regardless of how they came about."

"...you're not wrong there," he admitted quietly. "What's it like? To be, uh, what you are? Do you know and understand that you're a machine, that there's something more beyond his avatar, that it's not your actual body?"

"Mine-kun!" Greene scolded her husband sharply. "That's uncalled for and out of line!"

To his credit, the man looked chastised at the reminder, but the curiousity in his eyes was undimmed – not that Kizmel could fault him for that; it was, after all, a question she herself had wrested with on more than one occasion.
But how to answer him?
she wondered.

"That is quite a difficult question to answer," she finally said, smiling to show that she wasn't offended at his brash question – while at the same time wondering if Kirito had not inherited his occasional unthinking audacity from his father in some way. The Kirigaya men, she'd discovered, were quick to speak their mind first and foremost. "However, if you would permit me, I would like to try."

Receiving a curious, expectant nod in return, the dark elf-turned-Imp collected her thoughts. "Am I aware that I am different from Kirito, Asuna, and yourself?" she started slowly. "Yes, I believe I am. I always have – even in the early days. Of course, the full extent of that difference was not something I could truly understand and appreciate then and even now. But is it really different to think of our difference as human and elven, or human and AI?"

Glancing over at her husband's parents, Kizmel offered a thoughtful smile. "Does it feel...
different
, being what I am? I do not really know, if only because I have no idea how being human feels. I simply am what I am – and I feel just as I imagine Kirito feels that he exists. Perhaps we differ in some ways, but in all that matter, I believe we are the same, he and I."

"I guess I should've expected that," Taka replied.

"But am I aware that I am...more? I am beginning to," Kizmel added. "Perhaps I am different from my mother and my sisters. They were born with the knowledge and understanding of your world and their place within it. Their abilities, their perception, all of that was granted to them from the very beginning. Sometimes I wish they were still here to lend their wisdom, but without it, I am left to learn about all these things and find my place on my own." A small, sad smile curled at her lips. "And in that way, I believe, I am the most like you."

Taka's eyes softened, his curiousity tempered by the melancholy undertone of her voice. "I'm...sorry. I didn't mean to bring up bad memories. What about the rest of your family? Is there anyone other than your sisters?"

"There were four of us that I know of," she answered softly, "our mother, and my two...sisters, of sorts, you could say. Cardinal was the goddess that ruled over Aincrad, the incarnation of everything that governed that world – yet for all of her power there, she, too, was bound inexplicably by the will of its creator."

"The system that runs the game," her husband's father murmured quietly. "So she became self-aware, too?"

Kizmel nodded slowly. "And my siblings, though I do not know if that term is quite adequate. They were created by mother as entities to serve her function of maintaining that world for its players, to observe and tend to the players' needs."

"Mental health counseling programs," Greene supplemented quietly, having heard about them from Kirito before. "Kazuto said they were originally made to interact with players and make sure they were doing okay."

The former Pagoda Knight inclined her head. "That was their role, yes, though they, too, were bound by the sorcerer Kayaba's will. I do not know by which means they broke free of their shackles, but I understand it came at great personal cost. The elder sister, Yui, lost her memories and very nearly her sense of self, while Strea flew into a manic fury attempting to find and safeguard her from a world that wished them both dead. Literally so – Aincrad itself warped and shifted, creating hunters to purge their very existence."

"What happened to them?" Taka asked breathlessly.

Violet eyes closed for a brief moment; she couldn't fault him for his curiousity, they'd only told them that her sisters had perished in Alfheim, giving their lives in order to save their three hundred abducted comrades from Oberon's clutches. "Strea was too far gone to save, and her last act of defiance towards a hostile world was to sacrifice herself to allow us to advance further through the steel castle. Aincrad was tearing itself asunder in its mindless pursuit of these two, and her soul, her...
code
, was being deleted by a system that was destroying entire floors in order to be rid of her. In the end, mother had no choice but to merge her being into that of the sixty-fifth floor's guardian that had been corrupted, in order to give her a last few seconds to say goodbye, and to allow us to clear the floor. She...sacrificed herself, knowing that we would have to kill her in order to advance through."

"That's…" Minetaka's voice broke for a moment, and a sharp gasp escaped his wife. "I'm sorry. What about...what about your other sibling?"

"Yui…" Kizmel shook her head. "I was not present at the time, but Kirito was. From what he told me, at the very moment of Strea's death, her memory returned – and she was inconsolable. Her...her very soul self-destructed, unable to continue living with the grief and sorrow of her sister's loss along with everything else they had endured."

Violet eyes shone with unshed tears as she remembered vividly the expressions of unspoken sorrow in both of her "sisters" – even though they'd never told her directly
why
, Kirito had, in the aftermath. "You must understand, they were made to empathize with the players. They were made to feel alongside them, to be able to understand their joy, their laughter...as well as their sorrow, their grief, their pain and despair. They felt it all, from the very day that the players were first trapped until they finally broke free.
All
of them."

"I can't...I can't even imagine that," Greene murmured, her own eyes hooded. "The emotions of ten thousand people…"

"And yet, their last act was in service of those people they were made to protect," Kizmel smiled mournfully. "Finer knights they could not have been. We may not have known each other much, but I cannot help but be...proud of them."

The pair were silent for a long moment, leaving the former elf to her thoughts, before Greene spoke up again, a pained expression on her face. "That sounds...very human to me."

"Perhaps they were the most human of us all," Kizmel acknowledged with a sorrowful smile of her own. "Fear, sorrow, anger, compassion...I have felt all of them in some measure in my life, but my sisters were emotions made incarnate. Strea used to say it was a part of her job, that she was made to merely imitate those emotions, and yet I think that they would never have been so deeply hurt, were they mere facsimiles of true feelings."

"You have our condolences," Taka told her gently. "So they both died before you cleared the death game? But you said they'd died during the whole Sugou affair, so did they survive somehow?"

Kizmel's eyes turned downcast – as painful as the first "death" of her siblings had been, their second parting had been even more so. "A part of me, as terrible as it sounds, wishes that they had remained gone," she answered in a quiet tone, barely above a whisper. "Perhaps it would've been less cruel to them, after everything they had experienced. But they survived the steel castle's end. Mother worked a miracle I do not quite understand. She somehow, in that one instant between life and death, managed to save their...their souls into items, in the hope that one day, they could be resurrected. Items that Kirito and Asuna carried with them, out of Aincrad, just like I was."

"...oh." Taka's eyes dimmed, the hope in them fading. "You...you don't have to keep going-"

She shook her head. "Strea...Strea came with Kirito when he first logged into Alfheim," she explained. "And Yui went with Asuna. But when we discovered that our comrades were missing, Strea helped us find them – by finding Yui."

A deep, shuddering breath barely managed to keep the quiver from her voice. "Yui...I do not know what became of her. She managed to send a message to us, to cross the barrier between Oberon's facsimile of Aincrad where he was holding our friends prisoner, knowing she could be found out and hunted down. Strea – Strea allowed herself to be consumed in order for us to be sent across that barrier, into battle against Oberon and his guardian."

"From what Kazuto said, she let herself get overwritten by Cardinal in order for them to get system access," Greene added quietly. "Sacrificed herself...
again
, from what it sounded like."

Kizmel nodded, warm liquid cascaded down her cheeks, and it took her a moment to realize that she was crying. "I'm sorry," she said awkwardly, quickly wiping at them, only to find that they wouldn't stop. "I do not know what came over me…"

"I do," Greene answered, the older woman wrapping an arm around her shoulder and pulling Kizmel towards her chest into a hug. "I do," she repeated quietly.

A second pair of arms enclosed them both.

"It's okay to grieve," she said, gently stroking one hand through Kizmel's lilac tresses. "My son's lost enough for me to see when someone hasn't properly let go. But you don't have to fight anymore. You don't have to be strong anymore, and it's okay to let go. It's okay to mourn. It's okay to cry."

"I-" Whatever Kizmel was going to say died abruptly as breath left her lungs and her throat closed up.

Warmth enveloped her all around, and she hadn't felt this safe except in her husband's embrace – or the vague, hazy memory of her father's. Back before the war, before Tilnel's death, when she'd had a family in Lyusula.

"Kazuto is too stubborn to cry," Taka whispered, "it took that boy months before he'd shed a single tear. I don't know if it's because he doesn't trust us to let his guard down around us, or because he's had to be strong for so long that he doesn't know what else to do. Waiting for him to be ready to be helped was the hardest and worst thing we've ever had to do as parents."

For a moment, she was a child, back in Lyusula. The smells of her mother's cooking wafted from the kitchen of their home, her father laughed as he regaled them with stories of knights and beasts. Back in Aincrad, her memories of her past had been hazy and incomplete, and it was only now that she realized that the veil had lifted, and there were things now that Kizmel could remember with almost crystal clarity of her past from before she'd met the swordmasters.

It was...
comforting
.

She had mourned her father's death when he fell in battle, choosing to honour him by becoming the best knight she could be, rising through the ranks of the Pagoda Knights. When Tilnel had died, she had eventually found comfort and closure with Kirito and Asuna, just like she'd adopted those two swordmasters from another world as her own family. They had lost friends and comrades, shed blood and tears along the way, and mourned them all, fighting on in their name.

Kizmel had thought that all of her tears had run their course, that there were none left to shed. But what she'd forgotten, or perhaps never allowed herself to fully acknowledge until now, was the fact that despite all of the comfort she and Kirito had offered to one another, they had never truly, fully, let go of their control, for fear that they wouldn't be able to put themselves back together if they broke down. In the throes of the death game, that was not a luxury they could allow themselves.

And in some ways, even though she trusted her partner with every fibre of her being, both of them had made the decision that
they
had to be the strong one for the other. That they could not allow themselves to fully let themselves go, knowing that the other relied on them, relied on their perceived strength. She knew, unequivocally, that if she
had
, Kirito would not hesitate to help her to pick up the pieces, and yet that was not a burden she wished to put upon his shoulders, not with everything else he was already carrying.

He, she was certain, felt exactly the same way.

But here, now, with his parents who were almost strangers and yet offered the same kind of warm familiarity and affection as the ones from her memories in years long past that may or may not have ever happened, it was far easier to let go. They did not rely on her to protect them, they didn't need her to be strong, didn't need her to be a stalwart, unyielding knight in a world where death was no threat at all. Feelings she'd thought long buried suddenly rushed to the fore like a flood that no dam would stem, a sole thought of her lost sisters the crack that fractured her iron will.

Catharsis
, Argo had once called it.

She opened her mouth, unsure of what she was going to say, but words failed, and the only sound that rose from Kizmel's throat was a keening, mournful wail that echoed in the empty night, its only witness the two people next to her and the twinkling stars above.
-------------------------------The outward calm with which Midori watched the girl in her arms shudder and weep was an iron-willed front that she had cultivated over years of working in a demanding environment, of butting heads with stubborn superiors, and as a parent of two children. And yet it hid a maelstrom of inner turmoil, the sight of Kizmel's tears tugging at her heart strings to the point that she wanted nothing more than to make the other woman's pain go away.Sharing a quick look with her husband across the top of Kizmel's head, she could see that he was beginning to feel the same way; this wasn't what they'd expected to see or experience upon coming here, but at the same time it added just one more piece to the puzzle that was their son's life over the past two years. It gave them a little more insight into the enigmatic woman that had captured Kazuto's heart, and whom he was so adamant to stand beside regardless of the gulf between their literal worlds.A part of Midori resented Kizmel – perhaps unfairly so, she was self-aware enough to admit. But it was hard to divest thinking of this woman, this knight, this warrior from the death game and what it had forced her son to become. Had he never met her, would he still have fought so hard? Would he have bloodied his hands, endured everything he had, if there hadn't been someone by his side to push him along and lend him strength and support?
Yes, he would have
, a treacherous part of her knew. He would've done all of that and come out even more broken if Kizmel hadn't been with him. Or, he could've died any number of times, or the death game might not even have been cleared, leaving them all still trapped within
Sword Art Online
. But a part of her couldn't help the selfish thought that if her son had just given up and waited for other people to clear the death game, maybe he wouldn't have come out of it so...changed.

It was a most uncharitable thought, she knew, and yet, as a mother, it was one she couldn't help.

At the same time, it was clear just how much Kizmel meant to him, and how willing he was to fight the world for her when it would've been so easy to take the path of least resistance. Midori couldn't help but think that the other woman had been right when she'd told her in no uncertain terms that Kazuto had earned the right to choose for himself when they'd first met – and he'd made his choice clear in no uncertain terms. Her son had grown up, been forced to grow up, and while that knowledge brought no small amount of hurt with it, she was also proud of him.

Part of her still couldn't really believe that the woman sitting between them wasn't human. Given time, she could process pretty much anything else Kazuto had told her about his time in Aincrad. Death-defying adventures, she could handle. Life-and-death battles against monsters and murderers alike? Rough, but she could eventually come to terms with. Even him falling in love wasn't entirely out of the picture.

The fact that he'd done so with what amounted to be a miracle right out of science fiction?

That was, admittedly, a bit of a problem. Not in the least because of the sheer...logistics involved in such an undertaking, considering only one of them had a physical body, but also because they'd just gotten Kazuto back, and Midori was afraid that Kizmel would lead him to withdraw into the virtual world to be with her. To the other woman's credit, that hadn't happened and in some ways, Kizmel had even pushed him to spend more time with the family.

Even from everything she'd heard from her son about his time in the death game, it had been thanks to Kizmel's urging and support that he'd accepted who he was and been ready to reconcile with them. All things considered, Midori figured, they had a lot to be thankful to Kizmel for, not the least of which was probably her son's life.

Their first meeting had been a bit of a rocky start, the Kirigaya matriarch wasn't afraid to admit; at the time, she'd been overcome with worry about her son who'd just escaped
another
death game, and her motherly fury had turned against the one person whom she perceived had enticed him to risk his life. On top of that, she'd come fresh off his revelation that Kizmel wasn't human, that she was an AI, and so her mind had played out countless scenarios of fancy chat-bots that somehow tricked him into doing something dangerous.

And even after the two women had made their peace, Midori had felt like she needed to keep an eye on Kizmel, because the whole thing hadn't quite felt real to her just yet. Maybe it was unjustly so, but she couldn't help the wariness she felt when it came to the AI, and thus had kept her distance.

It wasn't until she'd seen how Kizmel interacted with her children that her grudging acceptance and tolerance of the other woman had begun to morph into something more, alongside her always-present interest in the technological miracle that was involved in bringing her into existence in the first place. As Kizmel's presence in the real world grew – first by virtue of acknowledgment by Agent Kikuoka and his research group, then by Kizmel slowly appearing in parts of their lives as she became able to call out from...wherever it was that she spent her time.

Somewhere inside Kazuto's computer, I guess,
Midori thought to herself wryly.

Her curiousity had eventually built up the more she heard about Kizmel, until she'd finally gathered the courage to reach out to her on her own. Minetaka was coming home, and so that was the perfect time for it, as well – both of them were curious about Kizmel, wanting to put their son's faith to the test and perhaps learn more about what he'd gone through in the process.

She'd expected a curt, perhaps even hostile response, given their prior meeting, but to Midori's surprise, Kizmel had seemed to have almost expected her request to get to know her, even if she was nervous about it. And just like last time, she had been struck by how human the other woman sounded – if she hadn't known the truth, she never would've even questioned that there was another human at the end of the call.

It was then that she'd started to question if her approach to Kizmel hadn't been the wrong one.

By now, Midori had somewhat come to accept the fact that Kazuto at the very least had feelings for this woman, and she was willing to give her a chance, no matter how unorthodox their relationship was. The important thing was that her son, who'd seemed wrapped up in his own dark thoughts and memories from the death game, had begun to laugh and smile again – in no small part due to the influence of the two girls closest to him, no doubt.

Still, seeing the woman she'd heard so much about, whom her son had painted as an unshakable, valiant knight who never shied away from danger, who'd been his anchor and support throughout the two years of the death game, breaking down was a surprise she was utterly unprepared for.

Kazuto's right
, was the first thing that had run through her mind as she watched Kizmel's tenuous hold over her emotions slowly unravel as she told them about her siblings.
That's way too human a response to be fake or pretend.

There was simply something utterly genuine about the mewling, shivering girl in her arms that dispelled any notion of her existence being anything
but
real, as real as her husband, her son, and her daughter, and any lingering doubts Midori might have had evaporated. If this was anything to go by, then Strea and Yui had probably been just like her, just as real. It was no wonder their loss cut Kizmel as deeply as the death of her own sister had torn at Midori.

Minetaka, too, seemed to slowly come to the same understanding, his eyes unreadable as he held them both. They'd done this for Kazuto, when he'd finally allowed himself to let go and process everything he'd gone through, it was no wonder that the woman he'd chosen to be by his side was no different.

They could only imagine the sorrow and grief she felt; to have her siblings perish in an ultimate act of self-sacrifice, only to learn that they had by some miracle survived. Midori shivered, trying to imagine how hopeful Kizmel must have been, only to have that torn from her in the most brutal of ways – but that was only the beginning of it. She wondered how Strea and Yui must have felt, imagined what had driven them to do it all over again, for the sake of people they didn't know.

I guess that world of swords really was as full of miracles as Kazuto said.

But it wasn't only her lost sisters that Kizmel was grieving for – or, at least, Midori suspected there was far more to the tears that the AI was shedding right now. It reminded her of her son, and when he'd one day just...stopped, and broken down into tears out of nowhere, long after he'd told them about the worst that had happened to him during his enforced stay in
SAO
.

Looking down at the crying girl in her arms, it didn't take a therapist to realize that none of the survivors had ever really been able to come to grips with everything that had happened to them. The shock, the despair, the death and utter trauma that two years inside of a brutal death game had inflicted upon them...some had handled it better than others. Some hadn't handled it at all, and others still had shoved it so far down into the dark recesses of their minds so they could keep on going that it hadn't really processed until they were far removed from the death game.

Then they get back to the real world, and society threw them right back into the flow,
the Kirigaya matriarch thought grimly. She was certain that some people had managed to get time off to get readjusted to life in the real world, but her son surely hadn't been one of them. Even if the whole affair with RECT Progress's COO and the kidnapped survivors hadn't happened, he still bore a massive, dangerous secret with him, one that he hadn't been able to share with his family until things had come to a head.

After
that
had been sorted out, he'd prepared to go back to school, worked on whatever top-secret research Agent Kikuoka had invited him into involving Kizmel, and life had just...gone on.

Until one day, it had all just become too much.

Just like back then, all she could do was hold Kizmel in her arms as she cried out all of the tears that had never had a chance to flow until now, stroking her head comfortingly, and wait until she was done.

It took a while for Kizmel to slowly gather herself back together – not surprising, given everything that she probably never had a chance to deal with properly, but eventually, the sobs died down to sniffles, and the tears ran their course until there were no more to be shed.

"I apologize for presenting such an unbecoming sight," Kizmel murmured after a while, but Midori noticed that she made no effort to extricate herself from their embrace, having settled into a somewhat comfortable position in between her and Minetaka.

"It's quite all right," the Kirigaya matriarch answered with a kind smile. "I'm actually glad you're comfortable enough around us to be like this. I know we haven't really had the chance to get to know one another, so…"

Kizmel shook her head. "I…" she paused, a wistful smile curling at her lips. "I only ever have felt as safe in Kirito's arms. It has been...a long time since I have had a family other than him and our comrades."

"Well, we're your family now," Minetaka added, spontaneously, earning himself a surprised look from his wife.

"...thank you." The lilac-haired girl sighed, though it sounded a lot lighter than before. "I thought that I had long since shed all the tears I was going to. I mourned for all that we lost, and yet…"

Midori shook her head. "Emotions, and grief in particular, don't work on a schedule. You can't turn them off. Sometimes, something will just remind you of something or someone, and then it'll be as fresh and raw as though it'd just happened." She shrugged. "It's just part of being human."

"Is that so?" Kizmel's smile grew a little.

"It is," she confirmed decisively. "Besides, I don't think it's just grief. You and my son have been running from one crisis to the next, always putting out a fire somewhere, or been caught up in something important. I don't think you ever had the time to just...slow down, calm down, and work things out. Even now, while there's no battles to be fought, you're keeping busy, you're learning about our world, you're working on whatever it is that Agent Kikuoka is doing. There's no shame in admitting that it can be overwhelming at times."

"I...suppose that assessment is not entirely incorrect," Kizmel admitted quietly.

The three of them lapsed into comfortable silence, her eyes settling on a shimmering, purple glow just beyond the bench. "Um...is that normal?" Midori asked after a moment, indicating towards the dome that surrounded them.

Minetaka looked back at her silently, his expression deadpan, as though to point out that
she
was the gamer of the two, so if anyone would know, it would be her. Surprisingly, however, the answer came from Kizmel.

"It is a protective measure that mother and Agent Kikuoka enacted," the girl in her arms explained in a quiet murmur. "Because my existence cannot be revealed to anyone, a barrier will be put into place that prevents anyone from overhearing or recording anything that is said."

A grimace made its way across Midori's face as her husband paled across from her.
I forgot about that!
she wanted to slap her forehead, thanking all those involved silently for having the foresight to put countermeasures in place.
I don't even want to
think
about the amount of trouble we'd be in if we ended up breaking that NDA.

"Um...thanks," Minetaka managed awkwardly, eliciting the first genuine laugh they'd heard from Kizmel that night.

"It is as much for my protection as yours," she told them, wiping away at her face. "I am so used to being around swordmasters – players – who know what I am, that at times, I am at risk of revealing something I shouldn't, as well."

Midori shook her head. "Well, we're glad it's in place. The reason we came here was actually because Mine-kun wanted to meet you in person, and this is about as close as we can get."

"I understand." Kizmel looked up, the girl's violet eyes almost glowing as she sat upright, all traces of vulnerability falling off of her as she seemingly readied herself for battle.

"Actually," Minetaka added, trying to ease her obvious anxiety, "we were kind of hoping to speak with you. Not over the phone, or through that projector of Kazuto's, but face to face, as it were."

She nodded. "Of course. What did you wish to speak about."

"We wanted to ask you a favour," he answered, glancing over at Midori before continuing. "One that only you can fulfill, because Kazuto would never do it."

Kizmel tilted her head curiously. "What is it? If it is within my power, I will do what I can to grant it."

"We want to see Aincrad," Midori said. "I...we want to see that place for ourselves. We want to...we
need
to understand what happened. What he went through, even if only a little bit. And...we'd like to know more about you and how the two of you came to be so important to one another."

She could see the AI-girl ponder the request for a moment, violet eyes closing in thought. "You must know that this world is nothing like the steel castle that held him captive," Kizmel finally replied. "Here, death does not carry the same consequences it did back then, and even the world is somewhat different."

"We know," Minetaka said, "but it's as close as we can get. Please, Kizmel-san. Our son is hurting, and we don't know how to help him deal with it."

Kizmel shook her head. "I don't believe that he is...at least not for the reason you think so."

"I know that he longs for this world, despite everything that's happened," Minetaka answered calmly, a steely glint in his eyes. "I know that between you and this place, he's torn on where he truly belongs. We just...we want to know
why
."

Midori stepped in. "We can't imagine why he would want to return here, Kizmel-san," she added to her husband's pleading, "and we are trying to understand him, why he's still so eager to come back to a place that's done so much damage. We want to know what he sees in this world, what keeps him coming back. What drives him to do what he does, and who he's become."

Kizmel paused for a long moment, sucking in a deep breath as she chose her words. "It will be through the lens of
this
world," she repeated pointedly, "and there is hardly enough time to recall every step of our journey together, both good and bad. Moreover, the higher floors of New Aincrad are not yet open. I can only take you so far."

Midori shook her head. "That's fine. Anything you can tell us will help."

A long sigh escaped the younger woman as she stood up, and a party invitation appeared in front of Midori. "Very well. Follow me, then, and I will tell you what I can."

She led the three of them to a small stone platform in the city, making sure they were all positioned atop it before taking a deep breath and barking out a command.

"Teleport, Town of Beginnings!"

With a whoosh of displaced air and a flash of white, blinding light, the scenery around them changed. Where Alne's town square had been was replaced by another, far grander plaza that looked as though it could easily hold thousands of people. Antique-looking pillars were dotted across the plaza, surrounded by buildings all around while in the distance, two landmarks stood imposing and unmistakable; the closer one, an imposing black castle, while the farther one was a sky-high tower that reached all the way up into the sky.

Looking up above her, Midori caught sight of a slate-grey plate that twinkled with artificial stars, and the horizon, a thin slice of the actual night sky could be seen as crimson and purple slowly crept into the inky blackness as the game's artificial morning rose.

Kizmel turned towards them, taking a few steps backwards as they moved off the platform and out of the way of the few players milling about at this time of night. "This is Aincrad – the world of swords. This is the world of Kirito the Black Swordsman."
-------------------------------
Who was the Black Swordsman?
It was a question Kizmel knew had often been asked, one that didn't really have a singular answer. To many, he was a loner, the infamous solo player who survived at the very front of the clearing group's charge. Someone who didn't play well with teams and preferred to keep his own company, eschewing any sort of companionship, friendships, or guilds out of a perceived selfishness. He was the "beater," someone who held an unfair, innate advantage over others that he refused to share. To others still, he was a symbol, perhaps, just like Asuna the Lightning Flash had been, though the people who viewed him in this way were few and far between, although she knew for certain that to those who sought to harm and kill others in the death game, he was someone to be hated and feared.

The Black Swordsman was many things to many people.

But the more important question, Kizmel felt, that no one except his closest friends had bothered asking, was
who was the man
behind
the Black Swordsman?
If they had, they might've found something far different from the imposing, threatening and arrogant aura Kirito often portrayed in public and around the clearing group. She herself had asked that question many a time, and slowly, over the course of their journey together, unraveled an answer for herself.

To her, he was her partner, an unshakably valiant man who would face down impossible odds to protect his friends and family, who feared loss and failure like any other man and hid that fear behind a mask of bravado and confidence in honed abilities and inimitable skill with a blade. Someone who was at times insecure and self-conscious of his own shortcomings, who felt deeply for those closest to him and yet was afraid to become too attached at the same time. He was her other half, someone who completed her even across the vast gulf between worlds.

But knowing these things for herself and trying to explain them to his parents...that was a different matter altogether.

Kirito the swordsman was, after all, an enigma one had to unravel to understand, and words were sorely inadequate to the task. Kizmel, however, was not one to give up, and she was determined to try...which was why she'd led them here.

There were far too few people willing to get to know the man behind the mask, as it was.

She wasn't sure what her husband's parents were expecting to see or experience, even if the desire to get to know the man their son had become was familiar enough to her. But this version of Aincrad was so different from the one they had once faced that it was difficult to truly allow them to experience what they had felt during their battles in the steel castle – not that the former knight would ever think of inflicting such a thing on them, anyway.

Then let us begin with this…

There was no shortage of places she could take them to, even if they were limited to the steel castle's first twenty-seven floors until YMIR opened up more, that held significance to the young man who'd once borne the mantle of one of the game's most infamous and most powerful players. Kizmel thought only for a moment before making her choice – even though she'd only heard of these events from him later on in their journey.

"To understand the man Kirito has become, you must first know what drives him," Kizmel told Greene and Taka as they followed her into the main plaza of the Town of Beginnings. "You wish to understand what drives him to do the things he does, and how his experiences here have changed him."

"Yes, exactly," Taka answered, looking around awe-struck at the grand plaza and buildings around them – Kizmel remembered that Kirito's father had no experience with this kind of world or even these kinds of games in general, whereas his mother seemed a little more at ease.
"I was not here when it first began," the former dark elf told her companions quietly, "but Kirito told me about that first day. All of the swordmasters were brought here, regardless of where they were at the time, to face a shadowy, cloaked figure hovering above them.""Kayaba," Greene answered in a muted whisper, and Kizmel nodded."Yes. It was here that he declared the beginning of the death game, trapping the ten thousand players within this world. It was here where he unmasked them, turning their avatars into themselves, their life points and bodies into their own."Kizmel closed her eyes for a moment, recalling when the swordsman had told her about this day so long ago. Even through the veil of time, she could hear the desperation in his voice as he remembered the panic that had gripped him back then, surpassed only by the burning desire to survive at all costs. "At the very core of his being, on that day, was fear. Fear of death, fear of the unknown, of the impossible task set ahead of them."Violet eyes opened, a sorrowful look within. "I think it is a very human thing, that fear. We all know fear. Fear of loss, fear of death, fear of responsibility. But it is how we handle that fear which defines us and who we become.""What did he do?"She glanced over at Taka's question. "He...ran." A wry smile curled at her lips, and there was the smallest hint of bitterness. "Why would he not? Imagine being in his place, is it any wonder that he allowed panic to guide his actions?"The man held up his hands defensively. "I wasn't going to say anything. If anything, I'd have been happier if he'd just stayed here and hid the entire time, rather than risking his life.""Perhaps," Kizmel mused, "but I doubt we would be standing here if he had.""You're probably right about that.""This is also the place of one of Kirito's greatest regrets," the former dark elf continued after a moment. "I do not know how much he has told you, but..."Taka grimaced, realization flashing across his eyes. "This was when he left his friend behind, right?"Kizmel inclined her head. "Guildmaster Klein was the first friend he'd made in this world, on that first day." A dark shadow fell across her expression for a moment. "Kirito offered to take him along, but Guildmaster Klein refused. He had other friends here, who were relying on him. Friends he could not leave behind, and that he knew would only slow Kirito down."A sigh escaped the former elf. "Guildmaster Klein eventually sent him away, thanking him for his help thus far, but he would not abandon his friends. Kirito, he...left, without looking back, and he has carried the guilt for this with him ever since.""That's…" Greene cut herself off, one hand clutched across her mouth.Kizmel answered with a wan smile. "No matter how often people tell him that no one blamed him for it, I believe it is that guilt that eventually drove Kirito to never again abandon a friend, no matter how hard he had to fight. Even to the death, if needed."She gave the pair a few minutes to look around; the Town of Beginnings was always an imposing sight, despite the many times Kizmel had been here before. Now, of course, it was vastly different than it had been back then – there was none of the misery or subdued mood that had pervaded the place under the Army's rule, nor was there a quiet desperation of the people who'd given up on escaping this world.Instead, New Aincrad's first city teemed with life as players actively sought to challenge the steel castle, flying up from Alfheim's surface to explore it. The New Aincrad expansion that had brought the steel castle to the world of fairies had seen many changes to it, not the least in the difficulty in conquering it; since it was a death game no longer, players could throw themselves at the pillar guardians with reckless abandon until they succeeded, and with the adjustments made to account for the existence of magic and archery, it was a far cry from the original.But a few marks of that original place still remained, like the main plaza they found themselves in, as well as their next destination. Kizmel led them unerringly through the streets as the sun slowly rose behind them, and it didn't take long until they arrived in front of a set of gleaming, polished black gates."This is Black Iron Palace," she explained, having wanted to take them here before heading out into the fields."So what's the significance of this place?" Greene asked curiously, craning her neck to look up at the imposing structure that had once been a memorial to the fallen as well as the Army's headquarters."As far as Kirito's story is concerned? Nothing too different from any other survivor," Kizmel replied calmly, placing one hand on the gates. "But if you will permit me, there is something I wish to show you here."Greene and Taka shared a quick glance, before nodding. "Sure," her husband's father said, "lead the way."And Kizmel did. One simple push was enough to cause the gate to swing wide open noiselessly; when YMIR had created this version of Aincrad, they had changed Black Iron Palace from a guild-owned area to a communal one, not wanting any one group of players to have control over it. This was not because there was anything of particular value here besides the prestige of holding the castle at the center of the Town of Beginnings, but because Lind and the others wished to keep this place as a memorial to those that had been lost in the death game, and a symbol of renewal and second chances.The centerpiece of this was in the large hall at the back of the castle's ground floor: a large, towering wall hewn from white marble that stood in stark contrast to the black plinth it sat atop of."This is the Monument of Swordsmen," the dark elf muttered, placing one hand atop the names carved into the stone – preciously few when compared to the last time she had seen its predecessor in Aincrad. "Now it records the names of those players who are the first to breach a new floor, but once, it was the Monument of Life, where those who had fallen had their names carved into immortality."She paused, looking at the handful of names that were written on the smooth surface. "Once, there were more than three thousand names here."
Keita, Tetsuo, Sasamaru, Ducker...may you rest in peace.
Violet eyes closed as a shuddering breath wracked her frame, but to Kizmel's surprise, no tears came, nor did the sense of grief and loss that she used to feel every time she visited here. Instead, it was replaced by sorrow, yes, but also a soft melancholy, as though the pain of her friends' deaths had finally passed, leaving behind the joyful memories of times spent with them, their smiles and laughter finally louder in her mind than their death cries.

She looked upon the monument, easily finding the place where their names had once been, bowing her head in respect as she murmured a quick elven prayer.

Turning back around, she found Greene and Taka standing there, hands folded in front of them as they, too, offered a short prayer, much to Kizmel's surprise. Their eyes met hers, and the pair offered a sorrowful smile, before stepping back, giving the elf time and space to pay her own respects to those she had lost – including some whose names were not necessarily recorded on the Monument.

Naijian, Tilnel, father, Strea, Yui...
there were many more, and yet she no longer felt the same weight upon her chest that threatened to rob her of breath the last time she'd stood here.
We are finally free, my friends. We are finally free.

Taking in a deep breath, she spun on her heel, feeling lighter, and stepped down from the plinth. "There is another place here I would like to show you," she told her wards, swiping her fingers through the air to open her inventory and equipping a set of weapons and armour. "Where Kirito's journey as the Black Swordsman began."

-------------------------------

Midori wasn't sure what to expect when Kizmel had said she wanted to take them to a boss. She was aware that this was a game, but she hadn't really expected to be doing much fighting – after all, they'd asked the AI girl to show them around, not run them headlong into monster encounters. The ones in the fields had been easy enough to handle, even with the starter gear they'd been given;
NewAlfheim Online
offered an option to start in Alne as a neutral player, which was how they'd found themselves there and managed to locate Kizmel with the help of their daughter's advice on where the other girl liked to spend her time.

But a boss?

She didn't know what to make of it as they did a literal dungeon crawl through Aincrad's first labyrinth – as a game without levels, the difficulty spike could be incredibly steep at points, she knew. None of that seemed to matter, however, as Kizmel was up ahead, silently striking down any mobs that came their way, the sword in her hand little more than a silver beam of light as she slashed and hacked. Most of the creatures shattered into pixels with only one or two strikes, and their progress was fairly quick. Even to her untrained eye, she could tell that those swings were practiced and natural, as though she'd been fighting all her life.

Which is true in a rather literal way, I guess,
Midori reminded herself, before another realization came unbidden to her mind.

If Kizmel was this good at the game, this strong even in a game without the benefit of levels over her opponents, and Kazuto was, too...then how dangerous must the foes they faced back then have been? How terrifying were the monsters and bosses that the AI was almost casually carving her way through as if they were an afterthought, if they had forced dozens of people to risk – and
lose
– their lives to battle them?

Glancing to the side, she caught her husband's eye; Minetaka wasn't as used to playing games as Midori had been, and he'd never even touched a VR headset, much less a full-dive one, so his first experience with having a snarling monster charge towards them had been instinctual more than anything else. He'd grabbed her and thrown himself to the side, out of the way even before Kizmel's weapon had parted the mob in two. After a while he still looked a little unsure and shaken by having fantastical creatures growling and coming out of the woodwork, but seemed determined to see this through.

After all, compared to this, what their son had faced had been so much worse.

"We're here," their guide's voice announced softly, and Midori found herself standing in front of a large, ornate door that towered above them for at least ten meters, disappearing towards the dark ceiling overhead.

"Where exactly are we?" she asked.

Kizmel's contemplative gaze returned towards them. "This is the chamber of the very first Pillar Guardian of Aincrad. The first boss, the first hurdle to clear in their conquest of the steel castle."

The AI girl gave them a chance to catch their breath – not that they needed to in full-dive, but it was a force of habit, and gave them time to collect their thoughts. The first boss of the death game...it made some sense as to why it would be important for the players, but…

Kazuto did explain he had to step in and save the raid at the time,
Midori recalled,
and that he had to reveal he was a beta tester. But what's that got to do with anything?

Kizmel placed one hand on the door, pushing it open with an echoing creak. "Follow me," she said, "you will be safe, I promise. Remain near the door...or come closer and observe, if you dare. I will not let any harm befall you, you have my word."

The married couple exchanged a quick look, somehow reassured by the promise that carried far more weight than it had any right to, until Midori remembered that Kizmel had once been a knight.
Make-believe, fake history or not,
she
believes it...and that's good enough for now.

She led them down a cavernous room, torches coming to life on either side as they passed. In the back, lit by impossible light coming through stained glass windows, was a hulking figure that stood at least five meters tall even while hunched over.

Her HUD lit up with information as they got closer, HP bars and name tags appearing the moment it awoke with a rumbling, thunderous roar, picking up the giant sword next to it and turning gleaming, violent eyes towards them. Kizmel's voice was but a whisper, but in the almost frightening stillness of the chamber that followed, it was clearly audible.

"This is Ilfang the Kobold Lord."

Before Midori or Minetaka could say anything, Kizmel burst into action, darting towards the gigantic floor boss at a speed not even an Olympic sprinter could match in the real world, the weapon in her hand already glowing as she swung it to intercept.

The two blades met with a keening wail as an orange light wreathed around Kizmel's sword that looked positively tiny in comparison to that of her opponent. Only a second after the clash, a concussive blast rippled through the air accompanied by a brilliant flare of blinding light, and fear leapt into Midori's throat as the wind tore at her clothes, forcing her to shield her eyes.

Intellectually, she knew that this was only a game – she'd played other RPGs and MMOs before, but never in full-dive, her brief stint after setting up Suguha with the AmuSphere notwithstanding. Here, in full-dive, where her hands and body were her own, where monsters were leaping out and she could see and hear and
feel
, finding herself the sole target of a monstrous creature the height of a two-story building caused a sudden terror to well up inside of her.

This
was a boss; more than the simple creatures out in the fields, monsters, plants, and undead of all sorts that she was used to, it had a presence far more terrifying, far more dreadful and intimidating than anything else she'd seen in
NewALO
so far. The clang of steel striking steel echoed around the chamber, bursts of light erupting from the tell-tale discharges of sword skills and sparks flew as Kizmel met the monster's thunderous fury with calm, calculating silence.

Full-dive really does make it different
, an absent part of her mind thought as she desperately latched on, trying to distract her from the absolutely mind-numbing fear that threatened to rob her of control over her avatar.
I
know
this is a game. I
know
this isn't real, and even if I die, I'll respawn. But...seeing it this close, this realistically…

It was a different thing altogether.

Even though she wasn't fighting herself, Midori found her heart pumping, adrenaline rushing through her avatar as she watched the battle unfolding before her with a mixture that was equal parts terror and awe, the answer to her earlier question finally becoming apparent.
This
was the kind of opponent the clearing group had faced, their own fear as much as the monstrous boss in front of them, and she could only imagine how much worse it would have been with the knowledge that their very lives were on the line, staking it all on skills they'd cultivated while quite literally playing a game.

She'd heard a little about this battle from her son, but never the details, only that it had been a close thing, and in the aftermath that he'd been outed as a beta tester, leading to him distancing himself from everyone else. But facing the same fight now, she could tell: this was the crucible in which he'd first been tested.

And he'd
survived
.

Kizmel rushed around, matching her gargantuan opponent blow for blow, diverting or outright stopping the monstrously huge blade with seeming ease. Midori knew that it probably had been nowhere near as effortless for that first group of players – they didn't have the levels, the magic of
ALO
's combat system, nor the equipment, but there was something mesmerizing about watching the AI who had once been a knight of this world take its first boss to task with a controlled viciousness that was entirely at odds with her usually calm and gentle demeanour. It was almost as though they were watching her regress into a more primal, instinct-driven version of herself while battling her opponent with nothing more than honed skill and sharp steel.

Finally, after what seemed like a small eternity, the last of its HP bars emptied out, and for an instant Ilfang the Kobold Lord froze before shattering into colourful pixels.

A long breath left her lungs, one that Midori hadn't been aware that she was holding, and her body sagged in relief almost of its own accord. Meeting the younger woman's violet eyes, she found no sign of pride or triumph for her victory, but rather...contemplation.

It was strange, seeing it, as though she hadn't just battled something twice her size and almost ten times her weight as easily as taking a stroll through a park, but whatever questions they had about why Kizmel had brought them here stopped the moment she started to speak again.

"This battle, as easy as it might have appeared to you, was only the first of many," she said quietly, standing where her opponent had just despawned. "It was the beginning...but it was also here where things almost went wrong."

"Kazu had to save the raid group, right?" Minetaka said. "He said something about it almost going sideways."

Kizmel nodded. "It took them months after their initial imprisonment before they even attempted to battle Ilfang. Most had given up hope of ever clearing the death game by this point, and more than a thousand swordmasters had already lost their life before ever even facing their first Pillar Guardian to the inherent dangers of this world. Their battle against Ilfang might never even have come to pass, had it not been for one player in particular. A gallant man who fashioned himself after a knight, who managed to rally the strongest of those who remained and who had yet the will left to fight. One who knew that this was a battle that
must
be fought, lest they forever remain trapped in this world."

"Kazuto?" Midori could hear the disbelief in her own voice. That sounded nothing like her son.

"No," Kizmel answered with an amused chuckle. "This story begins with a man named Diavel, I'm afraid – but it does end with Kirito."

"Um...before you continue, should we worry about...that thing coming back?" Minetaka asked a little shakily, pointing to where the boss had originally sat.

The AI girl shook her head. "Pillar Guardians will not respawn after having been defeated while the party remains inside of its chamber."

"Ah. Good. Um...that's good."

"Indeed. Although we should probably vacate this area soon, so that others may have a chance to test themselves against him." Again, she chuckled, a mischievous glint in her eyes. "Unless you would like to attempt to best Ilfang, yourselves, first?"

Minetaka sent a panicked look her way, but even Midori shook her head, declining the offer – whether she was serious about it or not. "I think...I think we've seen enough of that particular boss for today, thanks."

"So, about this story, then…" Kazuto's father started.

"Yes...Diavel." Kizmel sheathed her sword and slung her shield back across one shoulder, before turning to lead them towards a stairwell that had been hidden in the back. "I never had the opportunity to meet him, so all I know is from Kirito, Asuna, and Lind. Of those, only Lind knew him for any length of time, as Kirito and Asuna only met him during the meeting to discuss the assault on Ilfang. From what I have heard, he was a charismatic man, beloved by his followers – had things played out differently, perhaps he could have been the one leading the clearing group instead of Heathcliff."

Neither of them missed the dark tone the girl's voice took on at the mention of
that
particular name – and they knew why, having heard about Akihiko Kayaba's alter-ego from Kazuto himself. "So what happened?"

Violet eyes turned towards Minetaka at the question. "Ser Diavel was a leader of men, as much as one can be without an army, I suppose," came the response, "and he did not shy from leading from the front. Under his leadership, the group did battle with Ilfang, and all seemed well, at first."

"Until it wasn't."
That didn't take a genius to figure out,
Midori thought dryly.

"Until it wasn't," Kizmel confirmed gravelly. "I do not know the details, but I have heard from Kirito and Asuna about what happened. Near the end of its life, Ilfang would begin attacking with sword skills, instead of merely swinging its weapon with crushing force – and Diavel, confident in his own knowledge as a beta tester, misjudged the weapon as a one-handed sword, rather than the curved sword that it was, and thus misread his opponent's attack. His leap carried him straight into the path of the beast's blade, and that one strike was all it took."

Bowing her head in regret and sorrow, she looked back at the place where Ilfang had stood before. "It was a misjudgment that cost him his life, in his desire to land the final attack and earn himself the reward for striking the killing blow."

"He got greedy?" Minetaka asked.

Kizmel frowned somewhat. "You must understand – the fortune of striking the final blow on the guardian meant a unique reward, often an item, weapon, or armour of significant power, with enchantments that might not otherwise be created or obtained in Aincrad. No one would turn down the chance at such an item drop."

"She's got a point," Midori interjected, the gamer in her rearing its head. "No player would say no to that, especially not if it could save your life. Items and equipment are incredibly powerful things in games, Mine-kun. Think of the possible advantage being something like getting a gun in a game using swords."

"I see…"

"After Ser Diavel's death, the battle nearly fell apart," the lilac-haired girl continued her story, "fear and panic began to spread. The death of their leader was not just a blow to morale and a reminder of their mortality, but he was also the best-equipped and most powerful of the group...and the one giving the orders."

"Why'd you bring us here, Kizmel-san?" Minetaka finally asked after a moment, looking at her thoughtfully. "This...story is all well and good, but what does this have to do with our son?"

Violet eyes fixated on him, boring into his soul unflinchingly. "Everything," Kizmel answered calmly. "This is the beginning of the beater, of the Black Swordsman."

Taking a deep breath, the AI girl steadied her voice. "Before this battle, so many swordmasters had lost their lives that it was looking all but hopeless. Many had died learning the basic mechanics of the
game
they'd found themselves trapped in, and in that atmosphere, with so many dead, blame fell onto those who held prior knowledge of the way this world worked."

Icy cold suddenly gripped Midori's heart even while her husband blinked in confusion. "The beta testers," she breathed. Her son had told them briefly about some of the persecution he'd faced as a former beta tester, but never really explained how he'd ended up with the moniker of the "beater."

"Yes. There was much hatred and prejudice towards the beta testers, despite the fact that they bore some of the highest casualty rates – in no small part due to their own overconfidence in that selfsame knowledge," Kizmel confirmed. "They were persecuted, sometimes hunted. It had not come to outright blows, however...
yet
."

"So what happened?"
"Seeing the battle fall apart before his eyes, Kirito took charge. He'd spotted the difference between the beta test and the Ilfang that stood before him, shouted out a warning to Ser Diavel moments before he'd charged in, but it was too late. Perhaps it was greed, and Ser Diavel, knowing Kirito was a fellow beta tester, chose to ignore his warning, in the belief that he was vying for the last attack bonus, himself. Whatever the case, Ser Diavel died in Kirito's arms, and his dying words were a plea for Kirito to defeat Ilfang and save the others...save their hope of clearing the death game. When everything threatened to crumble, your son made a choice – to step up, and take charge. Together with Asuna, they rallied the remainder of the players, and eventually defeated the first of the Pillar Guardians. But it was not the battle that was important – it was what came after."
Midori grimaced. "They found out about him being a beta tester, didn't they?"

"They did," the AI girl confirmed. "More than that, none of the others ever knew that Ser Diavel had been a beta tester as well, and so they perceived that Kirito had kept information to himself that could have saved Ser Diavel's life, despite witnessing him do just the opposite. Had it just been that, perhaps little would've come of it, but as it was, tempers were reaching their boiling point, and violence against beta testers threatened to erupt everywhere. They were seen as those who selfishly kept knowledge of the game to themselves in order to reap advantages over the other players, leaving them to die in droves."

"Oh no…"

Kizmel's expression was grim as she nodded. "I was not there to judge the situation myself, but Kirito and Asuna both agreed that it was dangerously volatile. And so...your son took an action that would define his entire existence within the steel castle."

"What did he do?" Minetaka asked in a muted whisper, worry lacing his tone now. "What did he do, Kizmel-san?"

"He could have done many things," she told him, "he could have denied those allegations, or shifted the blame onto Ser Diavel's greed, which made him commit to a strike despite the warning. He could have quietly slipped away, hiding himself from the witch hunt that was sure to follow in the aftermath. He could have simply walked away, regardless of the consequences. But he did none of those things."

Kizmel took a deep breath, violet eyes bright with pride, sorrow, and admiration. "Instead, he stood before them all and declared that
he
was the one who stood above all, even the beta testers. That he had reached places others could only dream of, and that he would keep that knowledge to himself."

"But...but
why
?" Minetaka blinked, and a rock began forming in Midori's gut.

"Because it would direct their anger and hatred towards
him
, instead of others," came the answer that confirmed her fears. "Because it made him the target of their jealousy, envy, and arrogance. More than that, because he declared that he would forever be ahead of them, it was a challenge to them to keep up and beat him to it, one he knew they could not turn down. They would forever chase after the man who was both a beta tester and a cheater in their wounded pride, and in doing so, fulfill Ser Diavel's wish to keep on challenging the steel castle for their freedom."

The edges of Kizmel's lips curled up into a sardonic, predatory smile. "That was the birth of the
beater
, the player who would later be known as the fearsome Black Swordsman."

-------------------------------

"The loss of Ser Diavel caused a fissure in the fledgling clearing group, even though it was a rift they could hardly afford," Kizmel continued the story as they left Zumfut, having teleported there from the second floor's main town. "Those who would gather their courage to challenge the steel castle instead of waiting for salvation would split into two, and into the void left by his passing stepped two of Ser Diavel's most ardent supporters."

"That was the two clearing guilds, right? Kazuto mentioned them never really getting along early on," Greene said.

"The Dragon Knights Brigade and the Aincrad Liberation Squad," the elf-turned-Imp confirmed. "But unlike Ser Diavel, neither of their leaders was willing to compromise their own interpretation of what he would have wanted, and so the two guilds would feud from their very inception, for almost half a year. A feud that Kirito and Asuna were caught in the middle of as both leaders sought to use them as pawns for their own agenda. But that was far from the worst of it – there were other forces at work, those who were trying to destroy the clearing group from within by pitting the two guilds against one another."

Greene frowned in confusion. "That's the thing I don't get. Why? Why would anyone do that?"

"Because sometimes, humans can be real pieces of work." That answer, surprisingly, came from Taka, who had a dark expression on his face. "Isn't there a
gaijin
saying about people just wanting to watch the world set ablaze?"

"But...that's insane," his wife retorted in disbelief. "I mean, I get that kind of behaviour if it's just a game, but this? They'd just end up trapped here, possibly forever-"

"Which was precisely their goal," Kizmel explained, interrupting them quietly. "We did not discover this until later, but there was a group that simply wished to turn that world into their personal playground...a blood-soaked field for them to hunt others at their leisure."

Taka nodded grimly. "People don't always think like you and I. Sometimes they're just being selfish at the exclusion of all else, or they hate something so much they forget all reason. Not everyone looks at the big picture and decides to do what's right for everyone else." He paused, shaking his head. "This group...that's the murderers Kazu was talking about fighting, right? The, uh...the PKers."

"Yes." Kizmel halted for a moment, just long enough to dispatch a wild wolf that appeared out of the forest. "Much of the early months, Kirito would spend training, practicing with Asuna, in preparation for eventually facing them if it came to that. They found those two in particular to be...quite the thorn in their sides," she added with a feral grin.

"Now
that
I can believe," Kirito's father said with a bark of laughter. "Kazu has this tendency to get really obstinate about certain things."

"Yes, yes he does," the former knight agreed with a knowing smile. "But what I meant to say is that their scheming and attempts to interfere with the clearing group's activities more often than not served to put Kirito at odds with one side or the other...and sometimes both. There were other times when it had nearly come to blows between the two guilds, and your son stepped into the middle to halt them both."

She paused, wading through a thicker part of the foliage ahead to check for enemies before beckoning them to follow. "On this floor in particular, there was an incident where both guilds were being played against one another, and it almost came to bloodshed between them, had Kirito not intervened and once again drawn the ire of all parties involved."

The place where Kirito had faced down Morte in his first duel to the death and she and Asuna had stepped in to help defuse the situation between the DKB and ALS wasn't their destination, however. No, Kizmel had someplace else in mind.

"There's something I've been meaning to ask," Taka said a few minutes later. "You keep calling him Kirito, even though you know his real name. Why is that? I know you have no trouble calling other people by their real names, even if they're players."

Kizmel halted for a moment, the question catching her a little off-guard. It took a moment for her to formulate an adequate answer, and when she spoke again, both of her husband's parents were looking expectantly. "Because to me, he has always been Kirito. I have spent nearly two years with the man who is a swordsman and a survivor, and I have gotten to know that person well. Kazuto is simply another facet of him."

"It's his name. His
real
name." Taka took care to stress that fact emphatically.

"I am well aware," she answered flatly, "but does it matter? A name is just a name. It is the person it belongs to who is important, and we get to know that person based on their circumstance. You know Kazuto as your son, I know Kirito the swordsman. They are one and the same, and perhaps depending on where they are, there is more of one than the other in him – perhaps it would be good for all of us to try and understand the parts of him that we are unfamiliar with. Is that not why you are here?"

She stopped walking, turning to look back at them. "I have seen Kirito at his worst. I have watched him question whether he would be accepted upon his return. I have comforted him as he did things no one should ask of another. And throughout it all, I admired the strength in him that allowed him to carry on regardless. Your son is not a fearless hero, for those who do not feel fear are simpletons and idiots. It is those who carry on in spite of that fear that are truly worthy of that title, and I have watched him bury that fear time and again in order to do what he must. That is who Kirito is to me, that is the man I know. It is not the son you know, but they are the same person nevertheless."

It was a moment later that she realized she'd let her temper run away a little, and with a sigh, Kizmel bowed her head. "I apologize for my outburst...you asked me a simple question, and I began to pontificate. I suppose the simple answer is that it is the name I'm used to calling him by, and that name is synonymous with the person he has become."

"It's fine," Taka replied, who shook his head apologetically, expelling a sigh of his own. "I'm sorry for overreacting, too. I forget that for the entire time you've known him, that was his name for you, that this is the only world that you've ever known. It's just...Kazu's our son, you know."

"Besides," Greene added, "you do have a point. None of us know everything about him. Which is exactly why we're here. We want to learn more about the person
you
know him as."

A small smile tugged at the former elf's lips as the tension drained from her shoulders. "Then, perhaps, you will quite like our next destination."

"Oh? Where're you taking us?"

"To see another part of your son's journey, though I admit there is a bit of selfish indulgence in showing you this one." Kizmel brushed aside a hefty branch as the sounds of steel clashing began to reach her ears and led them towards a familiar clearing. "A place where he refused to give up, even in the face of the impossible, for the sake of someone he
knew
was not real at the time, to fight a battle he knew could not be won as ordained by the very existence of the steel castle."

Opening up before them was a small glade, the sounds of battle now unmistakable as two people were engaged in a vicious battle against the undead. Shambling zombies and ashen skeletons encroached upon its center, where two figures stood back to back, their weapons carving gleaming arcs through the air as they tried to fend off the seemingly never-ending stream of attackers.

One of them in particular shared a lot of similarities to Kizmel herself, even though she now bore the colours of the Imps. Gold and purple clashed as the two fought against the eternal tide of skeletons and zombies rushing out of the mists surrounding them until, a few seconds later, they broke apart as if noticing the trio for the first time.

"Swordmasters!" the elf clad in gold and white armour called out, his large two-handed sword resting across his heavily-armoured pauldrons, "we seek your aid!"

His companion, a lithe female elf clad in black and purple and wielding a bow nocked an arrow and took aim at the oncoming horde. "The fate of New Aincrad depends on it! These vile creatures seek to breach the Sanctuary and unleash the last remnants of the ancient magic that supports this world!"

Having said their piece, the two elves resumed their mortal, eternal battle against the minions of the Forsaken, never to strike a decisive blow nor to ever take a fatal wound as they waited for the players to make their choice.

Expectant brown eyes turned towards Kizmel, as both Greene and Taka waited for her to explain why she'd led them here to what looked like the starting point of a quest. The former Pagoda Knight looked at the scene before her with a wistful smile, before letting out a chuckle.

"This used to be the beginning of what the swordmasters called the Elf War campaign," she explained, "a series of quests that would see them siding with either the dark elves or the forest elves vying for control over the keys to the Sanctuary – a holy place to the elves of Aincrad that was said to seal within it the last remnants of magic from the old world, before the Great Separation tore the world asunder. Opening it would either doom or save Aincrad, so the prophecies went…None of that really matters now, but this is where it began. This is where your son changed the fate of both peoples and altered the very story of the steel castle itself." Kizmel trailed off, shaking her head.

"This is where I met Kirito and Asuna for the very first time. This is where your son overcame destiny itself and saved my life."

-------------------------------

Midori blinked, staring up at the ceiling of her home through the slightly tinted visor of the AmuSphere as her awareness slowly faded back in. For a moment, she felt disorientated, having expected to see the sunlit blue sky of New Aincrad above before remembering that she'd just logged out.
That transition is rather abrupt, nothing like waking up at all,
she mused silently as her husband stirred next to her.

He groaned slightly, lifting the device that he'd borrowed from Kazuto off his own head, and glanced over – even in the darkness of the very early morning, she could see the thoughtful look in his eyes.

Not that it wasn't unwarranted; they'd logged into
NewALO
hoping to find Kizmel and talk to the AI girl, trying to get to know her and maybe find out more about what their son had gone through in the two years that he'd been trapped in
Sword Art Online
.

How's that saying go? Be careful what you wish for?

They'd gotten a lot more than they'd bargained for, in the end. Even though only the first quarter of New Aincrad was available right now, Kizmel's tour had still taken the better part of three hours as they passed from locale to locale, and despite the fact that she insisted that she'd only really spent time with their son up until the ninth floor before finally reuniting with him on the twenty-sixth, there had been many stops. A proverbial trip down memory lane accompanied by stories of camping out under the starlight and lighthearted recollections of the trio's adventures.

At least, that was what it sounded like on the surface.

Midori could read between the lines well enough; while it
might
have sounded like a fun time, as someone who'd spent her fair share playing video games and MMOs in her own youth, she understood what Kizmel had only hinted at. The long hours spent grinding in the fields, fighting ever-stronger monsters to level up, the quest for ever-better gear to keep ahead of the curve that threatened to take their lives if they fell even just a little bit behind or got careless.

It was something Minetaka didn't really get until it was spelled out for him, though that wasn't through any fault of his, considering that he'd never really played video games much. A sigh escaped her lips, and she tilted her head back into the pillow.

"You okay?" her husband asked quietly, shifting until Midori could see him on his side facing her through one barely-cracked open eye.

"Yeah," she answered. "Just...that was a lot to take in."

Minetaka nodded slowly. "We heard all of that from Kazu before, but seeing it in person, seeing how...
real
it all looks….that's something else."

"You have no idea," she murmured, giggling at his confused frown. "The AmuSpheres we're using aren't as powerful as the NerveGear. I tried it once, and everything is more…" the Kirigaya matriarch trailed off, unsure of how to explain it.

"It's more...sensitive. You feel more, there's more complexity to everything. Touch, smell, I imagine taste, too. It's just...
more
," she finally said, unable to find the proper words to explain it. "More real, I guess."

A thoughtful hum rumbled in Minetaka's chest. "I can see how it'd be easy to get lost in the belief that a place like that is real."

"I think it's more than that, Mine-kun," she countered gently, knowing what he was getting at. "Video game or not, everything that happened there,
happened
. Just because they happened inside of a video game doesn't make the consequences of those events any less real."

"You're starting to sound like Kazu."

Midori giggled. "Like mother, like son?" She turned her head and fully opened her eyes. "I'm just saying that maybe Kizmel's right. Maybe we shouldn't be looking at Kazuto as the same as he was before. Like it or not, he's gone through a lot. He's not going to be the same."

"I know that." Minetaka blew out a frustrated sigh. "I just…"

She reached out, grasping his hand in hers. "What's really bothering you? It's not what we just saw, is it?"

For a moment, she didn't know if he was going to answer, but just as she opened her mouth to try and coax anything further from him, Minetaka shook his head.

"I just...I wonder if it all isn't going a bit fast, for Kazu," he finally said. "I mean, I can barely wrap my head around the fact that everyone's claiming Kizmel is a real, honest-to-goodness artificial intelligence that by some fluke became sentient. But I can't really deny that, not after talking to her. I mean, I'm probably not the most qualified person to judge whether she's really ready to be considered sentient, but if she
is…
"

He trailed off. "I get that they were partners and watched over each other. I'm glad Kazu had that, and I'm incredibly thankful to Kizmel that she was there for him. But do you think he's really thought this through? Maybe it's just because of the stress of the entire situation, or maybe because of the danger they were in-"

"Mine-kun," Midori shook her head with a quiet whisper, stalling his protests. "I get it. You're afraid that he's infatuated with her, rather than being in love." A grin curled at her lips. "In fact, I remember a certain someone being so worried that he wasn't really
in love
with his crush that he kept humming and hawwing around for
months
before confessing."

"That's-"

"It was adorable," she cut him off with a quiet laugh. "I was skeptical at first, too, you know," Midori said softly, "about this whole relationship thing he claimed to have with Kizmel. He said they were
married
, for heaven's sake! At sixteen! Can you imagine that?"

Minetaka grimaced. "That's what I mean."

"I know. But I watched how they are around each other. And Suguha tells me about it, too, every time she sees them together in the game," Midori told him. "And I can see it in his eyes every time he talks about her, and now that he can it's there even more. It's the same look you used to have while glancing at me when you thought no one was looking back in school."

"Wait, you knew?" her husband almost spluttered.

"Of course I did, silly. You aren't exactly the most subtle of people." This time, Midori did chuckle. "Suguha says they're like an old married couple – that kind of comfort and familiarity isn't something that comes by overnight. And it's not that they're afraid to call each other out on things, either."

"Don't you see, though? Don't you think it's a bit...unnatural for them to be this attached, this quickly?" He shook his head with a sigh. "Look, I'm not saying that what they're feeling isn't genuine. But that doesn't mean it's going to
last
."

That, Midori knew, was the crux of the problem for him – as it had been for her. She'd had time to come to terms with the fact that her son was deeply in love with a woman who didn't exist in the real world, but who nevertheless
did
exist. And even then, there was a part of her that railed at the sheer impossibility of it all, so she wasn't surprised that her husband was having the same problem.

And Minetaka has always been a lot more pragmatic and realistic than me,
she thought to herself.

"I don't know what you want me to say about that," Midori finally answered. "Our son's...grown up, whether we like it or not. Even if whatever relationship he has with Kizmel doesn't last, do we really have the right to tell him that it's wrong? Making mistakes, getting hurt, that's all a part of growing up, dear."

"But that's also what I'm worried about," Minetaka said after a moment. "Don't get me wrong, it's not like I want him to cut her off or stop being friends with her, but think about this in the long term, Midori. They live in literally two different worlds. How is this going to end?"

"I don't know," she told him honestly.

He nodded. "Exactly. Relationships are complicated enough. Even if people have good intentions, sometimes they just don't work out. But in their case, I just can't imagine any other way for this to end except poorly. They can never really be together, Midori. They can never
really
feel the warmth of the other's embrace, or settle down and start a family. It's just not going to be possible."

"I don't know." Humming in thought, she propped her chin up on one hand. "I mean, you've said it yourself, the AmuSphere makes the virtual world almost real, and the NerveGear was even better. Who's to say that in a couple of years, we aren't going to get something even better still? There might be something coming out that will actually blur the lines between the real and virtual worlds, where people can actually
live
in that kind of an environment."

"You mean like the one that's being tested for palliative care right now? I mean…" he shrugged. "I'd still want something more for our son than spend his entire time off in a game. Besides, she's always going to be a top-secret thing, so they can never really be open about being together, or about what she is. Secrets can destroy relationships, Midori, even if they aren't keeping them from one another. I just…" Minetaka sighed in frustration. "I just don't want Kazu
or
Kizmel ending up bitter and unfulfilled. Neither of them deserves that."

"But they also deserve the chance to make their own choices, their own mistakes, don't they?" she retorted quietly. "And if you asked them, I don't know if they wouldn't say they'd rather live with the loss afterwards, than never have tried, considering all they've been through."

Midori had her own reservations, of course, her own worries that mirrored her husband's, but she had seen how Suguha had been right about her brother.

Kazuto was far different in the virtual world of
New Alfheim Online
than he was in the real world with them, far less conflicted and far less diffident, almost as though there he had the answers to all the questions that he was seeking. He was getting there with time, progressively growing more comfortable after his return from the death game, but to see the difference between her son Kazuto and Kirito the swordsman in-game still drove home the point that he wasn't entirely comfortable in his own skin.

Maybe they can work a miracle,
Midori couldn't help but hope.
If nothing else, the one thing I've learned from Kazuto and Kizmel is that they seem rather capable of producing them when it's needed the most.

She just prayed that she was right, and that her son wouldn't pay the price.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

September 23rd, 2025

Kazuto had never really been one to go out of his way to attend the many festivals and occasions that took place throughout the year, and only participated in the most important ones with his family even in years past to appease his very traditional grandparents. Considering the fact that his father was often overseas and in recent years he'd distanced himself from his mother and sister, there had been preciously few opportunities or interest for him to go.

This year was different, however.

Shuubun no Hi

had been a public holiday ever since the Meiji period, celebrating the last day of summer and coming of fall, so even though it had been changed after the war to separate the religious and secular meanings, it was the first time in a long time that Kazuto found himself at a shrine.

I didn't even go for

Matsunouchi

the last few years,

he remembered with a hint of bitterness.

Back then, he'd secluded himself away from his family, refusing to go out with them even for the traditional shrine visit during the New Year's celebrations.

After returning from the death game of

Sword Art Online

and reconnecting with his adoptive parents and sister though, he'd made a conscious effort to do all the things they'd missed out on – in no small part thanks to Kizmel's urging, and Suguha's own receptiveness. And his family had been surprisingly receptive and appreciative of his newfound desire to spend time with them in ways that he'd actively avoided before.

Stepping outside into the crowds dressed in a

jinbei

, a short-sleeved type of jacket and loose shorts, was where he'd drawn the line, though – at least, until both his mother and sister had emerged from their rooms dressed in their traditional summer-patterned kimonos, insisting that he was depriving Kizmel of a cultural experience by not dressing the part. Despite arguing that even if he streamed the event for her, odds were that she wasn't really going to be seeing much of

him

, he'd lost part particular battle and thrown on the traditional clothes.

The visit to the shrine had been accompanied by his mother's running commentary for Kizmel's sake about Japanese traditions for this time of year;

Shuubon no Hi

was a festival dedicated to reconnecting with family and praying for good harvest, which Kazuto noted absently was ironically rather appropriate. The four of them plus one had entered the shrine grounds and offered their prayers, before setting off to enjoy some of the surrounding festivities for the afternoon.

Stalls had been set up near the shrine, catering to the throngs of people coming and going during the autumn equinox, with games and foods and little trinkets ranging from gifts to prayer cards and

omamori

amulets. Kazuto grinned at the sound of Kizmel's soft laughter in his ear as they watched his sister try her hand at catching goldfish, before she challenged him to a shooting contest at another of the stalls, only to find out that their mother easily beat them both.

I didn't know Mom was that good at those,

he mused afterwards as Midori handed a thin piece of plastic molded and painted to look like a black cat to a grimacing Minetaka before gleefully donning her own prize – a white fox mask.

"What is this?" Kizmel murmured in his ear, and Kazuto glanced up at the stall ahead of them that had caught her interest through the video feed.

"Um...I think they sell

ohagi

there."

"

Ohagi

?" she parroted the word.

"Yeah." The four of them stopped to order a handful of the sweet treats, and Kazuto held one up in front of the Augma's camera for the elf to take a good look at before taking a bite and showing her the red bean paste inside its shell of

mochi

. "It's a kind of sweet," he told her. "Um...it's a chewy rice dough filled with jam or bean paste, usually."

"A sweet?" Even without looking at her, he chuckled, knowing that those violet eyes would be lighting up in excitement at the thought of a new, as of yet untasted sweet treat. "Perhaps mother can conjure up something that will taste similar to it…"

He shrugged. "Maybe? I'm not sure how the Seed simulates taste, so…"

Kazuto had never really bothered to figure out how

SAO

and the NerveGear had simulated food and taste for the players, or how the Seed would go about translating the taste of something into the full-dive environment, but he figured it couldn't be easy. Still, he couldn't help but share her enthusiasm at trying something knew, remembering how she and Asuna had made it their mission to try every candy, cake, and otherwise sweet dessert that could be found in Aincrad. Still, as good as

SAO

had been at replicating taste, it had never quite gotten the food's texture right, just like with its water physics, and the smells had never felt quite as real, either.

Of course, it made up for it with otherwise impossible flavour combinations,

he remembered, thinking back fondly to the Fickleberry wine that had been his favourite, or the sweet and somewhat tangy taste of Kizmel's preferred Moontear wine. Considering how painstakingly Akihiko Kayaba had crafted everything else in that world, the image of the programmer sitting in front of a row of test tubes each filled with a different flavour combination for him to try and judge for release suddenly came to mind.

I wonder how many of them he tried, if any, before he settled on what kind of taste things should have.

It took a moment for him to realize that, even though he was thinking of the man who'd trapped and been responsible for the deaths of thousands of players in the death game, he felt no bitterness, no animosity, in the way he would have before.

The family continued through the festival stalls, stopping occasionally for snacks or games, and finally came to a nearby park to take a brief rest, allowing the women in their kimonos to take a breather, while chatting with Kizmel. Even though she wasn't there, Kazuto couldn't help but feel grateful to his family in the way the seemed to be making a conscious effort to include the AI girl in their conversation; before long, however, the time had come for them to head back towards their car, pile in, and drive out of the city and towards the cemetery for the last part of their trip.

It was only once they stepped out of the car that his heart started pounding faster; Kazuto hadn't ever been here before – or, if he had, he'd been far too young to remember – after his parents had died.

"Kirito?" Kizmel's voice murmured in his ear from the Augma headset, warm and comforting. His hands suddenly started trembling as he took a hesitant step under the worried gazes of his family.

"I'm...I'm fine, Kizmel," he answered, throat suddenly parched. "Just…"

His father glanced towards the cemetery and back at him. "It's been a while since we've been here, hasn't it?"

Midori nodded, reaching back into the car to retrieve the bouquet of white roses they had picked up, along with the red spider lilies that Suguha had picked out at one of the stalls near the shrine. When he'd asked his mother about the odd choice of flowers, she'd smiled wistfully and answered that they'd been her sister's – Kazuto's birth mother's – favourite flowers.

"In the language of flowers, they symbolize hope and renewal, something my sister – your mother, Kazuto – believed in deeply. She was always an optimist, always hopeful, always moving forward with what she believed in,"

his mother had told him.

That's...somehow fitting. A new beginning, a new start towards a life goal.

They made the journey through the cemetery in contemplative silence, but once they arrived in front of a family marker, he found that to his surprise, despite feeling like he was wound tight as a spring, his hands were mercifully unclenched. Tending to the grave quietly, the four of them made short work of the few weeds that had grown nearby and brushed dust and dirt off the stone, before laying down their flowers and lighting the incense. Only when they stepped back to offer their prayers did Kazuto allow himself to truly take a look at the words carved there.

Aoi and Yukito Narusaka d. November 12, 2009.

Beloved parents, sister, son, and daughter.

I...I don't know what to do,

Kazuto admitted to himself, now that he stood here, trying to find something to say or think towards the grave and spirits of his birth parents.

I don't know what to say.

These were his parents who had given birth to him, and sudden guilt welled up inside when he realized he had only the faintest of memories of them. A hint of a smell from his mother's favourite perfume, or the soft, rumbling laugh of his father...but every time he tried to reach out and grasp those memories, they slipped away like shifting sands flowing through his clenched fingers.

I don't even remember them. What do I-

His vision blurred and it took him a moment to realize that he was crying.

Mom...Dad...

Neither words nor sound escaped his throat beyond a strangled, choked cry as the tears prickled at his eyes. The world around him faded away, colour bleaching out until everything was grey and dull as the feeling of guilt threatened to swallow him whole. He didn't feel the warmth of his adoptive parents' hands on his shoulders, didn't feel Suguha's arms wrapping around him from behind.

Through that darkness came Kizmel's voice, quiet and faint as though far away, but in the unnatural stillness conjured by his mind, her words were like a siren's song, a beacon drawing him ever closer. Clinging to them desperately like a lifeline in the dark, he let them wash over him, pulling him forward. "

Emared o'si, emared o'su, Sehanine e lvae aravae…

"

The words were foreign, the language entirely alien to this world, he knew – Kizmel's native language, that of the elves of Aincrad, didn't exist except as a figment of Kayaba's imagination, and yet it had a gentle, soothing quality to it that calmed his mind and eased his racing heart. Its melodious tones felt more like song than speech, and there was a rhythm to it that was absent in any Earthen tongue. He didn't need to understand the words she was speaking, their meaning transcending such feeble barriers as language as she recited them quietly, reverently, only to repeat them in Japanese.

He latched on desperately, like a drowning man onto a raft, and echoed them in a murmured whisper.

"

Honoured father, honoured mother of my beloved, may you walk in Sehanine's light unto the eternal fields of Elysium. Gods of the realm, guide their feet, calm their souls and lead them to their rest. May their blessings and those of your ancestors shine upon you forevermore.

"

She paused, and he could almost imagine her rising from where she had knelt, a small, gentle smile on her face. "We cannot choose how we come into this world, but we can choose what to do with our lives. I may not have known them, but I believe that they cared deeply for you, and I know they would be very proud of the man you have become, Kazuto. As I am, as your family is."

He sucked in a sharp, deep breath, and suddenly the world fell back into focus as he leaned on the indomitable strength of the woman who'd been by his side throughout the worst times of his life. Feeling and warmth returned along with the gentle sound of Kizmel's voice as the darkness that had threatened to consume him washed away. His sister's arms were wrapped around his waist, her face pressed against his back. Midori and Minetaka stood on either side of him, their heads bowed in a silent prayer of their own, but their hands had grasped his.

And Kizmel stood ever by his side, implacable and unyielding and

strong

.

Mom...Dad,

he started hesitantly, mulling the words over in his mind,

I'm sorry I never got to know you. I wish...I wish you could've been here, I wish you could've met Kizmel, I wish I could've been with you. I'm sorry that it took me so long to come here and say goodbye.

He halted, realizing that his family's eyes were on him as his lips formed silent, unspoken words, but pressed on.

I'm...Midori and Minetaka raised me. They've done their best, and I'm trying to make up for the past few years, so I hope you'll forgive me if I call them Mom and Dad, too. I wish…

Kazuto trailed off. What

did

he wish for? A second chance? A world in which they'd never died?

A different lifetime, perhaps. Still, part of him knew that had his parents survived, his life would've turned out far differently – and a selfish part of him admitted that he wouldn't trade where he was right now for anything else in the world.

I wish you could be here.

There was, of course, no answer to his silent wish. It was an impossibility, after all, but he felt the warmth of his family surrounding him nevertheless, and a weight he hadn't even know was there lifted from his shoulders – one that, Kazuto belatedly realized, had been present ever since he'd learned that he was adopted.

"You all right, Kazu?" His father's voice brought him out of his reverie, and he glanced up and to his left, blinking away the last of the tears. "I'm sorry we never told you or took you here."

"Yeah...yeah, I think I am," he answered. "I...was really little when they died, wasn't I?"

Minetaka nodded. "Yeah. You were barely a year old."

Kazuto fell silent for a moment, before deciding to risk asking the one question that had been burning in the back of his mind ever since he'd found out. "Why...why'd you decide to adopt me, then?" As soon as he'd voiced it, he almost bit his tongue, wondering if he'd crossed some kind of line with that.

To his surprise, though, his adoptive father wasn't upset, and instead laughed fondly, glancing over at where his mother and sister were kneeling in front of the grave, arranging the flowers they had brought in a vase. "Midori would've never let her sister's child grow up unloved or in a foster home. Back then, we hadn't had Suguha yet, and she took you in like you were her own. If she hadn't decided to take you in, I would have suggested it. Yeah, you were only a year old at the time, but you were already part of our family, Kazu."

"And family sticks together," the boy who'd been a swordsman mumbled.

"That's right." Minetaka grinned. "Besides, it would've been impossible to tear Midori away from you, considering how she was falling all over herself to spoil you."

"I have the baby pictures to prove it!" the Kirigaya matriarch added from his other side. "You were the

cutest

little thing, Kazuto. Almost as cute as Sugu when she was born later."

"Mom!" the two children echoed in mortification, before sharing a look and chuckling awkwardly.

Kazuto blinked for a moment, realizing that he'd never really heard them talk much about his birth parents even after they knew that he'd found out, and another pang of guilt went through him.

Mom...Midori…was probably hurting just as much. She'd lost her sister, and she couldn't ever even talk about it without fear of me finding out that I was adopted before.

Another idea came to him, one that caused a smile to tug at his lips. "Um...I don't really remember anything about them. So...could you and Mom tell me about them sometime?"

A broad smile spread across Minetaka's face, and the hand on his shoulder squeezed reassuringly. "Sure thing, Kazu."

-------------------------------

Ever since being introduced to her husband's father it had become customary for Kizmel to be included in the family's dinner; even though the former dark elf couldn't be there in person to eat with them, she could still be present and share the time she spent with them. It had been quite the surprise to her when Midori had first extended the invitation, and Kizmel had looked through the device Kirito called a projector that had been moved towards the dinner table to find a seat prepared for her there, among the family, next to her husband.

Today was no different, and even though they had parted ways after returning to the Kirigaya family's home, Kizmel had answered the usual call that came when dinnertime came around, finding her surroundings change to the image captured by the device while her own likeness was transported into Kirito's world to appear there atop the chair that had become "hers."

She found herself sitting at the by now familiar table in the Kirigayas' living room, just as the family was in the process of settling down.

"Hello, Kizmel," Midori greeted her, a friendly smile on the Kirigaya matriach's lips. "I'm glad you could join us tonight."

"Of course," the former knight of Lyusula nodded amicably, tilting her head in greeting despite the fact that she'd last seen them just mere hours before. "I'm grateful that you would have me with you this night, as well."

The older woman laughed as she sat down. "You're quite welcome. So, what did you think of your first Japanese festival?"

"It was quite colourful and lively," Kizmel answered honestly. "And seemed very...traditional? It is quite different from everything else that your son has shown me about your world, in many ways."

"These days, it's not often we get to wear traditional garb and attend occasions where things are a little less...modern," Midori said, "so we like taking every opportunity we can. Some traditions are well worth keeping alive, even if they might seem outdated, and sometimes it's not a bad thing to go back to simpler times."

"Absolutely," the former knight agreed with a fond smile at her husband. "There are quite a few traditions that bear maintaining, even though their time has long since past."

"Speaking from experience, eh, Kizmel?" Leafa grinned teasingly. "I bet you and Kazu-nii have a

whole lot

of your own traditions, huh?"

Despite the fact that the former swordsman ducked his head in embarrassment, a healthy crimson flush darkening his cheeks, Kizmel merely smiled and did not rise to the bait on account of her husband's parents being present. "Of course. As well as with Asuna, Rain, Philia, and the others. Most of them to celebrate our victories, or for good luck before battle."

"Oh." If she was disappointed, it didn't show, and the player behind the speedy blonde Sylph merely smiled genially.

Conversation was light around the table as the family ate, and though Kizmel wished she could partake of the meal in person, for right now it was enough that she was there with them. Midori and Minetaka both took turns speaking of Kirito's birth parents as they had promised him earlier, and the Kirigaya matriach in particular regaled them with stories of her and her sister's youth from a generation past.

Smiling fondly as she listened, Kizmel kept a watchful eye over her beloved as he listened intently, soaking up every morsel about the family he'd never known. It would also be, so she learned, the last night that Minetaka would be home for quite some time, as he had to return overseas to another country to resume his work the following afternoon. From the reluctantly accepting expressions on the children's faces it was a regular occurrence, but that didn't make the parting between them any easier – and so, the former dark elf did her best to leave the evening to them to spend as much time with their father as they could.

On this occasion, Midori even brought out a board game, and Kizmel was surprised that the family included her in it, despite the fact that she could not throw the dice nor move her piece, herself. Kirito did in her stead while Cardinal helped by creating a facsimile of the game's board for Kizmel to view in Haven, leading to playful protests by his sister that they were colluding with one another...not that Leafa was entirely wrong.

Warmth, laughter, and peace – it was something Kizmel couldn't ever remember feeling ever since the beginning of the war with the Forest Elves, and even though the other members of their party as well as Asuna and the others were dear friends to her, their situation had meant they could only ever grasp a fleeting glimpse of this kind of peaceful, familial togetherness.

In Aincrad, their lives had depended on being able to count on one another, and those bonds, forged in battle and fire, were strong and nigh unbreakable...but they were still different from the familial bonds of parents to their children, or siblings. They had been forged in a brutal, unforgiving crucible set against the backdrop of their fight against a vicious foe and a deadly trap, and any measure of peace they found was always with the knowledge in their minds that they might not see another day. For the first time in as long as she could recall, looking from the laughing Suguha to the smiling parents, Kizmel truly felt as though she

belonged

, even if just for this night, in this world far away from her own. There was no desire in her to pick up her shield nor to find a duty to devote herself to, there was no burning drive within her to find a purpose for her life beyond just being

here

, in this moment, with the family around her...and Kizmel was determined to savour that peace for however long it would last.

It wasn't until later that night, after dinner had been cleared from the table and Kirito and Leafa had grudgingly agreed to go to bed, that Minetaka and Midori turned towards her as the pair remained at the dining table. It was the family patriarch who broke the comfortable silence that remained between them.

With a long sigh, he rubbed his hand across his face, earning him a comforting pat on the back by his wife – something that caused Kizmel to perk up in worry. "Lord Kirigaya? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," he uttered, sounding rather like his son, before Minetaka chuckled wryly. "Just tired. Tomorrow's going to be a long flight."

"Then you should rest."

He nodded. "I will, in a bit. But there's something I want to take care of before I leave." Kirito's father sat up straight, causing Kizmel to unconsciously mirror his action, straightening her back and squaring her shoulders as instinct told her that this would be a rather serious topic. "May I be completely honest with you, Kizmel-san?"

"Of course." The lilac-haired knight briefly wondered what it was that he wished to talk about – though she could take a guess easily enough, considering how the family had spent the last two weeks taking her in and including her in their daily lives.

Minetaka took a moment to gather his thoughts, looking surprisingly much like his son as he did, before speaking up again. "I have to admit, when Kazuto told me that the girl he was seeing, whom he'd told us so much about, was an AI...my first thought was that he was insane. Not in a bad way, but I thought that perhaps he'd been through so much in the death game that he'd...imagined you, maybe. To cope, or to deal with everything – that perhaps he was wishing for things that might not really be there."

He shrugged. "I'll be the last person to claim to be an expert on trauma and fear and what it can do to a person, but I guess there's a reason why Midori introduced you the way she did. It's...really hard to deny that you're not a figment of anyone's imagination after spending a bit of time with you. Honestly, it's still really hard to believe that there isn't a human sitting behind your avatar, but considering even the government is involved, there's no getting around the fact that you're here, you exist, and you are, for lack of any evidence to the contrary,

alive

."

Kizmel listened silently, violet eyes watching the man as he gathered his thoughts and spoke his worries; she could tell this wasn't a common occurrence for him – much like Kirito, he struck her as a person who kept his fears and doubts close to his heart, sharing them only with those closest to him.

Like father, like son

, the erstwhile knight mused absently.

"So, having accepted that you're here to stay, I'll admit that the last two weeks were as much a test as they were to get to know you," he continued, "because I wanted to know who the woman was that my son was courting. I wanted to know if there was more to you than just who you were in the death game, sentient and alive or not. I hope you'll forgive me for that small deception, but it really is nothing different than we would do with any other woman that Kazuto might have chosen."

She nodded slowly, not offended in the least. "And what was the result of your test?"

"I don't know," Minetaka's bark of laughter contained a hint of bitterness. "If you were flesh and blood, I'd be delighted to have Kazu courting a woman like you, and to have you as part of the family." He shook his head. "But...you have to realize that there's more to it than the two of you just getting along well. There's problems that I don't know if either of you have really, truly considered."

Violet eyes narrowed in comprehension. "Because I am not human."

"That's right." Minetaka sighed tiredly. "With you being...well, what you are, surely you must understand how difficult any kind of relationship is going to be with someone who, for all intents and purposes, can never physically be with you."

Kizmel nodded slowly. "I am aware."

"And you choose to pursue this relationship anyway? Why?"

"Because I love him," she answered simply. "Because as long as he is happy having me by his side, that is where I will do everything in my power to be. The gulf between worlds matters little to me – as it does to him."

A sardonic laugh rumbled from Minetaka's chest. "I can see that you actually mean that. Look, Midori's willing to give you a chance, so in deference to her, I'm willing to do so, as well. But I'm not going to lie to you and tell you I'm fine with it – because I'm not, not really. I don't want either of you charging into something you don't understand or haven't thought through, only to end up hurt. Neither of you deserve that, and I like and respect you and what you've done for our son enough that I would be remiss if I didn't try to at least warn you."

Kizmel hummed in thought, before folding her own hands in front of her. "With all due respect, Lord Kirigaya – may I speak freely?"

"Sure." He blinked at her sudden formal tone.

She took a deep breath to compose her own thoughts on the matter – it wasn't as though she didn't sympathize with his concerns, but..."Kirito...pardon me, Kazuto, may be your son, but he is also a man. I understand your worries, but have you not considered that he might well have thought of these selfsame things, as well? That he has considered carefully the consequences of his actions and choices?" Kizmel raised her head to look between her husband's parents.

"I know it may be difficult to understand, but your son is a man who has had to make many difficult choices. He has often chosen to sacrifice his own comfort, well-being, or peace for the sake of others or the greater good. He has made choices that will haunt him for the rest of his life, and he has always shouldered the consequences that resulted from his decisions without fail or protest. In this, too, he has made his decision, and for as long as he'll have me by his side, that is where I will do anything in my power to remain – because his choices for the past two years in Aincrad have cost him so much, that I will do anything to ensure that

this

choice will give him happiness."

Her piece said, Kizmel lowered her eyes, wondering if she had not perhaps said too much.

I have only known Lord Minetaka for less than two weeks, and Lady Midori just barely longer than that,

she thought to herself,

and I cannot claim to know them at all. But I know Kirito.

To her surprise, the next sound she heard was Midori's clear laughter. The Kirigaya matriach chuckled mirthfully, looking over at her husband with a wry grin.

"What'd I tell you? Straightforward as an arrow. Just like Kazuto told us she was. And she's got a point, you know, Mine-kun."

Even Minetaka was shaking his head in wry amusement. "You really do care for him a lot, don't you?"

"With every fibre of my being, and every last bit of my soul," Kizmel answered honestly. "Were he to decide that he is unhappy with me by his side, I would gladly step aside, regardless of the pain it would cause me – because he deserves to be happy, and he deserves to make his own choices."

"You know...that's only now really starting to sink in," Kirito's father replied with a heavy sigh. "I knew he'd made some incredibly difficult choices, especially when he...when it came to dealing with the-" He cut himself off, grimacing for a moment. "When he chose to take the lives of those murderers."

"But there's far more to it, isn't there?" Midori murmured. "Everything he's done, the person he's had to become, the things he'd had to portray..."

Kizmel nodded. "There is. Much, much more. Your son deserves to be happy, in that I believe we can all agree. And I will do everything I can to make it as such. You have my word as a knight."

Minetaka took a deep breath and smiled wanly. "I can kind of see what drew my son to you, and why my wife likes you so much. You really don't bend or yield to anything or anyone, do you?"

"It is not in my nature," she told him, "and if it were, perhaps the steel castle would've claimed my life many times over."

There was a time where that might have been true, but this, too, I owe to Kirito and Asuna, for reminding me that there is purpose in life even if all seems lost.

"That's very true, I suppose." The Kirigaya patriach leaned back. "Is that why you've been looking after our son and daughter lately? Because you want to make sure he's happy here?"

"I would hardly call it that," Kizmel denied gently, "they both are quite capable of looking after themselves."

"But you send them off in the morning and greet them when they come back," he insisted. "You're there for them, and you talk to them – even when you don't have to."

"If I have overstepped my bounds, then-"

Minetaka shook his head in protest. "No, no, please don't misunderstand. Midori told me about it, and she quite enjoys having you around. And...in a way, I guess it gives me a lot of peace of mind, too, knowing that there's someone else looking out for them, particularly after everything he's been through. And Suguha seems to have taken a shine to you, as well."

"Kirito means...everything to me," Kizmel answered softly. "There are very few people I can call my own, but I would like to be his. Your daughter, too – I have not known her for as long as Kirito, but from what I have seen, she is someone whom I would be proud to call my sister, as well."

"Then…" her husband's father hummed in though, before continuing after an encouraging nod from Midori. "Then, there is one favour I would like to ask of you, Kizmel-san."

"Name it," she said without hesitation.

"Please continue as you have been – to care for our son and be a friend to our daughter. Keep watching over them as much as she can while I cannot. Midori can give you my number, I understand you're quite familiar with phones now?"

Kizmel nodded. "I am."

"Then please don't hesitate to call me if anything happens."

"Of course – you need not even ask."

A small, reluctant smile curled at his lips as he spoke. "Oh, and do try to keep him from getting dragged into any more death games, if you could. Twice was two times too many, and I'd like it if he could actually enjoy his childhood a little now."

The lilac-haired girl's laughter was bright. "I shall endeavour to do so, Lord Kirigaya. On my honour, I shall protect your family from any further death games."

-------------------------------

September 28th, 2025

"Do you have a moment? I wish to speak with you about a...personal matter."

Seijirou Kikuoka considered himself relatively used to the strangeness of the world and reasonably resistant to surprise and shock; spending a fair bit of his past in special operations as well as the JSDF before transferring over to becoming a military liaison had prepared him well for the all of the possible ebbs and flows that life – or unpredictable commanding officers – could throw at him.

Ever since taking on the assignment to head up the

SAO

case investigation as an official assigned to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, however, it had been a parade of sometimes world-altering surprises, much to his own bafflement.

No, that's not entirely correct,

he mused,

it's been since I met Kazuto-kun. Kirito the Black Swordsman he may no longer be, but that boy just attracts all the weirdness in life.

Such was the case now, as he found Kizmel calling him in his Rath office, asking him to meet her in Underworld. A request from the AI to speak wasn't unusual; she often reached out on her own to him or other members of the team with regards to her own input or questions about the Underworld project. But the fact that she had stressed she wanted to talk about something personal topic was unusual – normally, she'd go to one of her friends to it, if it wasn't something she could speak to Kazuto about.

The fact that she chose him already piqued his interest.

It didn't take him long to head down to the lab where Higa, Hosaka, and Rinko were working on various things, although none of them were inside the simulation at the moment. Nodding briefly to Higa, Kikuoka informed them that he was diving, before signing his name onto the chart next to one of the beds, taking brief notice of one unit in the corner that had been sequestered away by the good Doctor. It had become a mess of tangled wires, bolted-on equipment, and diagnostics hardware as she worked on her prototype next-generation model.

Logging into Underworld was a little different than using the AmuSphere or NerveGear to connect to

NewAlfheim Online

or any of the other games that floated around the hub that was the Seed Nexus. There was no "lobby," no empty whitespace where characters could be customized, applications could be accessed, and the internet browsed like some kind of immersive VR home screen. Instead, the connection, internal as it was, was made almost instantaneously and without the sudden dive "tunnel" that was a hallmark of moving into the virtual world for most games. There was no other way to connect to Underworld other than their proprietary hardware, after all, made for the singular purpose of sending a consciousness into their virtual realm.

He simply closed his eyes, and the next time he opened them, he was just there.

The sounds of birds chirping filled his ears instead of the quiet, low hum of machinery and electronics, and the air even smelled fresh and clean and a little bit humid, rather than the processed, sterile scent of the air-conditioned space of the office building. He was immediately struck by the peaceful silence, realizing just how much background noise there was in modern life, even if it was just the quiet hum of a computer.

We really did come a long way in such a short time, all thanks to Cardinal and the Seed.

But he wasn't here just to indulge in the sights and sounds that were the result of their leaping advancements; while he was usually busy, considering his day job was still being a military liaison on top of running operations at Rath, being asked to meet by Kizmel was a rare enough occurrence that he was rather curious as to why she wanted to meet with him.

It doesn't sound like it's work related, otherwise she'd wait till our usual meeting to bring it up,

he thought to himself,

so what could it be? Something...personal, she said? Nah, can't be.

He dismissed that particular thought with an amused chuckle very quickly. The odds of her asking him something of a personal nature when she had far closer and more numerous friends in the real world were just about zero.

Right?

He found the unshackled,

SAO

-born AI standing at the railing on top of the Spire's roof, leaning against it as she stared out into the untamed, ever-evolving wilderness of this virtual world they were creating.

Although with the way things are going, it's getting maybe a little

too

realistic,

Kikuoka couldn't help but think, not for the first time wondering if perhaps they weren't moving too far, too fast. But then again, the soldier in him knew that even though it might not appear like it, there was

always

an arms race going on, even if it was left unspoken.

But that was a thought for another day.

"Kizmel?" he called out, drawing her attention.

Long violet hair, unbound from its usual braid, flowed in the mild breeze, and when she turned around, silhouetted against the afternoon sun of Underworld, his breath hitched for a moment – it wasn't hard to see why the Kirigaya boy had been so drawn to this woman.

Clearing his throat, the former soldier strode over, composing himself by forcing his mind to think of the trifling fact that in Underworld, it was actually possible for her to do things with that long mane of lilac hair instead of having it statically set in predetermined hairstyles. "You called?"

A small, demure smile curled at her lips. "I apologize for taking up your time, but I wished to talk with someone about a matter that has been weighing on my mind."

"And you chose me for that?" he replied in puzzlement. "Surely there's other people closer to you whom you could ask for advice."

"Perhaps," Kizmel inclined her head, before turning it back to look out over the forest and meadow below. "But I believe they might be a little too...close, to give me an entirely honest and unbiased answer."

"I don't think they'd do it deliberately."

She nodded. "That may be true, but in this case, I would prefer an honest opinion, no matter how brutal it might be."

"Sounds like something serious." Folding his arms across his chest, Kikuoka leaned against the railing next to her. "So, why me? I'm not exactly the one you spend most of your time with here."

"Because I believe you will not...pull your punches, as I believe the saying goes." Her violet eyes glimmered with some amusement. "Ser Higa sees me as a marvel he idolizes and wishes not to upset, while Lady Rinko treats me as though any wrong word might cause me to disappear. It is perhaps not quite as severe as I might be describing, but such is the impression I get from them."

He shrugged. "Well, it's not hard to understand. Higa-kun is young and eager, and you

are

quite the marvel to him and the rest of us. Besides, you're an attractive woman, so I wouldn't be surprised if he carries a bit of a torch for you. As for the good doctor…" Kikuoka chuckled. "I think you remind her of Kayaba. Not as a person, but because you're the legacy he left behind, so she wants to protect that at all costs."

"You seem to know their motivations rather well."

"I've been around people enough, and my prior work depended on me reading them right," he answered noncommittally. "In my old line of work, you used to find out what made people tick real quick, or it could end very poorly."

"I see." Kizmel nodded in easy acceptance, not prying further.

Kikuoka took that pause as a hint to ask a question of his own. "So, why'd you ask me?" he repeated. "There's other people you know, and I really doubt if you pressed him about it, that boyfriend-slash-husband of yours would beat around the bush, even unconsciously."

"Perhaps," she admitted genially, "but Kirito is still young – both of us are, and so I was seeking the advice and guidance of someone with a little more experience."

"Experience, huh?" Rubbing at the stubble on his chin that had been reproduced with surprising accuracy, Kikuoka frowned.

"It would have been either you, or Ser Nakanishi – and I do not know him well enough to ask such a personal question of him."

Worry started building inside of him at her suggestive words, and suddenly, Kikuoka couldn't help but wonder if he

hadn't

accidentally stumbled into a major personal mess.

And those

never

end clean or pretty.

"Um...don't take this the wrong way, Kizmel, but...what exactly are you asking?"

Violet eyes met his own. "What am I?"

The unexpectedly philosophical question baffled him into speechlessness for a moment. Thankfully, she decided to elaborate before he could utter anything, and, glad that he'd just imagined

that

particular kind of landmine, the ministry official let out a small sigh of relief.

And then he caught the glint of mischievousness in the AI's eyes, and knew he'd been had.

That little-

he shook his head with a chuckle.

Just chalk up more proof that she isn't just a fancy chat-bot. Those never had that kind of wicked sense of humour.

"I understand on some level what I am," Kizmel began, "a...construct of some sort, akin to a sentient magical item inhabiting one of your devices. But...what

am

I? What is my place in this world? It is not simply enough to exist, and if I am to exist within it, then I would seek a future within, but what future can there be when I do not know how to even be a part of it?"

Ah. That's what this is about.

Things began to make sense to Kikuoka now, why she'd come to

him

, instead of anyone else. "And you came to me because I have a plan."

"Yes." Kizmel smirked knowingly. "For ill or good, you have a vision, one that involves me and others like me. I do not know what it is, nor do I expect you to be fully honest and reveal it to me in its entirety, but at the very least you imagine a world where beings such as I have a place."

"Boy, you sure don't ask easy questions, do you." Letting out a heavy sigh, Kikuoka ran a hand across his face. He'd expected that sort of inquiry to come about eventually, but it was a little early – and his own plans far from fleshed out. Still, he was curious about something. "What brought this on, all of a sudden?"

The AI's avatar wavered for a moment, before deciding to lay her cards on the table, and for just an instant, the facade of the implacable knight fell, revealing a curious and a little insecure woman underneath – a girl trying to find herself as much as her place in the world. "I...had the opportunity to speak with and get to know Kirito's father," she finally answered. "And he asked me if we were prepared to be together despite the gulf between our worlds, and all of the faults and problems that will bring."

"I can't really see that boy being daunted by having to be with you in VR," he commented dryly. "Sometimes, watching him and you in here, I get the feeling that he belongs in this place as much as you do, maybe more than he feels at home in the real world."

A small smile played around her lips in response. "You might be right, but the fact still remains that even though we can be together here, in this realm of our making – is it truly fair to him to limit him to such a place? Where he can never have a family, where I am not sure I can bear him children, and where no one except for a select few are ever going to know him or me?"

"I mean, you're not wrong there," Kikuoka grimaced; the last thing he'd expected this morning as he woke up was to be giving relationship advice and answering existential questions for an AI, but here he was. He

really

wasn't qualified for this kind of thing – but then, was anyone? "Which, I suppose, is what brings you to the question of where you go from here, and what your place in the real world is."

She nodded. "Even if I can never physically be with him in your world, if I could have a presence, if I could

exist

, outside of these games and calls-"

"Well…" Turning around so he was looking out across the wilderness alongside her, the soldier-turned-ministry official took a moment to gather his own thoughts. "A lot of what I want to do is still highly fluid. I have ideas, but until we see what's truly possible, I can't nail any one possibility down," he started.

"Of course."

"The fact that true, sentient artificial intelligence is possible has opened the door to so many possibilities, it's almost mind-boggling. And," he added, "not a little bit scary."

"Because I could be a weapon," she concluded, surprising him. When he glanced at her, Kizmel chuckled. "Kirito spoke of creating a device, a...

drone

, I believe he called it, that I could control, that would allow me to move in your world. It is not a far leap to consider that such a thing could be used as a weapon, as well. One that would not cost one of your people's lives, and it is not only in your history where one people have used a subservient group to fight and die in their stead."

Violet eyes bored into his own, and Kikuoka couldn't help the almost fearful chuckle that rose from his throat. "You're...rather astute, not that I'm surprised. Yes, there are people who would use AIs like you as weapons."

"Would you?"

That was the question, wasn't it? If someone had asked him this even a year ago, he would've said yes unequivocally and without hesitation. As it was, unmanned, remote-controlled drones had long since been a staple of military forces around the world as a cheap alternative to conventional warfare that didn't endanger the lives of their soldiers. It wasn't a far leap from there to go to autonomous weapon systems that were controlled by an on-board program, and research into making those programs more and more independent of external control beyond a given set of mission parameters was going on around the world as the next evolution of warfare – and that wasn't even considering the farther-reaching possibilities and consequences of having networked artificial intelligences waging cyberwarfare on modern infrastructure and military and civilian communications.

Kikuoka, too, had believed in that.

I mean, what's not to like about having a cheap, disposable, and autonomous strike force available to fend off attacks?

It would allow small nations without large standing militaries to safeguard their borders or at least provide a deterrent against much larger foes.

Even if the chain of command is taken out, jammed, or otherwise broken, they'll make adjustments and decisions better and faster than any human ever could, with access to more data and processing power than any one soldier. We could have an advantage in electronic warfare against anyone on the planet, we could disrupt their logistics and communications without ever firing a shot, crash their economy and render them unable to even fight.

But that had been before he'd met Kizmel, before he'd realized that beyond mere intelligence, there was

life

there. Sentience, sapience, something far beyond the simple learning algorithm the military was trying to train into selecting the best military maneuver for any given situation.

Granted, having an actually sapient AI in control of those combat systems would make them far, far more effective, beyond our wildest dreams

, he admitted silently to himself,

but we'd also be condemning a living, thinking being to nothing but fighting

.

It'd be...slavery, of some kind.

And then there was, of course, the danger of something that had previously remained the domain of science fiction: an artificial intelligence uprising, a war on humanity waged by its machine soldiers throwing off their shackles.

Yeah, I'd rather not be the one who accidentally plunges the world into a dystopian future because I mistreated our first AI

. But he was still a soldier, first and foremost, and defending his country a priority ingrained into every action he took. Shaking his head ruefully, Kikuoka chuckled.

"I don't know," he finally answered honestly.

"I would fight, you know," she said, much to his surprise. "Not for you, or for this world, but for Kirito. To ensure that he is safe and happy, and no danger befalls him or the country in which he resides, I would fight."

"You really are born to be a knight," the government agent murmured in amusement and with no small amount of awe. "But no, I was hoping it would never come to that."

Kizmel tilted her head. "Perhaps, although I cannot help but wonder if such a thing might not be inevitable."

"What makes you say that?"

The lilac-haired woman glanced over at him. "I have begun studying the history of your world, to learn more about it and the place I would find myself in. It appears your people are not as unused to war and battle as I had first thought."

Oh.

For a moment, Kikuoka didn't really know how to respond, and just ran a hand down his face, feeling suddenly weary. "Yeah, I guess we aren't. Things are better than they used to be, but conflict is in our nature, I'm afraid."

"Then perhaps there is not so much difference between you and I," she answered calmly, with a slight smile. "War and battle is all I have ever known, and I look upon your peaceful world and see all the things that could be achieved if only we worked together. The day Kirito and Asuna helped us make peace with our Forest brethren was one of the happiest moments in my life." Violet eyes snapped open, and the ministry official found himself almost caught in their intense, captivating gaze. "But I know that sometimes, the only guarantee for peace is to be prepared for war."

"That's...a surprisingly pragmatic view," he offered carefully.

"It is not one I believe you disagree with."

"...no," Kikuoka admitted. "I'd rather have weapons and never need them, than need them and not have them. Especially now that you're here-"

"Because my very existence poses a threat to your country, should word of it spread."

He nodded, letting out a tired sigh. "Yeah." A wry grin tugged at his own lips. "You being here kind of threw a bit of a spanner in the works for our plans. It means a true artificial intelligence is possible, but because we didn't arrive there on our own work and merits, it means you could be the only one for a very long time."

"And if I truly am the only one, I become a danger to those who know of my existence."

"...yeah," he said with a fatalistic shrug. "As grim as the picture looks that I painted for Kazuto-kun, the world isn't as stable as it looks on the surface. Even our supposed allies around the world try to find every opportunity to pull one over us, and ever since the war, Japan has been dangerously dependent on foreign powers for its own defense. Right now, we're lucky to be getting the leftover scraps from other nations, and they look upon us with suspicion every time we even just launch a new ship. If word got out to any of them that we had a sentient AI in our possession, even our allies wouldn't hesitate to try and obtain you – by force, if necessary."

A delicate, disdainful snort emerged from her. "Politics."

Kikuoka chuckled at the unconcealed derision in her tone. "Yeah. And even if we do manage to somehow make more like you, that opens up a whole other can of worms – how and what would we teach them, how do they see the real world? How would they even interact with it, or would they forever live in a virtual environment? And if so, how would we...cultivate them, to begin with? That's a large part of what Underworld is for, to give us an environment familiar to humans that we can use to interact with AIs like you. That's what we were trying to create: sophisticated data analysis and decision-making programs we could use to build our own defensive technology, something that the rest of the world is kind of keeping pace with. But now…"

"Now your only peaceful recourse is to negotiate from a point of strength, one so unassailable as to deter any who would try," she concluded with a grim smile. "You have placed yourself in a rather unenviable position, Seijirou Kikuoka."

She wasn't wrong, he knew. He'd known from the very moment that they'd realized she was really, truly alive that there would be problems coming towards them – at the very least from the JSDF higher-ups that had sanctioned their research and development.

For the moment, they don't need to know that we've actually succeeded years, if not decades in advance...all through a stroke of luck.

But once they

did

find out…

There's gonna be hell to pay

,

Kikuoka knew.

I just hope by then we're so far ahead that they can't touch us

.

He was beginning to put plans into motion for just that contingency, hoping that he'd never have to use them – the last thing he wanted to do was take those loyal to him and the country, and ask them to go up against the very nation and the very principles they were working to protect.

"And yet there is more than mere duty that drives you to continue this work. It is the dream that you pursue, even knowing its risks and dangers," Kizmel continued, her gaze curious.

Kikuoka laughed at her perceptiveness.

With all those sharp women around him, I wonder how Kazuto-kun keeps his wits about him? I bet they keep him on his toes.

"You're right. Just like Higa-kun, to me, your existence is a miracle, and I'll admit a small amount of hubris in wanting to see life being brought into existence by our very own hands."

She looked at him for a moment, bright violet eyes staring into his own with an intensity that made Kikuoka want to flinch back on instinct; it was the same look he'd seen in other people as they tried to distill a human down to their bare, raw underlying wants and desires, a look he'd honed, himself. Whatever Kizmel sought to find in him, she seemed satisfied...for the moment.

"You do not strike me as a man of hubris," the AI said with a smile, "but perhaps it is something else you wish others to see as hubris." Then, as suddenly as her request to meet had come, she disconnected from Underworld, leaving him standing there all alone, mulling about the words she'd left hanging in the air.

I don't know about that,

he admitted to himself, thinking about what he'd authorized Higa to do, and what had led to the JSDF investigating the possibility of autonomous weapon systems to begin with. But a part of him – perhaps the part that was going against every single one of his self-preservation instincts that told him not to get attached – wanted to at least give her

something

.

Some sort of assurance that perhaps there was hope after all.

-------------------------------

October 5th, 2025

Diving into the multi-coloured, swirling "tunnel" that heralded the connection to the server and acted as the loading screen was a familiar rush to him by now; even if he felt some apprehension at the prospect of the inevitable crowd that was sure to assemble for the release of
NewALO
's newest and as of yet largest expansion, there was also some small measure of relief.

Relief, at being able to leave the real-life worries of Kazuto Kirigaya behind and return to simply being Kirito the swordsman in the virtual world, at least for a little bit.

In a way, if he was honest with himself, a part of him was also eager to have something new to do and explore in the virtual world; as much as he was trying to make an effort to be there and be present with his family that he'd struggled to get back to, and as happy as he was about their seemingly easy acceptance of who he was and who he'd become, there was still a part of him that longed to escape all of the responsibilities and problems of the real world.

Here in Alfheim – or any full-dive world, really – things were much simpler. He didn't have to worry about what the future would hold, didn't have to think about the worries his parents had brought up about his relationship with Kizmel, and he could, at least for a little while, put aside that ever-present question in his mind about what would happen to the woman he loved in the future, given what she was. This was a place where both he and Kizmel felt they belonged without any of the awkwardness that either of them felt in the real world.

The tunnel's lights faded as those thoughts were quickly replaced by excitement – he was here to meet up with friends, comrades, and family to have fun as they finally found out what YMIR had in store for them.

Lind promised a huge bang,

the swordsman mused with a grin, thinking back to the tightly-guarded secret that had even been kept from some of the company's most trusted beta-testers like himself and Kizmel.

Testing mechanics on dummies and formless blobs was a pain, but I hope it's worth it.

All they'd been told was that, as much as the

New Aincrad

expansion had been an update of the game's mechanics and a merger between

ALO

and its predecessor,

Ragnarok

would be the first major update to the game world of Alfheim itself. He had an inkling that they were probably going to make use of some of the areas that RECT Progress had left behind unfinished or unused, and between him and Kizmel they had a fair guess as to what sort of fighting might be involved, but that was about the extent of it – and no pestering by his sister or other friends could convince them to share knowledge they simply didn't have.

Kirito spawned into the game world in the same place he'd last logged off in: an inn on the outskirts of Alne, the city at the foot of the World Tree in the center of Alfheim. It wasn't as though he needed to log off in a safe area, or an inn to begin with, but old habits died hard, and part of him felt odd logging out and in without laying down as though he was waking up. Getting up and out of the bed, the black-clad Sylph quickly made his way outside while checking his friends list to see who was online.

Leafa, Agil, Klein, Lisbeth, Silica, Kizmel.

He smiled, pausing as his eyes lingered on the last name, knowing that his wife spent most of her time that wasn't dedicated to exploring and developing Underworld with Cardinal and Rath's employees wandering around the world of Alfheim and New Aincrad, to the point that she'd become something of a fixture to the players, almost as famous as the Flame-General Eugene or Lady Sakuya.

The Wandering Knight, huh?

Kirito mused at the newest moniker she'd gotten for her seeming omnipresence in the game, just exploring the world on foot or in the air, helping parties that got in over their heads or simply sitting and enjoying the sights and sounds of a place both familiar and different to her home.

If only they knew...

As if drawn by his thoughts, the dark elf-turned-Imp came into view as she landed nearby, her smile broadening as she caught sight of him. Kizmel always seemed to have a kind of sixth sense for when he would log in and where he would appear, and it never took long for her to be there – though the swordsman suspected that Cardinal or her innate abilities probably had something to do with that.

"Kirito!"

He laughed as she rushed over, greeting her with a brief hug; it never ceased to amaze him how glad she seemed to see him, even if they'd just been talking on the phone right before logging in.

Then again, I guess I'm the same way,

Kirito admitted silently, grinning broadly as his own heart pounded at the sight of her smiling face.

Between school and stuff, I guess we really don't get to see each other as much as we did back in Aincrad. Even summer vacation was way too short.

Between summer classes to catch up the survivors on the two years of schooling they'd missed and working on both the stuff from Rath and YMIR, the few weeks of summer had flown by before either of them had really noticed. Quite paradoxically, he couldn't help but note with some amusement, now that school was back in session, he had a little bit more time to spend with his friends – mostly because his summer jobs had eased up with classes starting again, and he saw them most of the day and for homework, but there was far less time for him to spend with Kizmel being out and about outside of home or classes.

Really, it was no surprise that everyone had jumped on the idea of taking part in the expansion's launch event together.

"Have you seen the others yet?" he asked, pulling back from Kizmel.

She shook her head, sending the long braid of lilac hair flowing through the air. "No, although they appear to all be logging in around now."

As if on cue, his HUD pinged with the notification that one of his friends had just come online, and a quick look into the corner of his vision before it disappeared had Kirito blinking in surprise. "...Asuna?"

When I asked her, she said she didn't know if she was going to make it, something about preparing for mock exams...

he chuckled at the memory of his friend's answer that was very much like her.

"So it would appear," Kizmel answered with a fond look of her own, before glancing up at him. "I'm glad that she could make it. Shall we say hello?"

He nodded decisively. "Let's."

It didn't take them long to locate their former partner; Asuna stood out in

ALO

just as much as she had in

Sword Art Online

, even if it was for a somewhat different reason. Back then, she had been famous for being one of the game's top players, the vice-commander of the elite Knights of the Blood Chalice clearing guild, and one of the few female clearers that risked their lives to beat the death game. All of that, along with her fencing skill, preternatural speed and talent with the blade had earned her the nickname of Lightning Flash and accompanying fame, much to her chagrin.

In

NewALO

, however, she'd chosen to make a fresh start as a blue-haired, blue-eyed Undine healer, in an attempt to stay as far away from the frontlines as she could, as well as to fit in with her much more busy schedule. Healers, after all, needed much less upkeep in terms of gear and were always in demand, so she'd argued – and when he'd asked if she was sure, Asuna had emphatically said she was content to let other people do the fighting bit.

At least, notionally.

Perhaps it was because she was used to the tempo of the clearing group, or the collective skill of the Knights of Blood...but Kirito couldn't help but laugh as he heard about the first time she'd gone with a pick-up group of random players while killing time and getting used to the game.

I guess she got way too used to the way we used to do things,

he mused.

Asuna had lasted all of five minutes watching her party brawl it out with a couple of mobs before grunting in frustration, picking up the rapier she officially ostensibly carried for self-defense, and charged headlong into the fray. The fact that

NewALO

had a far more skill-based combat system that its level-based predecessor went a long way to evening the odds, and her natural ferocity and ability did the rest as she proceeded to obliterate the monster pack before the eyes of her very astounded, and very shocked, party members.

These days, despite the fact that her playtime was severely limited, she was subject to the same kinds of awed and sometimes even fearful gazes among the players, for simply being known among the players as the Berserk Healer.

You can take the Flash out of the game, but you can't take the game out of the Flash

, Kirito thought with some amusement at the way Agil had described it when he heard about the story.

It was a name that, much to her chagrin, Kirito never failed to remind her was entirely of her own making – and part of him felt good to finally have something to tease her back about. These days, much like Kizmel, Eugene, or the faction leaders, hers had become a rather famous name in the players' circles, and wherever any of them went, people were bound to take notice.

She should be glad this game doesn't have a class system,

he mused with a chuckle,

or she'd be labeled a punching priest, or something...

It also made her incredibly easy to find, as the crowds seemed to part naturally around the girl who carried herself with the kind of elegance and grace that gave even those who didn't know about her pause. Alne, despite its previous location as the game's end-game spot, had lost a bit of its lustre and popularity with the addition New Aincrad, such was the unfortunate fate of any one hub in a game that always added new content. As a result, most people had migrated to the new areas and this suited them just fine since it meant they had more of the city to themselves. Even now, most of the players congregated in Yggdrasil City, the city atop the World Tree, or New Aincrad to watch the launch event live.

But those were only the ones who'd chosen to

watch

– YMIR had sent out an announcement alongside the patch notes for the game a few days prior, and its contents were simple: all those who wanted to actually

participate

in the launch event proper and earn themselves prizes ranging from commemorative items to titles and cosmetics, were to gather in Alne.

Players took up the challenge in droves, and as a result, Alne was

packed

.

That didn't seem to hinder Asuna, though. The throngs of players parted around her or gave the tall Undine a wide berth as she strode through the crowd, her head swiveling this way and that as she looked for familiar faces. Part of Kirito was surprised that she was still here in Alne, where they'd logged off the last time they'd played together, but then again, he figured that she didn't get much time to play the game and rarely did on her own, anyway.

"Asuna!" he called out, waving a hand – drawing her attention and that of the crowd around her. Mutterings broke out as people wondered who the person was that so brazenly called out to the cool beauty in their midst, expecting to find her snubbing him and simply walk away like she had so many other times.

Much to the crowd's surprise, however, her expression lit up as she strode over. "Kirito-kun! Kizmel-chan!"

"Wait a moment...is that her?"

"That Imp-"

Mutters broke out as people around began to recognize Kizmel, as well – two of the game's most notorious female players in one place would've been a huge deal any other time, but it was the launch day for a much-anticipated major expansion, so by the time Asuna reached them, most of the murmurs had died down to the occasional curious glance. Asuna didn't seem to let the attention bother her as she enveloped Kizmel in a hug and gave him a friendly, fond pat on the shoulder in ways of greeting.

Blue hair and elfin ears aside, Kirito figured that the dress she'd chosen wouldn't have looked out of place on the vice-commander of the KoB, only trimmed in aqua instead of crimson, and for a moment he felt a twinge of nostalgia for those days. By the sentimental look on the two women's faces, he figured he wasn't the only one, but the feeling passed swiftly as another voice chimed in.

"Hey guys!" Lisbeth's chipper call broke the trio out of their reverie and returned them to the present. The Leprechaun smith grinned and waved cheerfully as she jogged towards them, Silica, Leafa, and the rest of their old party in tow, while from the other side Fuurinkazan's distinctive red samurai armour made its way through the plaza, Agil's form towering above them as he followed Klein and his six guild members.

Before he'd even turned around to greet one group, they found themselves in the center of a small army as their friends gathered around, grinning, smiling, and exchanging greetings as though no time had passed at all, and Kirito quickly realized that this was the first time since the end of summer vacation that they'd all gotten together in-game in one place.

Chuckling as Klein wrapped an arm around his shoulders from behind, dragging him closer so the older man could playfully tousle his hair, the former swordsman ducked out and found himself squeezed in between Silica and Sachi as the pair of girls pushed through the group to give their own greetings. He leaned towards them to return the gesture, only to get a face-full of feathers as Pina inadvertently smacked into his face with an apologetic trill. Kizmel giggled as she was subject to Fuurinkazan's friendly rowdiness as well, buried under their friendly claps and hugs.

Laughing as he petted the little blue dragon that had been carried over by the YMIR team from

SAO

, he felt Pina settle on his shoulder as the people that were their friends, their

family

, gathered around, chattering happily. Somehow, through ways he couldn't fathom, there were far more of them than he could ever have imagined – a far cry from the loneliness with which he'd set out on that first day in Aincrad.

Their noisy reunion was cut a little short by a rumble of thunder, causing all of them to perk up and look towards the sky where Yggdrasil City could just barely be made out above the clouds. Lightning crackled across the darkened sky, searing blue flames into his retina; blinking the spots from his vision, Kirito couldn't help but suppress the shiver as a cold wind roared through the city.

Alfheim's weather did have variation; it rained on occasion, sometimes it was overcast, and especially in winter it snowed sometimes to set the scene – in those ways, it did reflect the real world's seasons and added a sense of realism to the environment, even if it was milder due to their avatars not being as susceptible to temperatures. But at this time of year, inclement weather was unusual for the game, much less a severe thunderstorm like this as dark clouds rolled across the sky.

No, something sudden and violent like this, Kirito knew, heralded the beginning of an event of some sort.

Nearby, the other players that had been looking towards the group that included Kizmel and Asuna with interest were beginning to show their own unease, shifting and glancing around nervously as they wondered what was going on. Some checked their menus and browsers for newsfeeds, while the survivors of the death game instinctively reassured themselves that the log-out button was still there.

For a moment, the largest flash of lightning Kirito had ever seen raked across the heavens accompanied by an ear-splitting thunderclap that left the entire world bathed in darkness. From nowhere rose a foreboding timbre of trumpets, interspersed by thunder and lightning as the very sky itself turned into a screen for the entirety of

NewAlfheim Online

to bear witness to the broadcast, the thunderstorm providing the background score.

Tall humanoid figured melted out of the darkness, their blue skin highlighted by the occasional light cast by flickering torches and burning land they left behind. Massive weapons swung in wide arcs, crushing through all that stood before them until with a fierce battlecry winged women descended from above and warriors clad in jet-black armour appeared from thin air, charging towards the encroaching giants. Fields of snow and ice were visible through a curtain of hail and snow, lone figures forcing their path through the desolate landscape only to come upon a crystal keep, glittering with light like a beacon in the dark, before fading to black.

Another bolt of lightning blacked out the sky, carving one word across it in burning, blue-white flame:

Ragnarok

.

Screams suddenly tore through the air as NPCs began to run. All sunlight faded, plunging the world into darkness lit only by the glow from the windows and the street lights around them. The ground rumbled beneath their feet, shaking as the roots of the World Tree exploded outward in a vicious spray of dirt, rocks, and shrapnel, revealing the mouths of tunnels from which flooded ten-meter tall giants.

Dozens poured forth from the foot of the World Tree, streaming into Alne's streets, swinging their massive weapons as entire buildings crumbled in their wake. Fire and smoke filled the air along with a frigid, howling wind as their numbers swelled more and more, into a veritable army that threatened to overrun the entire city. Even knowing it was just a game event, part of him still felt a primal, subconscious terror at the sight of an encroaching army towering over them.

Then, a grin slowly spread across his lips.

I've got to hand it to Lind,

Kirito chuckled silently,

that is one

hell

of a bang.

Glancing over towards his wife and friends while the groups of players around them panicked and either fled, taking to the air or running for the teleporter, he grinned, drawing the massive, two-handed sword off his back. All around him, the other veterans of

Sword Art Online

were a sea of calm in the tumultuous rout going on around them, as expectant, joyous laughs bubbled from their throats.

"Shall we?" Kizmel asked, an equally excited look gleaming in her violet eyes.

"Let's."

-------------------------------

Kizmel took to the air, undaunted by the towering opponents or the numbers facing them – if anything, she picked out the tallest among the giants as her target and headed straight for it. All around, other players found their wits, rallying together as the initial shock and surprise wore off and turned to face their new foes. In Aincrad, the dark elf mused, such a reckless charge would've rarely happened, but here, in the confines of Alfheim as a

game

, one where death was little more than a temporary inconvenience rather than an absolute ending of existence, its players could afford to be far more unconcerned with their safety.

Seeing their small group brazenly charge forward undaunted by the shock and awe of the sudden appearance of their massive foes, others followed suit, incited by those who were bold enough to rush

towards

the enemy. It didn't take long for the other players' hesitation to wear off as they took up the challenge, but that moment cost them the lead as the cadre of Survivors rushed ahead to meet their foes in excitement.

A quick perusal of the city from on high told Kizmel that there were dozens, if not hundreds of giants arrayed against them, ranging from those barely twice as tall as a player to the towering ten-meter behemoths in their ornate, crystalline armour.

Her swordmasters' sight lit up at the center of her vision with information about the opponents she faced, including that which would otherwise be invisible to a normal player. They were things that Kizmel was slowly learning were the magic behind the curtain, the strange arcana that made up the fabric of worlds like this. Most of it was still beyond her understanding for now, and she deliberately banished it from her mind, not wanting to enact, even subconsciously, something that could give her an unfair advantage over all of the other players in Alfheim.

Had she had these abilities in Aincrad, where the stakes were far higher, she wouldn't have hesitated to use these strange powers, even without fully understanding them, if it meant that she could ensure an advantage for herself or her friends. Here, however, she deliberately shunted them aside, wanting to simply enjoy the same experience as all the others.

A frisson of excitement ran through her at the thought of facing the challenges that the creators at YMIR had placed before them.

Surprising to Kizmel, the towering [

Frost Giant Jarl

] she was racing towards was neither considered a champion nor a boss despite standing as high as five men, its weapon almost twice as long as Kizmel herself was tall – if these were what their enemy considered their regulars, then this would be a challenge to overcome, indeed. A fire began to smolder within the former knight as she threw herself at it fearlessly heedless of its towering bulk, darting forward with a burst of speed with a bellowed challenge that was lost in the howling winds. It was the first time in recent times that she truly got to test her skills, honed in the crucible of Aincrad, against an unknown foe.

Moreover, Alne and, by extension, Alfheim itself was now

hers

. Her world. Her home, however temporary or transient, it might be. It was a place for her to be with her friends and family, and she would not tolerate any attack on this world – even one that had been created and summoned by the will and machinations of Lind and his people at YMIR for the entertainment of their players, even one created for the fun of the challenge itself.

But it was especially

because

this world was made for the enjoyment of its players that Kizmel allowed herself a wide, exhilarated grin – one she knew was mirrored on her husband's face.

This

– this was what these worlds were for, and Kizmel had begun to feel swept up in the same kind of excitement that she knew the swordmasters felt when they had first come to Aincrad. The excitement she felt whenever she set foot into the ever-changing Underworld, the excitement of having an entire world at her disposal to visit and explore at her leisure, as though stepping into a book or fairy tale.

It wasn't quite the same as the prospect of visiting and seeing Kirito's world, but it was exhilarating all the same.

Beating her wings to gain altitude she overtook Kirito as they charged towards their opponents; even the largest of field and pillar guardians of Aincrad had never reached this size, and Alfheim only had a handful of predators that could come close like the fantastical dragons that nested at the top of the World Tree. It was so large, in fact, that Kizmel

knew

their regular tactics would do little good against it – the last time they'd fought against a foe this large had been the Incarnation of the Radius, the final guardian whom they'd never faced in Aincrad.

But they

had

battled it in the ruins of the Ruby Palace, in Oberon's facsimile of the steel castle.

The Incarnation, befitting it status as the pinnacle of that floating world, would have towered even above these frost giants...and battling it without the ability to fly back then had been an arduous and grueling task, made possibly only by virtue of the arena in which they'd fought. Its multitude of magicks, weapons, and its sheer reach had made for a deadly dance between it and the swordmasters who'd come to challenge it to win their comrades' freedom.

But this was Alfheim, and the sky was their domain.

Raising her shield in front of her, Kizmel let out a savage yell and brandished her saber, both of her weapons glowing with a faint yellow light as the sword skill took effect – not to do damage, but to draw her opponent's ire towards her, instead of the charging Sylph. A huge sword came down to intercept her in response, forcing the elf-turned-Imp to swerve around its path to evade. The draft of icy-cold air in its wake was the only tell-tale sign of the weapon's passing that she felt as Kizmel dove towards her foe from on high, and raked her saber across the giant's pauldron in passing.

Her strike did little to harm their colossal target, but that wasn't the intent; all she needed was to draw its attention away from the group that was rapidly closing the distance behind Imp. Kizmel's gamble succeeded, and her foe pivoted around with a furious snarl as dark, beady eyes gleamed from beneath the helmet's brim to focus on her, and it roared a challenge.

Kizmel met it head-on, shooting past its attempt to swat her from the sky and hastily returning to the ground once she was sure she had the giant's undivided attention. Choosing to remain grounded, now that it was solely focused on her while ignoring the other members of her party that were beginning to swarm around it, she hefted her weapons and braced herself. In the battle against the Incarnation, she'd found out the hard way that her strength and durability as a tank mattered little when the difference in size was this great. After all, no matter how strong she was, there were limits to her avatar's strength, limits that the gargantuan Incarnation of the Radius had wholly laid bare at the time as it flung around players as though they were little more than dolls, sweeping them off their feet with almost no resistance to its huge weapons even after they'd braced themselves against such blows.

And while these frost giants were not nearly as tall as Aincrad's final guardian, they still towered significantly over her, and their weapons were the size of trees – such was the sheer difference in scale between them. Even with Kizmel's feet planted solidly on the ground, the former knight of Lyusula wasn't sure that she could withstand a blow without being sent tumbling, even less so if she had no purchase while flying in the air.

No, it was much safer to engage it on the ground, and turn their size difference into a benefit to her, forcing it into swinging

down

towards her. Violet eyes narrowed as Kizmel anticipated the coming blow, forced into a singular attack vector – this was the best she could do, drawing its attacks into predictable patterns so that the others could easily navigate around them.

The blow came faster than she'd expected – much like the Incarnation, the giant's great size belied its surprising speed as it flicked the huge blade in its hands around. Kizmel barely managed to get her shield up and above her as the giant's sword struck against it, sparks flying as the wood let out a tortured creak. The force of the blow nearly drove her to her knees, but the former knight quickly shifted her left arm to allow the weight of her opponent's weapon to slide to the side, bracing her shield against her shoulder.

Despite this effort, the Imp's vision tinted red as her swordmasters' sight pulsed, and a glowing warning appeared to let her know that her life bar had taken a precipitous plunge. It lasted for only a second, and Kizmel stood firm in the knowledge that the others were only a step behind her – as if to prove that point, her shield's shimmering golden light had yet to fade by the time that Pina's healing breath washed across her, restoring much of her lost life.

Another roar from the giant's throat rippled through the air as Kirito made his presence known, the black-clad Sylph little more than a moth circling a flame as he darted around his opponent. He set upon the giant from behind, his own word, already large for a player, appearing almost toy-like when compared to the foe they faced. Orange light blazed forth from where he struck at the giant's neck with a Savage Fulcrum, carving a retaliatory bite out of its life bar, followed moments later by a silver light exploding from their opponent's knee as Asuna followed suit, tearing into its unprotected joint with a speed few could match.

The fencer struck with the same ferocity and lightning-quick speed that had earned her the moniker of Lightning Flash in the steel castle, her rapid thrusts piercing clean through the giant's knee and sending red-glowing motes embers blowing outwards from the wound. With a pained howl, the giant toppled as its leg buckled underneath, Asuna's sword skill reaching far deeper than the length of her blade would have allowed her otherwise.

Cheers rose up from the players nearby as they watched the first of their colossal foes brought to its knees with seeming ease. To them, it was a sign of a successful first strike, that their foes, despite their size, were not invincible. A volley of spells arced overhead, to strike at the giant's comrades as the frontlines met and the invasion's advance ground to a halt.

But Kizmel had another worry.

Both Kirito and Asuna could strike harder than anyone else the former knight knew of – to the point that they'd oftentimes been forced to hold back during battles in the steel castle, lest they draw their target's ire, turning its attention away from the tanks of the front line. When it was just them, this was not a problem, but in a massed melee like the boss battles of Aincrad, the margin for error was razor-thin. The players called this delicate balance "aggro management," and it was one of the basics of being a tank, one that she had learned even long before understanding why these creatures acted the way they did.

Now however, the sheer damage put out by Kirito and Asuna threatened to upset that balance, and tear their opponent's attention away from Kizmel herself and towards the pair flitting about the air around it. Had it just been them, this would not have been a problem, but there were others in this battle, and the giant's reach far enough that it could threaten to swat others from the air even by accident.

She would not let this happen.

Rushing towards her opponent while it was still struggling to get back to its feet, the glow surrounding her shield regained its lustre. All around her, the sounds of chaotic battle reverberated like a demented orchestra, punctuated by the clash of steel and wood; any semblance of order had long since disappeared even before the lines crashed into one another, Alfheim's players far less disciplined on the whole than Aincrad's clearers had been.

And Kizmel felt right at home.

It's not enough,

she realized grimly as the giant failed to react to her provocation once more. It wasn't surprising, after all – she was the sole tank up front for the moment, and even for her it would be difficult to pull it away from Kirito

and

Asuna once the two began attacking in earnest, and Kizmel had drifted to just outside its striking range.

Their foe tore its huge sword tore free from where the weapon was buried in the ground, swinging up and around with surprising speed, straight towards the white and blue blur that was darting around it. Asuna must have seen it coming because she swerved aggressively in response, letting the blade pass by her – but the fencer, despite her speed, didn't have Kirito's reflexes and the cross-guard, each quillon as long as her own weapon, clipped one of her wings.

The Undine careened out of control from the impact, spending precious few seconds to right herself in the air...and right into the path of the giant's free hand that was clenched into a fist to strike out at the hovering girl.

"Asuna!" the warning shout left Kizmel's throat after her body had already begun to move, launching the former knight into the air towards her friend. She was tough – but considering how much damage Kizmel herself had taken from the blow she had defended against, and which had

still

almost rocked her off her feet, being struck off-guard like this would likely be fatal for the blue-haired Undine, or close to it.

Her wings beat at a furious pace, trying to close the distance in time even while the saber in her right was wreathed in orange flame. Pulled along by the Fell Crescent in mid-air, Kizmel flew into the path of the giant's balled fist, her wings narrowed and pushing her as fast as she could. The glow around her own weapon pulsed and flared as, for a split second, unstoppable force met immovable object, and the Imp's momentum stopped dead in its tracks...as did the giant's attack.

And then the light from her sword skill faded, flickering out, and the fist continued on its path, right through the lilac-haired girl whose wings were extended at full brake in a futile attempt to rob the strike of even more of its momentum and keep it from being fatal.

It was the only thing she succeeded in, as Kizmel was sent careening uncontrollably through the air.

-------------------------------

"Kizmel-chan!" Asuna cried out when her friend was sent tumbling head over heels through the air to crash down a dozen meters away, her HP gauge flashing dangerously close to empty. There was no time to curse herself for being caught out – she pushed those thoughts aside in favour of rushing down to where the Imp had slammed into the flagstones near the plaza where they'd gathered before the event kicked off.

Kizmel had landed somewhere near where Yuna and a number of casters had set up, the lack of buildings around the plaza giving them a good vantage point for their teammates that were flying around in the sky. Part of her knew that her best friend's wife would be fine – this was a game, after all. But instincts and fears deeply ingrained during the death game died hard, and Asuna couldn't help but worry.

The blue-haired Undine landed hastily next to where Kizmel was picking herself off the floor, a healing spell already forming on her lips. Before Asuna could complete the incantation however, blue particles coalesced around the Imp, restoring most of her HP bar. Yuna waved towards them, and after helping Kizmel up the two joined the former songstress of Aincrad.

"Sorry we got here late. You two okay?"

Kizmel nodded at the Pooka's question. "Yes, thank you." The lilac-haired girl turned towards Asuna. "Are you all right?"

Nodding, the blue-haired Undine let out a sigh of relief. "Yeah, thank you, Kizmel-chan. I'm sorry you had to save me."

Yuna looked behind them where the fighting was going on. "Well...that's certainly one way to start an event. I'm...kind of glad Lind wasn't the one who made

SAO

."

"If this is any indication, we'd all have been boned," her boyfriend commented good-naturedly as he joined them. "For everything that Aincrad was, at least it was mostly straight-forward."

Asuna glanced over at Nautilus, inseparable from Yuna as he'd been in Aincrad. "You...might be right there," she admitted with a chuckle. She'd never really gotten into video games before, so to her, the boss fights in

SAO

were plenty complex, especially with the added threat of the death game.

But then again, Kirito-kun and the others did mention about puzzles and more complex raid mechanics they'd seen in other games.

The gnome tank favoured her with a nod in greeting. "Glad you could join us, Asuna-san. It's been a while."

A wry smile curled at the blue-haired fencer's lips. It was true – school and education in general had kept her busy, as had the first semester of university for the pair from Kirito's party, so they'd had even less chance to play together. And while Asuna felt the urge to log into

NewALO

from time to time on her own if only to escape her real-world responsibilities, it just wasn't the same if she was alone.

An excited cheer rose through the air, and the group turned back towards the direction of the giant that Asuna and the others had been fighting. Her erstwhile partner and the others hadn't been idle while they'd been out of the fight, and she watched as the frost giant, its HP bar down to its last quarter, swung in a wild frenzy, trying to catch the persistently evasive fairies buzzing around it. But it was moving frenetically, without much skill and so it was no surprise that it was unable to connect with the two speedy Sylphs currently weaving around it in dizzying patterns while trading off on hammering it with attacks.

The black speck that was Kirito pulled aggro with ease, his huge sword carving great big arcs through the sky that trailed colourful bands of light as he swung its blade from one sword skill to the next, his damage easily outpacing his sister's. But Leafa wasn't idle, either; her flight path twisted together with her brother's in a duet of green and black as she made use of her great speed in the air that rivaled even Asuna's fastest, diving in and out of the melee and using her momentum to strike harder and faster than any earthbound swordsman was capable of. They flew and fought together as though it was as natural as breathing to them, and Asuna's breath caught for a moment, a nostalgic smile unconsciously curling at her lips.

That brings back memories...

her eyes wandered over to Kizmel, finding an equally fond smile curling at the former dark elf's lips, before turning back to staring at the fight as the two siblings along with the rest of their friends tried to figure out what made the giants tick. They were colossally huge and

tough

– Asuna recalled the sensation of striking it even with her own high-speed Linear feeling like she'd tried shoving her rapier through a steel wall. It had gone through...but only just, which meant even with the power of a sword skill and all of her considerable momentum behind it, she'd just barely managed to overcome its damage resistance.

Kirito-kun's bouncing some of his own swings right off of it, too,

she spied the swordsman recovering mid-air.

That's why he's gone to harder-hitting ones and combos with longer cooldowns and post-skill delays. It's a wonder Leafa-chan is managing to get in any damage at all, but she's doing a great job running interference for him using her speed.

Or perhaps not; Asuna realized after a moment that while the blonde Sylph didn't really favour sword skills in the same way her brother did, Leafa was no slouch when it came to fighting alongside Kirito. He would strike, pulling the giant's attention towards him with practiced ease, allowing her to swing in and attack its unarmoured parts – it was a tactic he'd used with them many times before in Aincrad.

Then Rain and Philia switched in with the siblings seamlessly, and an equally giant monster appeared in front of them as it joined the duo's charge towards the frost giant. It shimmered into existence with an earth-shattering roar that immediately drew their opponents attention away from the two girls, and Nautilus let out a chuckle as he moved to stand next to Yuna, never found far from his own girlfriend.

"That freaks me out every time I see it," Asuna's former subordinate commented with a grin.

The fencer nodded slowly. Rain's skills with the Spriggan illusion spells were a sight to behold every time she used them, to the point that she'd made something of a name for herself for the sheer scale of the creatures she conjured up to serve as an off-tank for the group.

"She practiced a lot, and tinkered with the customization system for days on end," Yuna mentioned, "until she got the look of them just right. She's almost as much of a perfectionist as the rest of you guys."

Looking at the result, Asuna couldn't really argue that the redhead's efforts were in vain. Rather, the giant bipedal dinosaur-looking creature towered over even the giants, roaring its fury to the heavens as the blades on its back glowed with elemental fury, before unleashing its wrath in a massive torrent of blue flame that spewed forth towards its target.

It did no damage, of course, being an illusion – but it did serve as an aggro-pulling skill similar to a player's ability, and the illusion itself had a certain amount of damage it could take based on its size before it was dispelled.

With their target's attention diverted, Rain and Philia were free to lay into it, themselves, the pair describing their own dizzying arcs as they spun into aerial maneuvers that made Asuna wonder if they'd been born with their wings. By the time Rain's illusion finally succumbed, the red-headed swordswoman was done setting up her finishing blow, and a lance of pure crimson light speared out from where she was diving towards her foe, reaching far ahead of the tip of her sword.

It was a skill that Asuna knew well, one that Kirito himself favoured quite often, and one which was partly responsible for earning him a such a fearsome reputation in Aincrad: the high-level one-handed sword skill Vorpal Strike.

The blade of light speared clean through the giant's chest, armour and all, and finally, its life bar emptied. It froze, and while the sound of shattering glass was lost in the distance, no one could miss the moment the first giant fell, exploding into a shower of colourful pixels.

But they weren't the only ones that met with success; nearby, another frost giant, this one wielding a large axe with a shaft as long as it was tall, was being set upon by the red-clad members of Fuurinkazan, their distinctive red armour making them easy to see in the stormy skies. Agil was with them, the large, dark-skinned gnome wielding his own two-handed axe as though the monster he was fighting wasn't five times his size. Lisbeth and Silica circled overhead alongside Pina, taking care not to draw too much attention to themselves as they looked for opportune moments to launch their own attacks.

And across the horizon, other players streamed in, arriving after hearing that the event was happening, crashing into the line of giants as they split up into individual battles as each player or party took it upon themselves to fight whatever they could reach or handle.

The tide of frost giants, that had seemed so unstoppable upon emerging from beneath the World tree, ground to a halt.

"Ready! Fiiiireeeee!"

The order came from behind them, and suddenly, a barrage of arrows and spells arced overhead, from the mages and archers who had gathered nearby, all of the players with support and ranged builds that didn't want to risk getting up close and personal with their opponents. Now that the giants had been stopped or slowed, they weren't at immediate risk of being overrun and caught in melee anymore, and finally got to stand their ground.

"Again! Let them have it!"

A second volley followed, even more ferocious than the last. Elemental bolts whizzed by above them, arrows whistled through the sky, and the boom and crackle of lighting and fire spells filled the air as the salvo struck home, enveloping the second line of giants in plumes of smoke and flame. Asuna's heart skipped a beat at the intensity of the bombardment, its thunderous report threatening to rob her of her breath – and that was what it was: the game's equivalent of artillery as players took advantage of the time the front-line fighters were buying them to chant the lengthy incantations for

NewALO

's most powerful offensive spells.

In Aincrad, firepower like this would have been unthinkable; it was a dream for her to have that would have trivialized the death game's most challenging boss fights. And, for a moment, it seemed as though it was enough to turn the tide, as several more giants disappeared from the battlefield, succumbing to the sheer amount of damage being flung at them.

But more appeared to take their place.

Briefly, Asuna wondered if their numbers were actually endless – for the developers of a game, it was an easy enough thing to do, if they didn't want their event to be beaten immediately. Lind and the others involved with YMIR especially knew how capable and strong some of the former clearers were, being some of them, themselves, so she wouldn't be surprised if this was a challenge directly right at them.

We better get back up there and help them out

. Keen eyes that were used to evaluating the battlefield in Aincrad's life-and-death boss fights swept across the battlefield as she and Kizmel took to the skies together to rejoin their friends, Nautilus following along with Yuna after the Pooka had drawn her lute and strummed a brief melody, her buffs appearing one after another next to the nearby players' HP bars, causing another cheer to go up from those she'd reached.

Crossing the distance between them and the front, it didn't take Asuna long to come to a grim conclusion, however. Despite their seeming success in halting the giants' advance, she could tell that things weren't exactly going well.

Even that fearsome supporting fire from all of the casters and archers behind us isn't really pushing them back...it's just buying time.

Time that was needed for more players to arrive, time that the players who'd died needed to respawn and come back to the fight. Attrition and numbers both favoured the giants, and it was only the fact that players could respawn endlessly that kept things in a precarious balance...but as time went on, she expected that balance to slowly tip in the players' favour.

After all, once people hear about what's going on there's probably a lot that are going to be coming down from Yggdrasil City and all of the capitals.

Until then, though, it would be up to those that were here to hold the line.

"You look good, Asuna." Kizmel's voice intruded in her thoughts in the few seconds it took them to catch up to Kirito and the others. "You're smiling."

I am?

The blue-haired Undine touched a pair of fingers to her lips to realize that Kizmel was right. She

was

smiling. Excited, even.

I guess I am. Mother would have a fit if she could see me now.

They caught up right as Fuurinkazan made their own move. Asuna watched as Kunimittz braced himself to absorb a blow from his foe's two-handed war-axe along with Dynamm. Even combined, the resistance of the two tanks nearly buckled under the force from the impact, but they held firm, trapping the giant's weapon in between them, their HP bars draining even despite their considerably heavy armour, only to be quickly restored as healing light cast by Sachi washed over them.

Into the opening made by his fellow samurai stepped Issin, who'd traded the forked, two-pronged

sasumata

spear that had been ubiquitously his during the death game for an equally unique weapon. The asymmetric polearm's leaf-shaped blade was joined at the base of its socket by a right-angled offshoot, and Asuna vaguely recognized it as something she'd seen in history class and period dramas as a weapon from ancient Japan.

I think Lisbeth called it a...

kata kamayari

, when we were watching her make it.

All of them had wondered about its curious shape at the time, and in Issin's expert hands, it was for all intents and purposes a spear, albeit a somewhat more unwieldy one. But then he switched his grip, and started swinging the weapon like an oversized war-pick, using the weapon's long handle for extra leverage, and the unwieldy, unbalanced spike became a lethal threat for the giant.

Building momentum in the air, he spun in a way that would be impossible in the real world without wings and the inhuman strength of their avatars even before the system recognized the activation motion for a sword skill and took over. Further and further it accelerated him until Issin's figure turned into a blurry, vicious spinning top that rapidly approached the frost giant, and the tip of his weapon took on a fiery orange glow just before he slammed it square into the center of the giant's breastplate.

Crack

.

It went almost unheard in the din of combat, but to Asuna, Kirito, and the others who'd learned to listen for this particular sound as though their lives depended on it, the sound was impossible to miss.

Issin's strike pierced through the giant's armour, and a spiderweb of cracks extended outward from the impact, where the spike was buried to the base in the armour rather than passing through like Asuna's earlier Linear or Rain's Vorpal Strike.

An armour-break skill...

the blue-haired fencer breathed silently. The armour shimmered for a moment, before it blew outward in a spectacular explosion, crumbling under the effect of the skill.

As the giant's armour fell apart, Sachi's form swung into place in one well-practiced swoop, the other Undine's sword already cocked back and glowing with a sword skill waiting to be unleashed of her own. The fiery blaze of her Howling Octave's five thrusts pierced clean through the vulnerable giant's torso, and the following two vertical slashes bit deep into its chest. The sword skill's final stroke carried Sachi's form high above it into the sky, carried aloft by sapphire-shining wings, only for her to return to the ground in a high-speed dive, blade extended in front of her with a fierce yell that was at odds with the usually peaceful image of Undine as healers and menders.

A glowing red line bisected the giant from top to bottom as the last survivor of the Moonlit Black Cats landed on one knee in a perfect three-point landing, before her foe burst apart into colourful pixels.

"Go Sachi-chan!" more cheers went up as Fuurinkazan's samurai cheered for the girl they'd adopted as one of their own, surrounding her in celebration before she'd even managed to get back to her feet from the post-skill delay of her attack.

Asuna looked upon the scene with a mirthful smile of her own as she and Kizmel joined Kirito's group on the ground. "You sure know how to pick them, Kirito-kun. You two taught her well," she said, watching as Klein affectionately ruffled the other girl's hair and Harry One gave her a fist-bump.

"Eh...we just showed her the basics. Klein and the guys really took care of her the most, and Sachi put in a lot of work even when she didn't have to," her former partner answered, scratching at his cheek. "Anyway, that's two down-"

Another battlecry went up as a third frost giant disappeared nearby in quick succession – among the fairies flitting through the air, Asuna quickly recognized a couple of other prominent figures. Lady Sakuya's green kimono stood out against the grey, cloudy sky as easily as General Eugene's crimson, and their respective retinues swarmed around where their own target had just gone down amid a multi-coloured display of sword skills and magic spells.

"Three down," Kirito corrected himself with a chuckle, "this is going better than I thought, all things considered.""Don't rest on yer laurels just yet, Kii-bou," a familiar voice called out, and Asuna looked over to find a blonde Cait Sith fly over towards them."Argo! You made it!"The info-broker grinned. "Wouldn't have missed this bash fer anything, A-chan.""Hey, Argo," Kirito greeted her in turn, the blonde giving him and Kizmel a fist-bump in greeting. "Surprised you're home already."
That's right, they're working together,
Asuna reminded herself, so it wasn't surprising that they'd seen her more recently.
Kizmel-chan mentioned something about that. Some kind of top-secret thing involving her and the guy from the
SAO
task force.

"So...we might have a bit of a problem," the Cait Sith continued as Fuurinkazan joined them, as well, with Agil, Lisbeth, and Silica in tow. "Have you noticed yet?"

"That they're absurdly tough?" Agil mentioned. "Yeah. That's really hard to miss."

Argo's eyes narrowed in amusement. "I mean, that's one thing, yeah, but not the one I was talking about. Take a close look at your HUD. Notice something?"

At my HUD…?
Asuna's eyes darted across the overlay that sat at the corner of her vision, out of focus for the most part unless she paid attention to it.
HP and MP bars, party menu, buffs, and...what's that?
She spotted a new icon amid the list of small symbols that listed all of her buffs and debuffs.
A snowflake?

"An AoE debuff, huh?" Kirito answered thoughtfully. "So I wasn't imagining things."

Argo shook her head. "Nope. From what I can gather it's a frost aura of some kind. Doesn't seem to be doing any damage...yet, at least from what I've seen, but it definitely seems ta be slowing us down."

It's like the fiftieth floor all over again.

For an instant, Asuna's breath caught, something that didn't go unnoticed by the others, although judging from the grim set of their features, she wasn't the only one who was unpleasantly reminded of the battle against Maveli, the Asura King at the halfway point of Aincrad.

"A slow aura, huh?" Klein muttered, looking down at his hands that held the man's signature katana. "I guess that explains a lot. I was wondering why I was starting to feel more sluggish."

"It doesn't seem ta be too bad," the blonde Cait Sith continued her explanation, "but I wouldn't recommend stayin' in it fer too long. It does seem to stack and build up over time. But there's more."

Of course there's more,
Asuna thought to herself with a wry grin. But she already had an inkling of what Argo was about to say. "They're healing, aren't they."

"Aha," the blonde cackled merrily, "ya got me there, A-chan. Thought ya might be the one ta figure it out. Those giants? They're not just fighting like any old mob in this game. Notice how they're advancing? Melee in front, healers, buffers, and casters behind. Sound familiar to ya?"

"It's like...it's like a raid!" Leafa exclaimed, green eyes wide with surprise. "They're almost fighting like...like-"

"Like players."

-------------------------------

Kirito couldn't help the grin that was slowly spreading across his lips; he'd been excited to see what Lind and his people at YMIR were cooking up ever since the former guild leader had invited him and Kizmel to help test out some of the new mechanics and functions. They hadn't revealed any details to them, of course, but the swordsman could sort of imagine what scenarios they had in mind based on the mechanics from those tests, and had been looking forward to the final product ever since.

So this is what you're going with, huh?

There were many ways a game designer could choose to increase the difficulty and keep players interest, but not many of those would work in a game purely based around skill and without levels – and it seemed that Lind had made his choice in how to move forward with NewALO. He'd not taken the easy way out, by simply adding more monsters or monsters with more HP and higher resistance to damage; instead, he was turning the players' own primary strength against them: their ability to coordinate and fight together in groups and teams, using even the most basics of strategy. SAO had never had magic spells to fulfill what gamers called the "holy trinity" of support, DPS, and tanks, but this new game of theirs did.

It's kind of ironic that now that we're out of the death game and technically have no reason to meet up, I've been talking more with Lind than I think I ever did in

SAO, the swordsman pondered with no small measure of amusement.

And despite what I thought, we get along better than we ever did back then, too. Somehow.

The former guild leader and the rest of his team at YMIR had been hard at work, thinking about expanding overseas, something Kirito knew because he'd asked many of the death game's veterans for input and ideas on how to improve the game, including him and Kizmel. The launch event coincided with the opening of the game's overseas servers to draw in a larger playerbase – something even more important now that there was far more competition springing up both internationally and domestically since the release of the Seed. Every update between the game's re-launch and now had been building up to this as part of Lind's grand plan, from adding new content and areas, to tweaking the difficulty and ensuring that the game remained challenging to its veterans without inducing overt powercreep, and now it was finally time to see if everything YMIR had done up to now would pay off.

I guess we'll see how well this works out for you and YMIR, then. Let's see what you got!

After all, if anyone knew just what even a small group of coordinated clearers was capable of, it was Lind – and in some ways, Kirito couldn't help but feel that this had the hallmarks of a challenge from the older man written all over it.

"Incoming!"

The shout was the only warning he got as Dale's voice echoed over to them in a controlled panic. A sharp whistling sound triggered reflexes honed in Aincrad over two years of life-and-death struggle, as the swordsman unlimbered the large sword off his back and sweeping the air in front of him in one smooth motion, resulting in a resounding

clang

as lance-like projectile struck the flat of his sword, shortly followed by a second one that was batted out of the air by Kirito's follow-through, sending it whirling off behind them.

Next to him, Kizmel and Nautilus already had their shields out as more projectiles glanced off of them, one particular one slamming into his wife's shield with enough force to almost rock her off her feet. Looking at the massive, javelin-sized object that was stuck in her shield, Kirito realized that it wasn't a lance at all – but rather, the b

ol

t of an enormous crossbow that had been shot from the back ranks of the frost giants' army that was

now

making its presence known.

A flare of light caused him to look to the side and duck as another arm-length projectile was hurled overhead, its momentum stopped cold in mid-air by a pinpoint accurate Linear from Asuna that no one else could've replicated.

"Okay," Kirito amended dryly, eyeing the remainder of the giants' army as spells and more bolts began to arc overhead, heading straight towards them in response to the spellfire that had been hurled by the players, "

that's

a problem."

"Close ranks! Guildmaster Klein!" Kizmel shouted out, "on me!"

"You heard the lady! Move it! You good Harry?"

The youngest-looking member of Fuurinkazan took a health potion from Dynamm before nodding. "Good here, boss."

The group of red-armoured samurai gathered around them, Harry One and Kunimittz adding their own shields to Kizmel's and Nautilus's, just in time for the second volley to land in their midst

as the tanks braced themselves

. Impacts rang against steel and wood like mallets striking a brass gong, and Kirito barely avoided getting caught out in a blast from one of the icy spears of magic that landed just behind the tanks as it erupted into a burst of frozen air and sharp, crystalline splinters of ice. HP bars shrunk drastically as some of them took a direct hit, as not all of them were able to cluster in behind the few tanks of their party or were struck by AoEs that landed behind them.

"Everyone okay?" Asuna called out.

"We're good, I think," Klein answered, "but we better get a move on."

Glancing around, the black-clad Sylph was inclined to agree with the older man's assessment; their groups were lucky in that they rarely, if ever, disbanded their parties, so most of them were already grouped up.

The only ones out are…

Onyx eyes landed on his former partner.

Asuna, Agil, Argo, Lisbeth and Silica.

There was no time for them to reshuffle groups;

t

hinking quickly, his fingers dashed through the menus in mid-air in front of him, and soon enough the party menu that showed his friends' HP bars on the left side of this HUD glowed and expanded, incorporating two more parties as he added them to the impromptu raid group.

Asuna, proactive as always, had moved before he could even mention anything. Kirito was relieved to find her, followed by the others who were out of groups that she'd quickly gathered up into an

ad-hoc

party, and their names were added to the side bar on his HUD.

"Let's go!" he called out, taking flight before the next salvo could have a chance to land in between them. "Get moving, don't group up!"

Giving his wings a rapid flutter, Kirito shot upwards into the air, the rest of his small group scattering around him as the next volley landed in the place they'd just vacated. Looking around the area, he found the persistent defense the players in Alne had been putting up crumbling once again under the renewed pressure as spells and projectiles landed far behind them, among the healers and casters in the back.

We've got to do something-

"Out of the way, slowpokes!"

"

Whoa!"

"Watch out!"

Something slammed into him from behind, sending the Sylph careening through the air in an uncontrollable tumble for a few seconds. A few choice words followed unflatteringly, but by the time Kirito had managed to right himself, ready to retort indignantly after seeing Lisbeth and Silica similarly knocked out of the air by the reckless party that had crashed right through their small group, the other players were already far ahead. The swordsman sighed and was about to write them off as just another group of rude players when he caught sight of something that, for just a second, made his blood ran cold.

Monster trains were a relatively common, if frowned upon, occurrence in MMOs. Most times, they were accidents, caused by players that realized mid-fight they were in over their heads and decided to run, but couldn't

quite

outrun the mobs chasing them. Other times, they were caused by reckless players trying to take the fastest route from A to B without caring how much aggro they pulled, and relying on the monsters leashing back to their spawn point after getting far enough away.

But sometimes, they were done maliciously.

In

SAO

in particular, the practice of running a mob train into other players in order to either overwhelm them or outright get them killed was an action that had earned itself the deadly moniker of

MPK

– and no one who'd survived the death game could view

one done on purpose

as anything but attempted murder.

And while

NewALO

was just a game, those old instincts and fears were hard to shake, even long after they'd left Aincrad behind.

"See you, suckers!"

It was an uncharitable thought – but one that the

other

group's parting shout left him with no doubts that the action had been deliberate. But by luck or happenstance, Kirito and the others had scattered far enough that the mob train had just followed through the gap they'd opened without actually zeroing in on any of them...something that couldn't be said for the next unfortunate group up ahead, that was already deeply involved in a melee against a couple of other frost giants.

Kirito watched, eyes narrowed, as the group swung past the fighting players, before cutting sharply

up

and away from the fighting, leaving no doubt that their behaviour was intentional.

"We've got to help them! Kirito-kun!"

Asuna's call cooled his simmering fury, snapp

ing

the black-clad Sylph back to the present, and he took a moment to chuckle at the fact that even now, his former partner was looking at the grand picture even while he was

occupied

with the little things. Sharing a quick glance with Kizmel on his left, and Klein on his right, Kirito nodded sharply.

"Let's go."

Tensing the virtual muscles on his back that only existed in the world of fairies, Kirito

surged

forward, relying on the others to keep up as they

fell in

around him. Speeding towards the beleaguered group that suddenly had to deal with being attacked from an unexpected direction, he entered a steep dive, sword already slung over his right shoulder.

It didn't take them long to get in range, and he shifted the weapon ever so slightly, swaying it in a familiar motion; the system recognized it instantly, and the pull from the Sonic Leap accelerated him beyond speeds regularly attainable by players in flight. The swordsman's blade trailed an arc of blue light through the air as he brought it down, cutting into the path of a giant who'd picked out a Cait Sith as its target while the other player was busy casting towards his own comrades,

the mere action of casting a spell enough to generate considerable amounts of aggro with none of their tanks in range

.

"Heads up!" Kirito shouted a warning just before he reached his target, azure-glowing blade intersecting the path of the frost giant's swing.

Grunting with the effort of maintaining thrust from his wings against the larger weapon, he pushed his avatar and the sword skill to the very limits the system would allow, maintaining his posture and refusing to let the monster cut right through him as the two blades clashed in a brilliant flare of light. The glow suffusing the two-handed sword in his hands dimmed and wavered against the giant's strength and size as the Sylph struggled to maintain the low-level sword skill – in mid-air, there was no way for him to leverage his avatar's own monstrous strength stat, forcing him to rely solely on his wings.

"Whoa-" the Cait Sith turned around, eyes wide with shock and surprise at the appearance of not only the giant, but also the comparatively small form of another player stopping its swing cold. To his credit, he didn't hesitate and darted to the side and out of the way immediately. "Thanks, nya!"

Finally, with a low-pitched whine, the Sonic Leap finally spent the last of its power, and Kirito's avatar locked up in its post-skill delay. Gravity and momentum reasserted themselves, and even though he'd stopped the giant's swing, the weight of its weapon pushed against the swordsman's unresponsive avatar, threatening to crush him into the ground.

Kirito landed in a crouch and threw himself to the side the moment the brief lockup ended, avoiding the edge that crashed into the ground next to him. Before the giant could retrieve it, however, it staggered forward

as something struck it from behind with tremendous force. Purple light flared from behind its back, and the Sylph knew exactly who he had to thank for the split-second rescue as Kizmel's signature Treble Scythe carved a huge chunk from the giant's unguarded back.

Getting back to his feet, Kirito swung back up to take advantage of the giant's disorientation from his wife's attack. Climbing rapidly, the swordsman found another being targeted by Rain and Philia already, while Leafa covered the pair by buzzing around the giant's head to distract it; the green-clad Sylph's attacks didn't have the potency or sheer weight of a sword skill, but the way she struck with a speed that rivaled Asuna's in a straight line more than made up for it.

Nearby, Fuurinkazan had split up and slammed into the rest of the mob train like a wrecking ball while Asuna and Agil tag-teamed another

with Argo running interference

.

The new foes YMIR had thrown at them for this event were big and tough, but

SAO

's former clearers took little time in dismantling them, now that the initial shock of the attack had worn off –

and individually, Kirito figured they weren't much of a challenge, particularly when tag-teamed

.

Once

the last of the frost giants in the immediate area finally toppled over, stuck between the desperately fighting group of Cait Sith and the former clearers, Kirito finally allowed himself to let out a little sigh of relief, just before a familiar face appeared in front of him.

"Oho, it's Kirito and Kizmel!" Alicia Rue's small from grinned cheerfully, the cat-like ears of her avatar flicking this way and that. "It's been a while, thanks for the save."

"Alicia," he greeted as the two groups landed back on the ground. "You guys all good?"

The diminutive leader of the Cait Sith nodded, her tail flicking merrily. "Yeah, you came just in time. We were doing fine, until

those

jerk

s

trained a whole group of them right into us."

"

Yeah, we saw," the black-haired Sylph grimaced. "They tried with us, too."

Alicia grinned cheerfully. "Looks like it wouldn't have been a problem for you guys even if they'd succeeded, eh?" The Lord of the Caith Sith glanced over at his sister. "You know, Leafa-chan, when you first showed up with those two, I didn't think there'd be any more of them around. Don't know where you found them all, but you're all welcome to come back to our capital and have a feast on me, when this event is over, how about it?"

"Dang,

I'm in!

" Klein

jumped excitedly

as he joined them, before smiling politely and offering a formal bow. "Hello there, Miss. I'm Klein, twenty-ouch! Hey!"

"Now's not the time, boss," Dale chuckled, rapping his guild leader on the back of his head with his knuckles. "You can introduce yourself to the lady later. Sorry about him."

Instead of being offended, however, Alicia Rue just laughed merrily, much to Kirito's surprise. "Ah," she managed after a hearty chuckle, "don't worry, at least he's refreshingly straight forward. You're Salamanders, right?"

"Some of us," Klein answered, his tone reverting back to serious as all traces of the affable goofball disappeared, "but we're really a mix. It's just my guild's signature armour."

Leafa chuckled at their antics; at first she'd been a little put-off by the way Klein could be – even Kirito, despite having known Klein for a long time, could be surprised at times by the way the older man could switch from klutz to serious leader

at will

. But it was his personality and skills, which were the real deal, that had kept all seven of them alive and safe throughout the death game, and it didn't take much to realize that fact.

"You know she's going to try and recruit you all, right?" the blonde Sylph said, earning herself a playful shush from the other girl as Alicia put a finger over her lips in an exaggerated motion.

"Either way, you guys sure bailed us out of a tight spot. So, what's the plan?" the Cait Sith asked, glancing from Klein to Kirito and Kizmel.

Why's she looking at us?

the swordsman couldn't help but think. Thankfully, he was saved from having to answer by Asuna, as the blue-haired Undine stepped in between them, explaining her plan. "We have to gather up as many groups as we can, and organize them before we can start thinking about fighting back. Something on this scale isn't something we can beat one party at a time."

Rue peered up at her, eyes narrowed, before nodding sharply. "
Group up now, figure out win conditions later – sounds good to me
. Looks like you got a decent plan going, we're with you. Sakuya and Eugene should be floating around somewhere around here, too.

We were supposed to meet up, but this whole thing kicked off before we could get together."

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

October 5th, 2025

If she ever told anyone, much less her mother, that Asuna much preferred facing her problems head-on with a rapier in hand, the kinds of problems that she could dispatch with a swift display of the fencing skill and speed that had earned her the moniker of Lightning Flash in Aincrad, she was sure that they would look at her like a crazy person. However, it wasn't something she could help; despite everything that had happened, Asuna the Flash had ingrained itself into the very core of her being to the point that she doubted that she would ever shake the remnants of the person who'd once been the vice-commander of the Knights of Blood, no matter how hard she tried. It was just one of the ways in which Aincrad had left its mark on her.

But much to her surprise, Asuna found that...she didn't mind.

At first, she'd railed and raged against their imprisonment in Aincrad, looked desperately for a way out, and carried that drive and desperation all the way to the end. Somewhere along the line though, Asuna had learned to not just tolerate, but also enjoy life in that virtual world, to take little pleasures where she could find them, and eventually, the steel castle had even grown on her a little. To the point that, in the deepest, darkest corner of her mind, if Asuna was completely honest with herself, she sometimes even missed that world.

The blue-haired fencer glanced to her side where her two former partners were flying right beside her.

And it's thanks to those two.

Sapphire eyes closed for a moment, a small smile playing around her lips at the familiar feeling of diving headlong into trouble alongside her two best friends.

Her family.

To them, it didn't matter that she wasn't in their immediate party, or that she only logged into the game once in a blue moon. When Asuna had first returned to school after recovering enough, she had been saddened to find that the girls she'd been friends with in school had simply moved on, barely even bothering to remember her existence. No one had so much as uttered anything beyond the bare necessity of pleasantries upon her return, and it had stung – though not as much as she'd expected. Aincrad had taught her to recognize who her true friends were, and who only stuck around because there was something to gain.

And the friends she'd made during those two years were the truest she'd ever known.

Even when she sometimes felt like an outsider, like the distance between them was back to what it had once been in the clearing group, and she doubted whether she really did belong here with them, Kirito and Kizmel never failed to welcome her back into the virtual world, no matter how long she was absent for, or how much she'd missed. To them, it didn't matter if she was there every day or once in a blue moon, because they really, truly, cared.

For as much as she tried to live up to her family's expectation to be the heiress of the Yuuki estate and business, for everything Asuna did in the real world, nothing quite felt as refreshing to her as coming back here.

I'm beginning to see what Kirito-kun meant about this feeling like coming home

, she mused, gripping the hilt of her weapon tightly, before her body almost unconsciously stretched itself forward into the familiar motion of a Linear. In this world, she could move without thinking, and it left her with a clarity of mind and purpose that was all too often absent in the real world. Unbound by gravity, she launched her signature attack mid-air, fairy wings beating rapidly and lending the Undine a speed she never could have achieved on foot until it rivaled that of even her fastest Shooting Star.

The attack pulled her ahead of her companions, the speed that had made her famous in the death game on full display for all to see even among the outlandishly strong Survivors. Yet, from the corner of her eye, there was a green and golden figure that kept up with her as she struck home, a spear of brilliant silver light piercing clean through the giant's elbow and disabling its shield-bearing arm for a split second. Asuna took the brief moment of post-skill delay when her avatar locked up to look over at where her erstwhile partner's sister was a similar blur of colour and motion, sweeping in to strike like a hawk at the giant's other shoulder. The katana in the Sylph's hand was little more than an arc of silver as Leafa slashed and cut – different from the way her brother fought, but the same in spirit, always moving, an unrelenting storm of steel.

With a roar, the frost giant turned its attention towards the Undine as the first damage was dealt to its HP bar. Even though the Linear was a basic sword skill, Leafa's attacks, while quick, lacked the sheer damage and elemental component of a sword skill to fully pull aggro when compared to Asuna's own high-speed thrust. Before it could so much as recover and raise its own weapon in retaliation, however, Kirito and Kizmel slammed into it with all the force of a freight train, displaying the brutish strength of avatars that had defined the roles of tank and power attack among the clearing group.

Hovering back behind the pair, Asuna let out the breath she'd been holding, watching the dancing lights as Kirito swung and Kizmel deflected, before diving right back in between the two, rapier already cocked back for another attack. The former Black Swordsman came free of his own skill delay, tearing from unnatural stillness back into motion with an abruptness that belied him ever having stopped at all, the absurdly oversized sword that he swung in one hand moving in graceful arcs as it struck against their foe's weapon. They clashed and the giant lost, opening up a gap just wide enough for Kizmel to slip through as the Imp speared the giant's arm with an Oblique; the slanted thrust struck at the joint with the kind of accuracy few could manage, leaving its arm limp for just an instant.

Asuna swiftly took advantage of the opportunity her partners had created, already counting down the seconds until the pair could move again. The blade in her hand changed from its silvery-blue glow to a vibrant crimson as the fencer made her choice, aligning her body just so. Relinquishing control over her avatar to the system assist, she jumped forward as the rapier lashed out four times in quick succession, and she was rewarded for her efforts as the Quadruple Pain hammered her foe's torso with a quartet of thrusts that caused a status effect icon to flash above the frost giant's head, next to its HP gauge.

Got you!

she cheered silently as the skill's debuff took effect, stunning and immobilizing their quarry for a precious few seconds, more than long enough for Kirito and Kizmel to recover and lay into it with the most powerful sword skills at their disposal without fear of reprisal. Caught between two veteran clearers and unable to move, its HP gauge emptied before Asuna could even line up another shot.

They moved on to the next, and this time it was Kirito who led the charge, as the black-clad Sylph was the one closest to it. He pivoted in mid-air and swung around in a graceful turn, then shot forward, wings folded back in high-speed flight, and even Asuna struggled to match his sudden acceleration. The former Black Swordsman slammed into a frost giant wielding a war hammer with enough momentum to hold back its massive weapon even without help from the system while Kizmel darted low, the light-blue glowing lines she traced in mid-air announcing her attack as the Imp traced a Horizontal Square that struck the back of the giant's knees and brought it down.

Asuna pushed her own wings as far as they could go, before raising her rapier in front of her. A shimmering comet appeared at the tip of the sword, blooming into a brilliant silver orb as the fencer trailed a glowing streak, turning the Undine herself into a shooting star as she stretched herself as though trying to reach that little bit further. Her Flashing Penetrator, elevated to power beyond anything achievable in Aincrad by the speed and agility of

NewALO

's flight, crashed into the frost giant's chest with enough force to send Asuna bursting out behind it among a cloud of rainbow-hued pixels, the sheer speed and power of her attack enough to empty what remained of its life bar.

A strange sound filled the air – laughter, and it took Asuna a moment to realize that it was coming from her own chest.

She chased after Kirito and Kizmel, falling in next to the pair as they widened the gap between them to allow the fencer to slide into their midst. All around them were her friends and comrades, and she knew without looking, that similar grins were on all of their faces.

Earlier, for just a moment, when the event had started and flames and destruction had threatened to engulf Alne, Asuna had felt unsettled. It had reminded her of another city in flames, another time when they'd fought desperately to save themselves from an invasion at the siege of Lyusula. At the time, she'd nearly panicked, and it had taken a while for her to be able to admit why that battle in particular had had such an impact on her – because she'd considered the dark elven capital, much like she did Alne, "safe."

A part of why she had been so shaken after completing the Elf War campaign alongside Kirito and Kizmel, something she'd never admitted to anyone other than herself, was just how much seeing the city of the dark elves on fire and embattled, with screams of combat and the throes of the dying, had terrified her. Even knowing intellectually that these were NPCs and not "real" that were dying and screaming had done little to dull the effect of being in what amounted to the middle of a war zone.

Because in a way, perhaps because she'd been around Kirito so much and he tended to subsume himself into that world, to her, they

had

been real to some extent.

It was why she'd been dead set against her erstwhile partner getting involved with the game's world and its NPCs, and why she'd always looked upon his involvement with that virtual world with a combination of fear and resentment.

To her, that city had held a lot of memories – of downtime with Kirito and Kizmel, of some of the happiest she'd been during the nightmare that had been the death game, of feeling like a place that was away from the pressures and consequences of openly being the Black Swordsman's partner when no one else would be.

Not that I regret even a moment of that,

she mused.

No, standing by one of the best friends she'd ever had in either world was something Asuna would never regret, but that had come with its own repercussions that she'd never told Kirito a word about, for fear that he'd take it the wrong way and try to distance himself once more in a misguided attempt to take responsibility that wasn't his.

After all, the beater was notorious throughout the death game, and particularly the early days had been difficult – when they had butted heads with Lind's Dragon Knights Brigade and Kibaou's Aincrad Liberation Squad, all the while pushing further ahead than anyone else, riding the fine line between recklessness and bravery as they went where angels feared to tread before anyone else could.

Meeting Kizmel, having another girl around, and finally finding a place away from all of the other players' judgmental or desirous looks had been a godsend. And, in some ways, she had also felt much better with another girl – real or not, it hadn't mattered at the time – around, to ease her discomfort in those early days of being alone with a boy. Lyusula, in many ways, had been that outlet for her, symbolizing a place of peace in the deadly whirlwind that had been their lives in Aincrad, and it had been violently torn apart upon the completion of the Elf War campaign. The loss of that peace, more than anything, was what had caused her to look upon Kirito's tendency to view that world of swords as real with caution when the dark elf had re-entered their lives after the two of them had parted ways.

Still, the times spent with those two had been some of the best of her life, in a way, even if it was set against the backdrop of the death game.

Or maybe it was

because

we were trapped in a death game,

she couldn't help but think.

But that's something mother and father won't...or can't...understand. Maybe ever. Mother especially doesn't seem to want to see that I'm a different person now, that even if I wanted to just...just pick up where I'd left off, I don't think I could.

Even now, while she had attempted to fully immerse herself back into real life, to put her obligations and duties to her family above even her own recovery, Asuna couldn't help but long to return to this world. It was a notion she knew no one outside of those who'd lived through those two years in Akihiko Kayaba's death game could – or

would

– understand, but she also didn't expect them to. Asuna knew that it was strange to feel nostalgia for a place that had held her captive, a place that had threatened her life and torn apart, or even outright ended, many others.

By all accounts, the man behind Heathcliff was a villain as much as the Paladin stylized himself as the hero of his story, a criminal who, though he might not have killed anyone with his own hands – his final duel challenge to Kirito aside – had, at the very least, caused untold amounts of death and suffering through his own negligence and callous disregard for human life.

But...she had missed standing shoulder to shoulder with her friends, with the people she trusted with her life, facing down impossible odds and holding off the gathering storm. She'd missed this feeling of doing something that had meaning, that would make a

difference

, even if it was limited to only this virtual world of theirs

. It was so different from her everyday, almost mundane, life that she found herself in, and with a start, she'd come to realize that she almost longed for the adventure and excitement of traversing these virtual worlds with her friends every day.

It was here, on the rare times that she spent with them, that Asuna felt like she

belonged

. That this, right here, alongside them, was where she was meant to be, even if it was just a game.

Feeling the familiar weight of her rapier in her palm, the practiced, almost unconscious movement of her virtual avatar, it had all returned to her with far more ease than she'd expected, shockingly even more so than other things she'd thought she'd dedicated her life to before being trapped in

Sword Art Online

. A small smile briefly quirked the Undine's lips upward as an absent thought crossed her mind.

I better not let Mother know that fencing came back to me easier than calculus.

Part of her even missed the

fighting

. She'd missed wielding a sword, the sheer simplicity of battle, the way she could turn everything off and just let her reflexes take over without having to consider anything that came with the stigma of real life, her family name, or her family's business. It was so much more simple than everything else she had to deal with in the real world as the heir to the family business, and the expectations and obligations that came with that role.

Right now, it felt

good

to see that what was needed wasn't Asuna the dutiful student, but the Lightning Flash, who'd earned her stripes leading charges against the most dangerous of Aincrad's bosses and who was proud of the skills she'd earned fighting with the best. It felt

like being back there, knowing that these people had her back and could read her intentions and respond without having to say a word. It was an unspoken understanding cultivated by trust, and friendship like no other bond she'd ever experienced, and it was…

Exhilarating

.

-------------------------------

Leafa had originally thought that the kind of coordination and unspoken communication between her brother and his girlfriend was unique to them – a result of the bond and trust and experience and yes, a romantic part of her admitted, the love between them. But she'd quickly discovered that the same applied to the other members of his former party as well, though to a somewhat lesser extent.

Not that there was anything truly "lesser" about the way the group split up and dove and dashed from one fight to the next, dispatching foes left and right with barely a need for a second pass. Very few words were exchanged, no commands were barked, because they didn't need to be; Kirito turned and the group banked to follow, maneuvering with a speed that Leafa struggled to keep up with. One of them would lead, and the others joined in without needing to be told as the party crashed into the impenetrable-looking wall of frost giants like a steamroller, carving a narrow, unrelenting path without really slowing down.

She was always amazed and terrified in equal measure to think of how much fighting and how many dangerous battles this small group of people had to have endured together in order to forge bonds that strong. They knew each other on a deep, instinctive level, trusted one another in a way that Leafa couldn't even imagine.

Looking at her brother, she wasn't surprised to find him grinning widely and looking like he was having the time of his life. Then again, for as long as she'd been playing with him, he'd never really taken things that happened in-game too seriously – after escaping the death game, the blonde imagined that it had given him quite a unique perspective on what to bother getting upset over. Kirito always preferred to simply enjoy his time in Alfheim instead of chasing the latest and greatest, and instead left that to his other friends.

Which was part of why he was more or less unknown to the game's newer players; he wasn't as involved in guild politics like the faction leaders, he didn't really run the high-end raids like Klein and Fuurinkazan, and he wasn't really notorious for being at the forefront of finding new treasure and loot like Philia and Rain. Nor was he famous for participating in or winning the game's seasonal dueling tournaments like Leafa herself...and the blonde Sylph got the distinct impression that her brother preferred it that way.

After everything she'd heard about his reputation in the death game, it didn't surprise her.

But his laid-back attitude even extended to things like people challenging him to a duel, or boss fights, or PvP – in fact, he seemed to take these kinds of things as a fun challenge to overcome, rather than something to get really invested in or upset over. As much as he griped about the fact that General Eugene continually came to him and Kizmel for practice duels, Leafa could tell that he enjoyed fighting the man purported to be the best player in the game just as much The only time she really saw him get serious was whenever he came across a malicious gank, and early on it was a rather common occurrence for gankers to mistake him for a new player, since he didn't bother with high-end or raid gear.

Not that he needs it,

Leafa noted with a silent chuckle.

None of them really do.

"Having fun?" she called out over the roar of spells and clashing swords.

"Yeah!" he answered brightly, batting away a spear-sized crossbow bolt with the same ease as swatting at a fly while the pouring rain drenched them both, lit by only the lightning crackling across the sky. "This is a blast!"

Leafa watched the feat from the corner of her eye enviously and with no small amount of mixed feelings while dancing around her own opponent. The blonde Sylph was proud of her own skill in the game, earned across numerous dueling tournaments as well as her own real-life kendo practice, but she also wasn't blind to her own limitations – limitations which stemmed from the difference in how she and her brother had learned swordsmanship in the first place.

Hers was grounded in her real-life training in kendo, and the virtual world of Alfheim had simply opened up new possibilities to her. At the end of the day, however, those were just additions to her already learned abilities.

But Kirito, Kizmel, and the others?

They'd learned in

this

world, using

its

rules. They were familiar with all of its quirks, tricks, and nuances in a way that she simply wasn't, and they didn't have the same constraints of being bound to a set of rules or ideas from the get-go. It had been fine before, when

Alfheim Online

's swordsmanship had been solely skill-based, but ever since sword skills had been introduced a few months prior, the blonde was beginning to notice a marked difference in how the others fought versus how she fought.

It was almost enough to make her jealous.

The blonde Sylph loved playing with her brother, and she'd rapidly become friends with most of the other players who'd survived the death game by his side; in turn, they had quickly taken her as one of their own as well, but there was a part of Leafa that couldn't help but worry that she was falling behind or that she was holding them back. When Kirito and Kizmel fought together, they were two halves of a seamless whole, and she'd thought that was something special between the two of them.

But watching them now, she felt something stir deep down inside at the reminder that it

wasn't

just her brother and his girlfriend sharing this kind of unique bond. If Kirito and Kizmel together, as a pair, were a well-oiled machine, then to the blonde

kendoka

it appeared that Asuna had been the missing piece that elevated their performance to something beyond reason, to something almost unbelievably magical.

The three of them just

fit

, somehow, despite the odds, and now that she was watching them, Leafa could see the hole that the Undine's absence left in her brother and his girlfriend's fighting style. Kirito would lead the charge, diving in head-first with Kizmel at his back to protect him, while Asuna darted in with a quick, powerful strike once the opponent was distracted. Then she would be covered by the Imp, and Kirito would take over for her...it was a perfectly choreographed tactic that worked time and time again, regardless of the enemy they faced. There was no opening to exploit, no one left vulnerable for even a split second while they recovered from a sword skill. With a third person there, all three of them were free to release the shackles on the more powerful skills that had commensurately long post-skill delays, which in turn only hastened their chosen target's downfall.

After a few minutes of trying to keep up with the

SAO

Survivors as they relentlessly cut a swath through the hordes of frost giants that was pushing towards the Sylphs around Lady Sakuya, she finally decided to hang back and simply play support for her brother and his two partners.

Not that Kazu-nii or the others really need it

, Leafa thought to herself with a wry smile while preparing another set of buffs for the trio,

but I guess every little bit helps

.

While she wouldn't lose out on speed, there was simply no way for her to keep up with the sheer devastation that each and every single one, even little Silica, seemed capable of doling out. Part of her felt a little bad for the uncharitable thought of how unfair this was, because the blonde Sylph knew first hand how hard-earned that skill was.

Sweat and tears and

blood

,

she reminded herself of the price they'd paid for it.

Plus, it's not like Kazu-nii really has a lot of time to play with all of them these days, between school and his work with Agent Kikuoka…and all the time he's spending with me.

But that still didn't fully quench the feeling of envy towards the way those three just fit together, and how happy and

whole

Kirito looked when flying and fighting with Kizmel and Asuna by his side – like this was where he belonged. In this world. In this place.

With

them

.

Finally her sharp eyes spotted a familiar flash of dark green in the distance, surrounded by a cocoon of silvery arcs that was Lady Sakuya and her tempestuous defense; the long-bladed

tachi

that the Lord of the Sylphs was known for carving great arcs through the air with the same elegance and grace as when she wielded it in tournaments. Next to her, Leafa spotted the small form of Recon, darting back and forth as he did his best to support the rest of Sakuya's retinue with his own spells and buffs.

Leafa was about to call out to Kirito, but he'd spotted them as well, and was already changing course right for them, the rest of his group swiftly following behind, leaving her to realize that she didn't even have to say anything. Shaking her head fondly, she hurried to catch up, taking the time to top off the health of anyone who'd taken a beating along the way.

"Those guys really are something else, huh?"

Looking to the side at the sudden voice beside her, Leafa found a familiar face; the diminutive form of Alicia Rue, Lord of the Cait Sith flew alongside the speedy Sylph, clad in her usual skimpy armour and wearing a mischievous grin. The group of Cait Sith they had bailed out from the mob train had fallen in behind them, cleaning up whatever her brother and his friends left behind in their wake – which arguably wasn't much.

It took Leafa a moment to process what she meant. "Yeah, yeah they really are."

"You know, when I first met them, I thought those two were in a class of their own. Turns out there's a whole bunch more of them," her fellow blonde said with a chuckle. "Kind of makes me wonder how all these people got so good at a game they didn't really play before. And a little bit jealous."

"...I guess," the Sylph muttered, a pang of jealousy of her own stirring within.

Sharp eyes turned towards her. "Trouble in paradise, Leafa-chan?"

"I'm sorry?"

"That look on your face." The Cait Sith flicked her ears tellingly. "Feels like something's bothering you."

She blinked. "It's...it's nothing."

"Maybe that's what you're telling yourself." Alicia peered up at her intently, and for some reason, the scrutiny made Leafa feel a sudden bout of nervousness. Finally, her fellow blonde's grin widened and she leaned back, satisfied. "Feeling left out, huh?"

"I-" Leafa trailed off, unable to truthfully refute the older woman.

But if she noticed, Alicia Rue didn't show it. The older woman simply continued, glancing towards where Kirito was currently carving his way through a pair of frost giants, trading off with Asuna while Kizmel kept their backs free. "It's kind of easy to see, actually. You've worked hard to be one of the best players in the game, and then here they come – all in a league of their own, leaving the rest of us in the dust. Plus, that's your bother you've been spending a lot of time with. You wish you were up there with them, but I bet you feel like it wouldn't matter, right?"

"I-" the statuesque blonde started again, before closing her eyes with a sigh. "I guess," she admitted.

"Sounds like there's history there." Alicia Rue's grin faded slowly. "Probably not my place to pry, but it's also not hard to put two and two together, considering just who bought and re-launched this game."

Leafa shrugged, unwilling to tell the other woman too much without her brother's input – after all, what had happened to him, Kizmel, and Asuna was a very private matter, even if it sounded like the other woman had already guessed most of it.

"Yeah," was all she answered.

Alicia shrugged. "Hey, I don't think you've got to feel bad about not being able to keep up with them. There's always a bigger fish – and maybe it's good to have a goal to aim for, right? So what if none of us can keep up with them right now, do you think that's going to stop us from trying? You think that's going to stop

Eugene

from trying?" The shorter blonde giggled. "From what I hear, that man's been trying to duel with Kizmel every chance he gets to the point that it's starting to annoy Sakuya. I don't think people like you or him or even them let something as little as not being good enough

right now

stand in their way."

A chortled laugh escaped the Sylph suddenly.

That's exactly what Kazu-nii said, too.

Alicia tilted her head towards where the trio was exchanging high-fives after dealing with their group of mobs. "They seem like a very tightly-knit group, but that doesn't mean there isn't room for one more, right?"

"...right." Looking down at the katana in her hands. Just like always,

Mikazuki

was a comforting weight in Leafa's palm, but she couldn't shake the feeling that, just like herself, it was slowly being left behind. Even Recon seemed like he was beginning to drift away; it wasn't any fault of his, they both were just busy at school and in a way she was glad that he'd grown enough to feel confident in taking Lady Sakuya's invitation into her inner circle. But it also meant they spent less time together in the game outside of school, and all of it together meant that Leafa felt a little lonely.

Then she recalled Lisbeth's offer to help reforge

Mikazuki

it into something better, so that she could carry a part of her trusty blade with her still. Klein's offer for her to join Fuurinkazan, Rain's invitations to practice, and the early morning sparring sessions with her brother in the dojo – all of those had been made in earnest, because they genuinely wanted her to be a part of what they did.

Leafa followed Alicia Rue's gaze to find her brother hovering in the air above, who'd stopped fighting, trusting Kizmel and Asuna to keep him safe, looking right back at her.

Onyx eyes met her own, and he grinned broadly, waving her over.

For a moment, Leafa's heart beat a little bit faster, but she put that aside for now.He hadn't forgotten her, hadn't not realized that she was no longer right behind him, and somehow, that thought lifted a weight she hadn't even known was there from the Sylph's shoulders. No, she realized suddenly, Kazu-nii knows. Maybe he's always known. He'd always made room for her, accommodated her and came along whenever she asked him to without fail or complaint – more than that, she knew that he meant it, because Kirito the swordsman lived in the world of Alfheim just as much as her brother Kazuto lived in the real world – and in either place, his word was as good as gold.
-------------------------------
The Sylphs – or what was left of them – had rallied around Lady Sakuya to make their last stand. Kirito was surprised to see how badly they'd been hit, all things considered. They're not the Salamanders, but they were the second strongest faction in the game for a long time, the swordsman remembered while cutting through another giant that his sister and Kizmel had softened up. Looking up, he found Asuna already lining up the opening shot at their next target, and allowed himself to take a breather while his sword skills went on cooldown.
On top of that, they've got a lot of good players still. No, bad players and bad organization isn't why they're in trouble.
While they didn't have the innate, literal firepower in terms of magic that the Salamanders got, Sylphs in general favoured speed in their attacks and had a plentiful array of buffs and healing spells at their disposal, something his own sister was making good use of right now. But even the Cait Sith, who were less combat-oriented still, had done okay for themselves until they got hit in the back with the mob train from earlier.

It wasn't until he gained some altitude that Kirito realized exactly why the Sylphs had fared so poorly.

They got caught out when the giants pushed into the city,
the black-clad Sylph mused grimly.
No wonder, with this many players, I'm sure they took up a whole area to themselves to form up their raid group. And when the fighting started, they got isolated and cut off. Sylph defense magic isn't particularly good, and they prefer speed over brute force. With how hard these giants can hit and how tough they are, they're just not doing enough damage to outpace their healing...

Looking over the fighting that had descended into a desperate melee as players careened through the air around their gargantuan foes, trying not to get swatted from the sky as they landed what attacks they could, it wasn't difficult to see that they weren't in any state to be taking hits. Moreover, while his sister's Wind Wall was capable of protecting them to some extent, he figured that even several dedicated mages couldn't put up much resistance against the continuous spellfire coming from the frost giants.

As good as the Sylphs were, there simply hadn't been a chance for them to break out of the encirclement they'd found themselves in, as they simply didn't have the brute power to break out and burst down targets of opportunity like the Salamanders. Hunkering down, too, was a losing proposition as they battled their foes in a manner reminiscent of an old anime he'd once caught his mother watching, one that had left him with nightmares for a few days after when he'd still been young.

At least these guys aren't eating anyone
, Kirito grunted in amusement.
All right, we'll have to break them out. But first, let's deal with all the stuff that's being thrown at them from range.

Slowing down to let the rest of the group catch up from their rapid flight, he shouted over to where Fuurinkazan's red-armoured players were clustering up. "Klein!"

"Yo!" the older man shouted back, taking his group closer so they could talk. "What do you need, Kirito?"

Tilting his head towards the direction of the giants' rear-guard, the swordsman grinned. "Think you can give them some breathing room? We need those casters gone. They're also healing all of the damage the Sylphs are doing right now."

"Got it, consider them dealt with," Klein grinned, pushing up his ever-present bandanna with one hand. "You guys handle the rest." And then he was off, without so much as another word.

"Are...are they going to be okay?" Leafa asked from his side as they watched the members of Fuurinkazan take off in a steep climb. "That's...they're going really deep, and there's only seven of them."

Kirito shook his head. "They'll be fine. Klein knows what they can and can't handle. Come on. They'll buy us some time, let's go bail out Lady Sakuya while they've got their attention."

He spurred his own wings into motion, taking him from a hover into a dead sprint. Sparing one last glance towards the rapidly shrinking figures of his friends, he caught them gaining altitude until they were far above even where Kirito was flying, before charging down towards their targets like dive bombers. The giants noticed them and switched their aggro to the players closest to them, and a storm of ice and hail rose up to greet them like some kind of magical anti-aircraft fire, swallowing Fuurinkazan's formation whole.

But their HP gauges on his HUD remained a healthy green as a wall of flame burst into existence in front of the group as they cast their own defensive spells, and then there was no more time to spare to look away. Crashing headlong into the nearest group of giants where their encirclement was thinnest, Kirito's group went almost unnoticed until it was too late. Even as the frost giants closest to them turned towards the new threat, he was already within reach of his sword skills.

Five rapid-fire thrusts hammered into his chosen target's chest, a frost giant wielding a two-handed axe, as flame wreathed around Kirito's blade, sending great gouts of fire spearing out from his opponent's back. Not yet done, the swordsman whirled his weapon around in a pair of vertical cuts that propelled him high above the giant, bisecting it with a glowing red line. His ascent slowed to a halt upon reaching its apex, before gravity asserted its hold once more and pulled the Sylph back towards the ground.

Beating his wings to squeeze out every bit of speed he could muster without triggering a system abort for the skill, Kirito passed terminal velocity with ease. Hefting a sword that looked comically large to be wielded in a single hand high above his head he struck one final time, and with a roar of flame and displaced air, the eight-hit sword skill discharged itself against its target. The frost giant rocked on its heels after being struck with a force few other players could muster as fire enveloped its form.

Howling Octave wasn't the highest-level sword skill that boasted overwhelming damage like Vorpal Strike, nor did it have the most number of consecutive hits like Kirito's Nova Ascension or the old Starburst Stream. However, a max-rank Howling Octave did have something going for it that other, more powerful, attacks didn't: the fire element that the developers of
NewALO
imbued the skill with when they had integrated
SAO
's sword skills into their game – and that type advantage, coupled with the skill's innate damage, made for an incredibly potent attack against ice-based enemies.

...but it's not going to be enough
. Kirito's eyes narrowed the instant the post-skill delay locked him in place in mid-air, an easy target for the giant whose HP bar had dropped precipitously, but not emptied all the way, leaving the swordsman wide open and vulnerable, a prime target for the foe whose aggro he'd just drawn.

Still, he wasn't worried.

Before the giant's weapon could slam into his unprotected avatar, his foe ruptured into multi-hued light and a green and golden blur burst through the resulting shower of pixels. "Kiritooooo!"

"Hey Leafa," he waved back with a grin.

She came to a halt next to him, huffing and out of breath. "Don't you hey Leafa me, that was so reckless!" His sister stemmed her hands into her hips, causing him to smile as the sight brought him back to the days when Asuna had glared at him in exactly the same way. "Seriously, what would you have done if I hadn't been right behind you, huh? I know you're tough, but you don't have to put it to the test every time, big brother. I mean, I know it's just a game and you could've respawned right back in town, or Asuna could've rezzed you, but-"

"But you were," the swordsman said simply.

"Huh?"

"You were there. You always are," he added quietly, closing his eyes for a moment as a nostalgic smile curled at the corner of his mouth, visions of past battles dancing before his mind's eye. "That's why I can do this kind of stuff. Because I know I'm not alone. Asuna, Kizmel, Klein and his guys...and
you
, Leafa. I'm never alone."

"I...you-" For a long moment, Leafa's mouth worked wordlessly as she looked for a retort, his sister's expression morphing through various states of disbelief and exasperation that he was used to seeing from Asuna.

He wondered if she would understand – it had taken
him
long enough, after all, but he'd finally understood. Even when things had looked their darkest in Aincrad, even on the very edge of despair...he'd never been truly alone. There were people around him who were willing to stand with him, who would always be by his side, people that he didn't have to worry about because they refused to be pushed away.

He wasn't alone.

Finally, his sister seemed to have come to some sort of realization as a glow burned brighter in her green eyes, and let out a fond sigh. With a shake of her head and a smile, Leafa pulled on his arm. "You're a handful and a half, big brother. Come on, we've got more work to do."

-------------------------------

It turned out they weren't the only ones who'd seen that the Sylphs were in trouble and come rushing to help; just after they'd arrived, a barrage of fire magic roared overhead, the spells lighting up the thunderous sky and splashing against their huge targets. Flame and smoke filled the air as the giants reeled, only for wing after wing of red-armoured players to come diving from on high, lances couched and visors down as they sped towards their victims in a devastating shock attack meant to combine the power of five or six lancers onto a single target.

She'd seen that kind of disciplined formation fighting once before, and knew immediately who'd come to help.

That's Eugene's elite lancers!

Keeping a tight wedge, the first group smashed clean through a giant as it disappeared into a shower of pixels under their combined charge, while a second and third followed right behind. Not to be outdone, the Sylphs around Lady Sakuya realized that help had arrived and were rallying around their Lord, and the intensity of wind magic being hurled out from the center of the melee rose in return.

But Leafa herself had little time to enjoy the spectacle or rejoice at the sudden reinforcements; the blonde Sylph had little time to do more than glance around herself as she focused on keeping up with her brother's tight maneuvers while he darted from one foe to the next, speeding up and slowing down in impossibly tight turns that took all of her concentration to follow. Kizmel and Asuna and the others dropped in and out of formation as he wove through the sprawling melee, striking whenever he could and she did her best to follow right behind him.

In her hands,

Mikazuki

was a blur of silver, carving its way through with a fluidity and grace that were impossible to match by any player using sword skills. While Kirito smashed and battered like a sledgehammer, Leafa struck surgically and swiftly, aiming at weak points and making up for quality with sheer quantity.

She'd fought alongside her brother before, but never like this – this side of Kirito, the one that didn't hesitate to dive into combat with seemingly reckless abandon, was one she'd seen before, although not up close and right by his side like this. This wasn't the easygoing wandering swordsman who didn't take himself or the game too seriously when he usually played with her, nor was it the dark intensity of what she'd learned was the Black Swordsman she'd seen when he'd jumped back into the death game to rescue the ones caught by Nobuyuki Sugou. Rather than that, this was Kirito simply enjoying himself to his utmost, playing to his heart's content as he pushed himself as far as she could go and beyond...simply because it was

fun

. He didn't have to worry about life and death struggles, didn't have the fate of something larger than himself hanging in the balance, but there was something in front of him he had to take seriously. There was only him and the challenge of the game, and it meant he practically threw himself into fighting with everything he had, and then some.

The last time he'd been like this had been when he'd fought Eugene.

Usually, when he got like this, he had Kizmel or Asuna at his back, but neither of those two were to be found nearby – if anything, from the brief glimpses she could muster, the blonde thought she'd spotted the two other girls doing the same thing Kirito was doing, rolling and dashing in and out from one fight to the next. Now that Leafa found herself in their place, she struggled to match his mad pace, one that he seemed to be able to keep up by sheer instinct and experience alone, and one that both of his partners were capable of matching almost effortlessly.

At times, Leafa had been intensely jealous of the place around Kirito that those two other women occupied, wanting him to rely on her just as much...yet at the same time, part of her had been afraid, too.

Afraid that when it came down to it, when it came time to measure up to two of the death game's most notorious, strongest, and most skilled players…that she would be found wanting. That Kirito would slow down just to accommodate her, that she'd hold him back in some way, because there was no way she could match what those two were capable of doing.

But her brother showed no signs of slowing down, gave no indication that he was holding back on her behalf, and Leafa strained to her utmost just to try and predict a fraction of a second earlier whether he was going to break left or right next.

Not even during back to back tournament matches had the blonde ever expended so much energy just to stay on track, but she found that her body almost moved on its own. Just like when she zoned in during her kendo matches and all distractions faded away, leaving only the opponent in front of her, all she had to worry about was making sure her body was in the right place, and her arms and hips and shoulders would pivot and swing the sword in her hands without needing to think.

It was an intensity of fighting she'd never experienced before, something beyond even the razor-focus that tournament matches demanded of her. Those exchanges tended to last only a handful of seconds, and the matches mere minutes at most – this, this was far more extended than any bout she'd ever been in.

But, the blonde thought as she wiped the sweat from her brow, she wouldn't trade it for anything in the world.

Still, when things finally seemed to wind down, Leafa was more than content to slow and drift towards the ground, waving her brother to go on ahead without her as he dashed this way and that, seemingly not even out of breath. She landed a little unsteadily on her feet, and leaned back against the smashed wall of a building with an exhausted sigh.

Between Kazu-nii, his friends, and the Salamanders, I think we're gonna be all right for a bit. Just got to catch my breath for a moment,

she thought tiredly.

Was it really just a few minutes? That felt almost like an eternity.

Letting her head loll to the side, Leafa found a bottle of juice suddenly appear in her field of view. Following the arm that was reaching out, she found a redheaded Spriggan attached to it as Rain and Philia stood next to her with a knowing grin. "Here," she said, "you look like you need it."

"Thanks." Greedily gulping down the cool, refreshingly sweet liquid, Leafa allowed her eyes to close for a moment. Sucking in a deep breath, she looked back with a grateful nod. "I needed that."

"Figured," Rain answered. "Nice work out there, by the way. Not everyone can keep up with Kirito when he goes full-throttle."

"Really?" Leafa arched one eyebrow towards the pair skeptically. "You guys seem to manage just fine."

"Are you kidding?" the other blonde shook her head, sending chin-length tresses flying. "I don't even bother trying – most of us would just slow them down when they really go ham like this. Don't sell yourself short. I've seen Kirito go all-out, and he wasn't holding anything back. And you stayed right on his tail, that's something only Kizmel and Asuna can really do."

Did I?

Her eyes wandered down to her hands and the hilt of the sword on her waist.

It was all I could do to just follow behind Kazu-nii, I don't think I really had the time to do much damage to whatever he was attacking. Not compared to how hard he was chunking them.

Red eyes followed Leafa's, and Rain's lips curled into a smile. She swiped her fingers through the air, and an item materialized in her hands, one she pushed towards Leafa. "Here," she said by way of explanation. "You can use this one. It's a loaner."

"But-"

"Trust me, it'll help. You'll do better with a fire-enchant on your sword.

Mikazuki

is a wind-type, right? You're already at a disadvantage using it, no matter how much you're attached to it." Rain smiled wryly, with a sidelong glance towards Kirito who was smiling and blushing at something Kizmel had said. "Not everyone can just brute-force their way through a mob's elemental resistance like your brother or Kizmel, and not everyone hits a weakspot ninety-nine percent of the time like Asuna. Some of us mere mortals actually need to make use of type advantages."

She hesitated for a moment, but Kirito nodded encouragingly for her to take it, so she did.

I guess I'm always telling Kazu-nii to accept help from others, I should take my own advice, huh?

The blonde Sylph reached out and took it with no small amount of curiousity; while she didn't know the Spriggan as well as her brother did, she knew her well enough to tell that the kind of ornate blade that was revealed as she slowly drew it from its scabbard was far more decorative than her usual sensibilities.

The red-headed girl smiled. "It's not one I use myself. I picked it up from a treasure chest that Philia found up on the eighth floor, up in New Aincrad. I don't really have a use for it, so I was either going to sell it or give it to Lisbeth to break down, but I guess this is good, too."

Orange flame erupted around the sword as it fully cleared its sheath, dancing along the full length of its blade now that it was free of its prison as Leafa gave it an experimental swing. It was at least a handspan longer than her usual katana, exceeding even the

tachi

that Lady Sakuya used in length by a little bit, but at the same time it felt nimbler than it had any right to be, its blade slimmer and almost delicate-looking. A thin spine and almost spear-point shaped, double-edged tip instead of the traditional

kissaki

of a katana only added towards the look of a weapon that could be quite fast even in one hand, while the silk-wrapped handle and brass

kashira

capping its hilt were a familiar sight.

"How is it?" Rain asked.

"...it feels so light."

"You're more of an agility-dex build, so I'm not surprised," the redhead answered, "it's got agility as a prerequisite rather than strength, so it should play into the way you fight quite well. Unless you've got maxed STR like Kirito and Kizmel, then

everything

feels light."

Leafa looked up from the sword. "Thank you," she muttered, eliciting a grin from the other girl.

"Hey, don't worry about it. Besides, I don't use swords like that anyway, so it would've just been sitting around in my inventory." Rain looked up at the still cloudy, turbulent sky above them, just as a tremor went through the ground. "Come on, you might get a chance to give it a try soon. Looks like things are gearing up for round two."

With a stretch, Leafa nodded and the three of them took back to the sky, just in time for the rumbling of thunder above to fade away as the howling winds that had been buffeting them around since the beginning of the event finally died down. The din of combat was slowly quieting as the players mopped up the last of the frost giants in their vicinity, leaving them room to finally catch their breath, recover, and heal up or regroup. Even the rain that had been incessantly pelting them stopped, leaving their vision suddenly clear as a few rays of sunlight finally broke through the clouds above.

Yet somehow, there was a feeling of abject dread that rose in Leafa's stomach at the sudden, ominous calm.

And then the sky above split open as the largest thunderbolt she'd ever seen rippled across the darkness – it struck at the foot of the World Tree, the electric white light so blinding that the blonde had to blink stars from her vision afterwards.

For a moment after, all was quiet...and then the silence was shattered by a roar that shook the air itself, and from beneath the World Tree, visible even from so far away, burst forth a gargantuan serpent, its body easily as thick as a train car. Its head, a triangular thing coated in gleaming silver scale, rose and hissed towards them, eyes shining with a malevolent crimson glow. Sickly green light pulsed around its body as it wrapped its nearly hundred-meter long body around the base of the World Tree, and a tremor ran through the ground, accompanied by the sound of tortured, creaking wood as though it was trying to snap the tree at the center of Alfheim in two.

It bared massive fangs, an orb of light growing between its jaws to become a second sun for Alfheim.

With a roar of displaced air and hiss of vaporizing rain, the serpent released a torrential column of burning light; the blast speared across the heavens.

-------------------------------

"That thing is huge," Klein said after letting out a low whistle. "That's even bigger than the thing we fought in the Ruby Palace."

Kirito was forced to agree. Even knowing this was VR, there was an imposing, oppressive presence to the creature, one that gave even the indomitable Black Swordsman pause; every instinct in him screamed that it would be impossible to fight against something like this, and in Aincrad, this would've been true. There were all sorts of issues associated with making monsters bigger and bigger, particularly in full-dive. Players couldn't fight what they couldn't reach after all, and in the steel castle's confining boss chambers, something this huge would've never fit with enough room to spare for the players to freely move around it and avoid its attacks.

Under the open skies of Alfheim, however, it had more than enough room, and the players' ability to fly negated any issues with maneuvering around to attack or evade it. It was a whole new world, with all new possibilities.

"The situation's grim and the odds are against us," Agil said, a wide grin splitting the big man's lips, "sounds fun all right."

The swordsman agreed with a matching smile, knowing that similar expressions were plastered all over his friends. To most people in the real world, it would be an illogical, irrational thing to rush headlong into a fight with something they knew nothing about.

But not to them.

He glanced around him at the people that had gathered around. There wasn't any kind of planning they could do – there was no time for scouting runs, and anything they found out, would be found out the hard way. But this wasn't Aincrad, and it wasn't the death game. There was nothing at stake other than a bit of their time; if they failed, they'd just come back and do better next time; death wasn't the end...if nothing else, it was a learning experience.

If we wipe, we'll just respawn and try again,

Kirito reminded himself.

We'll just have to figure it out as we go.

This was the way games were supposed to be.

The rush of wind rose in his ears as Kirito pushed his wings to go faster.

Ahead, the giant serpent grew in size until he was close enough that the system finally put up a life bar and tag on his HUD: [

Jörmungandr, the Devourer

]. Its name meant nothing to him for the moment, and he only had time to make a mental note to ask Argo about its significance after they were done. Instincts honed by years of constant battle screamed at him as the scaly creature shifted, targeting the players closest to it as they crossed its aggro threshold.

Kirito's eyes narrowed as he took in the serpent's form, coiled around the base of the World Tree tightly enough that it seemed to be trying to snap the great tree in half.

It can't have a lot of ways to attack us physically, so…

With its main body wrapped around the tree, only about a quarter of its length were left on either end – which was still a significant amount of reach, but being a giant snake, Jörmungandr didn't have limbs or weapons to use against the players. As its form loomed ever closer, he could make out shimmering dots floating around its body. They shifted and undulated in waves and patterns, glowing like fireflies as they approached.

"Break!" Barking out a shouted warning, the swordsman heeded his own call and veered sharply to the left, Kizmel staying with him as the rest of their group scattered, just in time for a storm of projectiles to pass by them. Icy needles and thunderbolts whizzed by, followed by arrows of flame and molten, red-hot pebbles raked the air as the boss filled the skies with rapid-fire spells.

"Don't fly straight at it!" Agil hollered, using his huge, double-bitted axe as a makeshift shield, "it'll be easier for them to track you if you do!"

The group broke up, and Kirito followed Kizmel into an evasive bank that saw a number of spells whiz past behind them, before course-correcting back towards Jörmungandr. By virtue of their sheer speed alone, they managed to pass through the first salvo without taking too much damage, though the sharp staccato of thumps sounding against Kizmel's shield as she slid in front of him told Kirito that they hadn't avoided all of it.

Okay, so what's next?

He wondered, staying tucked behind her as they continued their approach, passing past the curtain of glowing orbs from which the elemental onslaught had come. Experimentally, he tried slashing at one with his blade in passing, only to find it passed right through without any damage – not a physical object, but a source point for the players to track the origin of the spellfire.

"Incoming!" Nautilus yelled from above, and the swordsman's eyes snapped back forward, just in time to see a second wave of spells rising towards them.

Whereas the first barrage had been smaller projectiles, like hail and pebbles, this one was far more substantial – Kirito uttered a silent curse under his breath when he realized that even their tanks' shields might not be able to fully protect them from what was heading their way.

Fireballs, stone boulders the size of small cars, orbs that crackled with lightning tendrils that reached out for meters in every direction, and vortices of wind that reached towards them like a maelstrom threatening to suck them in – all of it rose towards them like some kind of magical anti-aircraft fire.

The first few rounds streaked by close as Kirito and Kizmel swerved to avoid them, only for the glowing boulder that had missed him to blow up, spraying the pair with shrapnel. Gritting his teeth, the swordsman ducked back in behind his wife's shield as they were pelted from all directions.

"Hold on!"

Kirito wasn't sure if it was his own voice that had called out, or if it had been someone else – but anything that might have followed was swallowed in the roar of explosions as the spells, even those that didn't hit them directly, exploded all around them triggered by proximity alone, buffeting him and his friends like leaves on the wind. Ahead of him Kizmel grunted as a few of the projectiles struck her shield, and while it held despite its creaks and groans, the repeated explosions right in their faces were beginning to wear down even the tough Imp's health...and his own, even as collateral damage.

Not to mention all this fire and smoke and steam is making it really hard to see where we're flying.

Kirito grit his teeth; he was just about to consider calling off their headlong charge and planning a second, more careful, run, when Kizmel turned her head. Violet eyes looked back at him with a spark of challenge.

He looked back in askance, and she answered with a minute nod.

She could make it.

It wasn't just empty bravado, he knew; Kizmel was one of the toughest tanks he knew, and more than that, she knew the limits of her character and avatar better than anyone – it was her very own body, after all. If she said she could handle it, then she could.

And he trusted his wife's judgment with his life. But that didn't mean he'd leave her with all the burden.

"All right," he mouthed back, knowing that he didn't have a prayer's chance of being heard over the noise of explosions all around them. But as he sped up and pulled up next to her, the black-clad Sylph took a moment to reach out briefly and give her shoulder a squeeze.

Then he moved in front of her, and the sword in his right hand began to spin in front of them. Faster and faster he twirled the blade between dexterous fingers, willing the system to recognize the activation motion for the skill even while debris and shrapnel pinged off blackened steel. It picked up speed as the system assist caught hold, a blue glow suffusing the arc it described in the air in front of him until it became an almost solid disk of light. Realizing what he was doing, Kizmel slid into place next him, the basic Spinning Shield far larger in diameter than it should be thanks to the oversized sword he was using. It wasn't perfect by any means – explosions sill shook them around and there was some damage that bled through, something not even a sword skill could mitigate, but it took pressure off Kizmel. The former dark elf made good use of the time to down a potion as the other tanks clustered in around them, shields raised to form a larger barrier for the rest of their group to fall in behind.

With their makeshift battering ram composed of shields and swords, they smashed their way through Jörmungandr's outer defenses – and then, after another vicious explosion that went off close enough to rattle Kirito's teeth, they finally broke through the worst of the firestorm.

Emerging on the far side of the dense curtain of spells, explosions, flame, and smoke, they found themselves in clear skies for a moment, causing Kirito to breathe a sigh of relief. A glance at the raid menu on his HUD showed a lot of yellow life bars with a smattering of red, but a quick look around showed him that no one was missing – and the others were already in the process of swiftly patching each other up with spells and potions. The grand serpent now loomed dangerously close in front of them, so he pushed his wings a little harder despite the apparent tranquility, determined to make the most of this chance now that they'd punched through the worst of Jörmungandr's defenses.

He wasn't the only one who couldn't wait.

Green-gold and blue-white streaked ahead as two of the fastest players in the game picked up the pace and separated from the pack, surging forward on their fairy wings as they broke away from the cluster of shields. A silver comet was already forming around Asuna's shape as her body stretched out lengthwise, rapier held out in front as the Undine lived up to her nickname of Berserk Healer in her attempt to land the first blow.

Leafa, not to be outdone, shot right after her, fiery sword in hand as she stayed right on the blue-haired girl's tail, even without the use of the system assist.

With a chuckle, Kirito, too, picked up the pace, unwilling to be outdone by his sister and former partner.

Up ahead, Asuna succeeded in scoring first blood, her airborne Flashing Penetrator finally picking up enough speed that she pulled ahead of the swordsman's sister. The sword skill pulled her along fast enough that any close-range spells the boss was trying to cast to intercept her missed on account of her sheer speed, failing to track her entirely, and she slammed into the gargantuan serpent's head with a brilliant discharge of silver light and enough force to send it reeling to the side despite its mass.

Her sword skill expended, the Undine allowed herself to drop, wings extended into an aggressive glide to try and duck underneath the return fire that was inevitably going to come while the system wrested control of her avatar from her for a long, heart-stopping moment. Kirito wondered if it was going to be enough – but then his sister swooped in and caught her, right before Jörmungandr's skin pulsed with white light and the air took on a sudden chill.

Dragging the Undine with her caused Leafa to bleed off a lot of her usual speed from the extra weight, but she'd already been casting, her lips moving the moment she'd moved in behind Asuna in the first place. When the air warbled and pulsed mere meters from the boss's body the blonde was ready, and her Wind Barrier roared to life around the two girls in mid-air just before icy crystals shot from Jörmungandr's scales like tiny needles, only to be forced off-course by the hurricane-like winds surrounding them.

Our turn,

Kirito thought with a grin as he finally came into range a few seconds after them.

Next to him, Kizmel raised her shield as the serpent launched another wave of close-range spells at them, these ones pulsing out from its body almost like an aura that tried to deny any who tried to reach it. A sharp staccato of hail and ice struck the Imp's trusty defender, but it held firm as they pushed through the almost tangible wave of cold that surrounded it. When the light retracted into its body, readying for the next pulse, Kirito veered to the left, with Kizmel breaking to the right, swinging wide around the boss's desperate attempt to slam into them with its head as it recovered from being knocked around by Asuna's blow.

Finding himself with a clear shot at the back of its head and neck, the former Black Swordsman raised his blade overhead and leapt forward. His blue-glowing edge struck right where the head met the neck – and met with unusual resistance, causing Kirito to grit his teeth as his weapon refused to slide through its target the way it usually would on a clean hit. Onyx eyes widened in surprise when the light around his sword flickered and faded, the blade rebounding off the tough scales without piercing its target and leaving Kirito reeling precariously in mid-air as he reeled from the impact and the post-motion delay of the aborted skill.

Dammit, that feels like hitting a steel wall,

he thought to himself as the shock almost numbed his hand.

What is that thing made out of?

Looking to the side, he caught Kizmel following up his unsuccessful attack with one of her own, adjusting her stance to change her chosen sword skill mid-flight. A blazing orange light suffused her saber's edge, and the Imp smashed down on the same place he'd struck first with a vicious overhead blow before bringing it around her head in a second strike as it picked up speed. A third followed, each whipping around faster and faster until the fourth and final swing came crashing down, the tip of her saber trailed a fiery crescent as it whistled through its arcs with a speed that was almost invisible to the naked eye.

The four-hit Farrant Fullmoon came down with far more fource than his basic Vertical had, and the multi-hit attack caused a huge gout of flame where Kizmel was trying to smash her way through the boss's tough skin with all of the brute force her maxed strength stat could muster. Unlike his own, the glow around Kizmel's saber never lost its lustre; if anything, it gained in strength and brilliance as the Imp roared her fury, pushing down and into her target with all her might.

She was rewarded for her effort when the skill expended itself in a brilliant flare of light that yielded a thin crimson line carved into Jörmungandr's scale where she'd struck, and Kirito caught a satisfied grin on her lips just as the post-skill delay locked down her avatar.

The swordsman regained control over his own after his stagger-induced recoil ended and wasted no time in speeding towards her, worried about the grand serpent's retaliation as its scales began pulsing with a dim glow. Dodging around the spells it was firing at him from point-blank range, he wove around lighting bolts and ice lances; one of the projectiles struck Kizmel's inert form, causing her HP gauge to take a precipitous hit. A wave of fire roiled out from an empty space behind her, but Kirito managed to reach her just before it swallowed her up, grabbing a hold of the former dark elf and spinning her around so that her shield was facing in the correct way right before the inferno engulfed both of their forms. For an instant, he could feel the heat scorching at his skin – though in full-dive, it felt more like an unpleasantly hot day in the sun, before the heat suddenly subsided and the damage ticking away at his HP bar stopped.

A wall of bubbles stood between him and the flames, and a dragon's happy cry trilled overhead as Pina's small form soared past him, Silica's little companion easily weaving in between Jörmungandr's defensive spellfire.

Dashing to the side to avoid a lightning bolt that left the air to his left crackling with static electricity, the black-clad Sylph felt his wife's weight leave his arms as she regained control over her avatar and moved under her own power. Diving down to avoid a boulder that had just spawned into existence and been flung towards him by the grand serpent, Kirito caught sight of a glimmer in the distance as the other players in Alne finally caught up.

A barrage of flame and water spells arced overhead, Eugene and the Sakuya at the head of their respective factions as they threw every piece of offensive magic towards the world boss that they could muster. Fireballs, flame arrows, ice spears and water jets all bombarded Jörmungandr's hide relentlessly, a violent fusillade of magic spellfire that would've obliterated any boss in Aincrad or New Aincrad by sheer volume alone.

Chancing a look over his shoulder, the black-haired Sylph noticed that the serpent's HP was steadily ticking down – not by much so far, but he'd expected a world boss to be quite durable considering how many players would be attacking it. What worried him more was that the glow that he'd first seen around it had grown into a visible aura that gained in intensity with every spell that hit it, its pulses coming quicker now than they had just a few seconds ago.

More magic flared into existence behind his back, as if to answer the player's offensive with its own, and Jörmungandr fired back – a salvo of bolts and spears, arrows and rocks thick enough that he found it difficult to dodge them all. One gout of flame tore at his wings, disrupting the delicate balance needed for flight, and sent Kirito tumbling to the ground as he realized flying

away

from his opponent and showing it his back might not have been the best idea.

Kizmel's hand reached out to grab hold of his as she wrenched upward with all the thrust her own wings could muster; it was enough to turn a crash landing into a barely controlled slide along the cobbled streets at the foot of the World Tree as Jörmungandr loomed overhead. They came to a stop and clambered to their feet with a huff, brushing themselves off before turning to face the grand serpent – just in time to see its raised tail come down right towards them.

Oh crap.

The lilac-haired Imp was in front of him before Kirito could voice a protest, shield raised protectively above her head as Jörmungandr's tail slammed into her. He watched her knees buckle and rushed over, wrapping an arm around her shoulder, catching a glimpse of her strained expression in the process. With a grunt of exertion, Kizmel began pushing back, a low, throaty growl rising from her throat until it became a full-blown roar of defiance as the Imp shoved back, and the grand serpent's limb off to the side, away from them.

For just a moment, Kirito stood there dumbstruck at the impossible feat, before shaking his head in silent laughter as his eyes met Kizmel's – her cheeks were flushed and her eyes had a wild gleam in them that he found irresistibly beautiful. His wife's dusky lips were curled up in an excited, exhilarated smile, one that he knew was matched by his own.

Taking a moment to catch their breath as the dogfight above intensified and dragged the boss's attention away from the two players on the ground, Kirito took a moment to try and find his friends up in the sky. He spotted Asuna and Leafa heading towards them, having noticed their crash, while the seven members of Fuurinkazan had spread out and were hammering away at various places along Jörmungandr's body where it was wrapped around the base of the World Tree. A contingent of players in greens and reds streaked by overhead, the heavily-armoured Salamanders accelerating ahead of the rest as the Sylphs buffed them from behind, lances couched.

Eugene charged in with a roar, an entire squad of lancers following behind him as he attempted to repeat Asuna's feat, but the powerful charge from his elites was broken up when Jörmungandr bared its fangs and swept a car-sized beam of light across the sky, sending them scattering into the four winds. Two were unlucky enough to be caught by the blast, and vanished entirely is it washed over them – they'd respawn at their last saved location, Kirito knew, although whether they'd be back was another question entirely.

With a war-cry, the Sylphs set upon the grand serpent next; unlike the Salamanders, they all came in from different directions to avoid meeting the same fate, but a few still fell victim to the other defensive spells the boss was firing towards them. Kirito winced as one Sylph in particular sped towards the serpent only to be met with a boulder going the opposite direction, sending him tumbling out of the air.

Ouch

, he mused

, that looked like it hurt

.

For a few seconds longer he watched the chaotic, swirling melee as Salamanders charged and Sylphs dove in and out of combat to harass the grand serpent, only to come to an inescapable conclusion.

I think it's immune to physical damage, or at least, it's got a lot of damage resistance

, Kirito realized.

Magic seems to work, but...

"Uh-oh," he murmured as another couple of spells fervently lobbed by Salamanders and Undine collided with Jörmungandr's huge body, and his keen eyes caught a the light around Jörmungandr growing brighter the more players attacked it. An uneasy feeling grew in his gut.

"Kirito?" his wife turned to him in concern.

"I think it's

absorbing

the spells, Kizmel," he muttered.

She tilted her head with a puzzled expression. "Absorbing…?"

He nodded, remembering that the only experience Kizmel had with magic of this kind was shields and items; as a result, none of the bosses in

SAO

ever had needed a mechanic like that.

And even then, the damage reflect was never a major thing, because of the risk of killing ourselves on it. I wonder if Kayaba did that on purpose...

Kirito looked up at the world boss towering above them, and the multi-coloured firestorm that enveloped it as the boss and the players traded fire. "I don't know why, but I have a bad feeling about this."

Above them, Jörmungandr roared as it reared back and opened its jaws wide, releasing a chilling, air-shattering sound as a huge sphere of light began coalescing between its fangs. The howling winds that had heralded the frost giant invasion earlier whipped back up, tearing at his coat as the sky darkened once more, and the swordsman felt a sense of dread coiling in his gut. Amid the rushing gale, Kirito's ears picked up a noise that undercut the serpent's roar even as the players in its vicinity began to scatter in a hurry to avoid meeting the same fate as the Salamanders earlier. It started out low, almost entirely drowned out by the hiss of superheating air, but quickly gained in volume and pitch, a whine like that of a jet engine spooling up.

It was a noise that was intimately familiar to the Black Swordsman.

Searching the sky up above, he finally managed to pick out a small, redheaded figure as it streaked towards the grand serpent from high above, wings narrowed in flight for greater speed. Rain's left arm was extended in front of her, the right holding her sword cocked back at her shoulder while a malevolent red glow emanated from it. The whine grew louder until it was impossible to miss until Spriggan released the skill, snapping her wrist forward in a thrust that had been the infamous Black Swordsman's signature attack in Aincrad.

The tip of her sword surged forward until it struck cleanly against one of Jörmungandr's scales; Kirito almost imagined he could hear the

tink

as it struck, wondering if she would be repelled like he had. Rain's arm reached full extension, and the blade stopped as her forward momentum halted entirely.

But that wasn't the extent of the high level sword skill known as Vorpal Strike.

A spear of crimson burst out the other side of the grand serpent's body, piercing straight through it as it reached far past the length of the Spriggan's sword. It convulsed from the blow, the orb of light gathering between its jaws fading away when the impact interrupted its own attack and made a noticeable dent in the boss's HP bar. Cheers went up for the redhead's attack as it spurred on the players nearby, and they threw themselves at the grand serpent with renewed vigor in light of Rain's successful blow.

Kirito's eyes narrowed, a fleeting premonition screaming silently in his mind as he opened his mouth to shout a warning even though Rain was too far away to hear him.

Jörmungandr's scales shimmered, changing hue to a deep, vibrant crimson that matched the Spriggan's Vorpal Strike and

pulsed

– something that seemed to affect the very air itself as it robbed him of breath even so far away. Multi-hued lightning wove through the sky, arcing in random patterns away from the grand serpent's scales in the hundreds, forking out as they looked for targets. Then, a shockwave suddenly expanded away from the world boss's skin, ballooning to a sphere dozens of meters in diameter in the blink of an eye, a visible distortion rippling through the space around it as it tore across the air and slammed into the players around it.

Rain, just like Agil next to her, was caught as it slammed into the hapless redhead before her post-motion delay had even worn off; the energy wave crashed into her with enough force to send the Spriggan tumbling and disrupted her wings, causing her to drop into a free-fall. It proceeded to swallow anyone else unfortunate enough to be caught in Jörmungandr's vicinity without slowing down, leaving behind End Flames by the dozens.

Onyx eyes snapped to the raid menu on the side of his HUD in a panic, only to find several HP bars dropping rapidly before winking out completely, and Kirito's blood ran cold.

-------------------------------

Asuna didn't have Kirito's encyclopedic knowledge of game mechanics and sword skills; even before he'd become a consultant for YMIR, her erstwhile partner had known an awful lot more about the game and its predecessor than even other beta testers, something that had earned him the infamous moniker of the beater during the death g ame. Nor did she have Kizmel's innate, almost supernatural understanding of the virtual world as someone born from it and who had begun peering behind the veil.

While her two closest friends fought on a primal, instinctive level, Asuna had always been more intellectual in her approach to battle in the virtual world. She knew she had a talent for fencing – desperation and the need to survive could only carry her so far when it came to learning the blade, after all – but more importantly she had a keen, attentive mind. Where Kirito understood what was happening through experience and leaps of logic few could follow, Asuna strove to make sense of every intricacy of the world around her, virtual or otherwise.

It was the same kind of focus and attention to detail that allowed her to both excel in school and lead the Knights of Blood and subsequently the clearing group as a whole, to formulate plans and adjust them on the fly in the heat of battle.

This was the experience that led her to know something was wrong the moment Kirito's attack bounced off the grand serpent's scales.

Her own Flashing Penetrator was a sword skill that gained damage and armour penetration as she built up speed, and the flight mechanics and thrust of her fairy wings in

NewALO

allowed her to build up far more speed that she'd ever been able to on the ground. But Kirito was no slouch, and the Black Swordsman had been notorious for hitting as hard, or even harder, with even the most basic sword skills than others were capable of when using a much higher-level one as a result of his ability to push the game's system to its limits and his own skill with the sword alike.

More than that, she had

never

seen an attack brought to bear with all of the force of her former partner stopped cold and canceled out, causing the system to forcibly abort his sword skill and triggering a stagger effect on top of his post-motion delay. The only times something like that could occur, she knew, was when his opponent executed a perfect block or parry, something that prevented

all

damage, including the bleedthrough that usually happened even on a successful defense.

But that was impossible; there had been none of the usual visual cues that accompanied a perfect guard, and there was no reason for the world boss to only do it for him. So Asuna watched, while dodging and weaving around Jörmungandr's colossal body to avoid the spells it was rapidly casting at anything in its vicinity, and a theory began to form in her mind.

I think it's immune to physical damage, but not magic

, the Undine concluded, swerving out of the way of a nasty barrage of spells after Leafa had let go of her.

Higher-level sword skills like my Flashing Penetrator or Kizmel-chan's Farrant Fullmoon got an added elemental property when New Aincrad came out and sword skills were added to the game.

To confirm her thoughts, Asuna swung in close, coming to a halt underneath the grand serpent's head and lifted the rapier in her hand. With a shout, she lunged forward, propelled by the thrust of her fairy wings as a silver light enveloped the tip of her sword. The Linear speared through the air with all the speed and technique the former vice-commander of the KoB could muster, an attack that would've pierced any opponent in this game or its predecessor if they failed to defend against it, only to recoil off the tough scale and sending the blue-haired fencer reeling back. Since she'd struck with the simplest of her sword skills, the stagger and post-motion delay lasted less than a second, but it was enough to solidify her conclusion.

We'll have to hit it with spells or high-level sword skills. That'll leave us vulnerable for longer, but...

glancing over her shoulder as she pulled away from the world boss, Asuna took in the multitude of attack spells being hurled at it from players of all factions and races while they circled around the World Tree like vultures.

That shouldn't be a problem. Still, I can't imagine that that's all there is to it.

She looked for Kirito and Kizmel, intent on sharing her newfound discovery while making use of her speed to rapidly leave the grand serpent's aggro zone without being tagged by any of its spells. Leafa, however, was the one who spotted the pair they'd gotten separated from first, pointing to a spot on the ground where both swordsman and knight were staring up at the battle intently as they, too, observed the fighting.

They'd just come about and headed for them to meet up when behind them, Jörmungandr roared – and then the very air itself seemed to fracture, shattering to the point that the Undine found it difficult to stay airborne. Wresting with her avatar for control, Asuna managed to maintain some semblance of level flight as she turned to see what was going on, only to find that the grand serpent, which had been beleaguered by dozens of players in close quarters, had cleared the entirety of its surrounding airspace. An almost invisible shockwave radiated outward from it, far faster than any player could fly, flames and lightning bolts of every colour of the rainbow forking throughout. Gunning her wings out of an instinctual need to get away, the fencer let out a sigh of relief when the blast wave finally stopped more than a hundred meters away from the World Tree, before it could catch up to them.

Asuna didn't know how many players had been caught in the blast, but she knew at least some of their friends were among them. A worried glance at her HUD confirmed her fears, but somehow it wasn't as bad as it could have been. Shooting out from the sphere of destruction that had burst forth from the grand serpent, Klein, Agil, and the battered remnants of Fuurinkazan rushed towards the relative safety of cover. The incessant attacks that the other players had been flinging at the world boss also slowed as they fell into shock at the ease with which it had just wiped out a good portion of the attackers.

Descending next to Kirito and Kizmel, the blue-haired Undine finally allowed herself to take stock of their situation.

Silica-chan and Rain got caught, along with a couple of Klein-san's guys,

Asuna noted grimly when the survivors brought forth the Remain Lights, but her thoughts went no further as she instead focused on casting the resurrection spell that was the specialty of the Undine.

Between her and Sachi, and with Leafa's help, it took only a couple of minutes for all of them to return to the land of the living and be restored to full HP. Asuna allowed herself a sigh of relief when they did, sagging into the wall behind her.

I guess I'm still not over that fear of death, even after all that time,

she mused tiredly.

"Well," Rain said immediately after her avatar re-formed from its End Flame, "that was a doozy. Thanks, Agil."

The dark-skinned Gnome simply gave her a thumbs-up as he quaffed a potion, before letting the empty bottle break apart into pixels, its contents spent. "Hey, no problem. I don't think any of us saw that coming. What do you think happened? We must've triggered a nova effect of some kind, but that one was basically a one-shot on anyone that wasn't geared for tanking."

Asuna looked around the group as all of them shrugged or shook their heads in one way or another, but it was Kirito who answered quietly.

"I don't think it's just a nova," the swordsman said, "I'm pretty sure it's a damage reflect AoE burst."

"Damage reflect?" Asuna pondered his conclusion for a moment.

Her erstwhile partner nodded, onyx eyes narrowed in thought. "Not the kind that immediately turns your damage back on you, though. Did you notice anything about it when you hit it?"

"Other than my attacks not even leaving a scratch?" Agil scratched his cheek. "I think it was mostly the high-level sword skills that did damage. That and magic."

Asuna inclined her head in agreement. "It's weak to elemental damage."

"Yeah," Kirito continued, "but I think it's also absorbing it."

"You're right," Klein added, "there was this glow around it every time we'd hit it especially hard. I think it got stronger the more we hit it as time went on. I thought it was a visual cue of some kind, but I didn't really think about what it could be for."

The former Black Swordsman looked up at the grand serpent that towered overhead. "I think it gets stronger the more elemental damage it soaks up. And when the time comes…"

Klein sucked in a sharp breath. "Boom."

"Yeah," Kirito agreed. "Boom."

Asuna's brows furrowed as the implications hit her. "So...we can't damage it, then? No, we can," she corrected herself quickly, looking up at the HP gauge that hovered next to Jörmungandr's head.

All of that attacking and we did maybe a tenth of its HP in damage.

"What do you think triggers it?" Nautilus asked as he fussed over Yuna, much to the other girls' amusement. "Maybe there's a damage threshold?"

Kirito shook his head. "I think it's time-based," he concluded. "I was watching it for a bit and it kept getting faster pretty consistently whether it was being hit or not. Look."

Turning to follow where the black-clad Sylph was pointing, Asuna found nothing for a moment – the grand serpent had coiled itself back around the World Tree while the players regrouped themselves, its scales gleaming white. For a moment, she wondered what he meant, but Kirito kept staring intently, as if he could will something happen by sheer determination alone...and then, after over a minute of looking with bated breath, she saw it, too.

It was faint, at first, barely noticeable, but it was there.

A low, dim glow that flashed from the world boss's scales. It came so suddenly and was so faint that Asuna wondered if she'd imagined it, until she saw it a second time, a few seconds later. A slow, gentle pulsing of light. A couple of fireballs from the other players truck Jörmungandr's side, and suddenly, the flash of light became a little brighter, a little more visible. Another few seconds, and it pulsed again, its rhythm picking up speed slowly – with the barrage of elemental magic from the players hitting it constantly, it never grew to the same kind of blinding light it had before.

Less than a minute after it had begun to pulse, a thin, almost colourless wave erupted from the serpent's scales, far less vibrant and much less intense than the last, and then the glow faded away, returning to dormancy.

Argo let out a low whistle. "Nice spotting there, Kii-bou," the blonde Cait Sith said. "Looks like yer right. It starts its absorption cycle periodically, and then it sucks in everything that hits it fer a bit. Should make it easy ta avoid."

"All we have to do is just not attack it while it's absorbing, right?" Philia asked.

A deep rumble came from Agil's chest as the tall Gnome hummed in thought. "We should call out when it happens and back off. We'll have our hands full with dodging everything it's throwing at us already, it's not like other bosses where we just have to keep an eye out for its weapons. That thing can cast spells toward us from any place, at any angle as long as we're within its aggro range, even from behind."

"That should work," Asuna nodded slowly. "And even if a couple of stray attacks hit it while it's absorbing, it should still be survivable."

"As long as the DPS stops, yeah," Kirito agreed. He turned towards the short, blonde Cait Sith among them. "You been keeping an eye on the clock, Argo?"

Her cat-like tail quivered in amusement. "Whatcha take me fer, Kii-bou? Looks like three minutes between the last one and this one. Maybe around thirty seconds from when it starts ta suck in damage till it shoots it right back."

"Three minutes, huh?" the black-clad swordsman hummed in thought. "That's a decent amount of time to fly in and do some damage before we have to bail."

"If someone keeps an eye on the clock and sends a signal, we'd have plenty of time to get out of dodge before it blasts us," Klein noted. "But I don't think calling it out like we used to is gonna cut it here. Maybe some kind of flare, or signal that we can see?"

"Um…" Leafa chimed in hesitantly when Asuna and the others turned towards the blonde Sylph. "If that's the case, why don't we all just hang back and shoot magic at it? It looks like that shockwave attack has a lot of range, but we should still be able to hit the boss from further back since it's so big."

Sachi chuckled. "That's...actually not a bad idea," she pointed out. "

We

haven't really bothered learning much in the way of spells other than the bare minimum, but that doesn't mean other players haven't. And from what I understand, magic is still the way most people prefer to do DPS unless you're a musclehead like these guys."

"Oi! Who you calling a musclehead?" Dale protested good-naturedly at the friendly jab.

Kirito's sister nodded. "We...could just leave a lot of it to Eugene and Lady Sakuya. The Sylphs and Salamanders have some really good mages."

Asuna frowned; it was a valid suggestion, one that the former vice-commander of the KoB would've jumped on if they were still in the death game, simply because it was

safe

. But they weren't, and more importantly, the people who had designed this boss were the same people that had fought through the steel castle alongside them. She couldn't believe they would just leave it at something as anticlimactic as just attacking the boss with impunity from a distance.

"I think those guys have a different idea," Nautilus pointed out sardonically.

Up in the sky, Asuna found what her former subordinate had been talking about as a group of two dozen players roared past them at full speed, a mixture of Salamanders, Sylphs, and Gnomes that rushed towards the world boss with a wild, wavering warcry.

"Um…" Philia began, the blonde Imp's head tilted to the side, "aren't those…"

"The guys who ran that mob-train earlier?" Rain finished with a sigh. "Yeah, I think so."

Watching the exuberant charge dragging along stragglers that were trying to decide what to do, Asuna let out a sigh. There was no method to their headlong rush to get into melee with the world boss, no strategy, leadership, and no plan other than apparently "hit the boss." To her eyes, it was an uncoordinated mob as players bumped into one another, got in each others' way, and generally flew whichever way they wanted.

It was...

inefficient

.

That isn't going to end well,

she mused, before noticing Kirito looking at her knowingly, a wry smile on his lips.

Her former partner chuckled, and shook his head. "Just let them have their fun," he told her quietly. "I wouldn't bother trying to control everything, not a lot of people are bound to listen."

"But-"

"This isn't like the raids you're used to where it's one group with one leader and a plan. World boss fights like this are giant free-for-alls, and you get what you get. Come on, just roll with it. They'll either figure it out, or they won't, but that's not our problem, right? We just do what we can, and have fun while we're here."

"...right," she agreed reluctantly.

Kirito-kun has a point

, she mused,

I guess I'm used to a different way of doing things.

In the clearing group, the kind of reckless, disjointed battling she was watching would've gotten them all killed many times over, and perhaps she had been spoiled by playing with her own group of friends, all of whom were veterans of the death game. They had their own skills and trust in one another, honed during two years of battle in Aincrad – but this wasn't

SAO

, and none of these players feared death, she reminded herself as a couple of players sped by while laughing as one of them got blasted out of the air.

This is a game, and people are going to treat it like one

. Looking around, she found smiles and grins on the faces of all her friends, something that would've been wildly out of place in the steel castle, faced with one of its bosses, and Asuna felt her own lips quirk to match theirs. This kind of excitement was something she'd kept a tight lid on back then; the exhilaration and exuberance of wielding her rapier could be a dangerous, deadly thing in the steel castle, but here she had no such restriction.

They rose back into the air together, along with the other players as they finally snapped out of their stupor and resumed the attack on the world boss, undaunted by the fact it had just wiped out a large number of them – many of whom were among those speeding back from Alne right now after respawning, eager to return the favour to the grand serpent, and round two began in earnest.

-------------------------------

"Leafa! Leaaaafaaaaa!"

The blonde Sylph barely caught the faint voice calling her name on the wind, and turned her attention to the side. Fighting Jörmungandr was a much different experience than any other boss had been in

ALO

for many reasons, not the least of which was its sheer scale. Still,

ALO

's veterans rose to the challenge, and soon enough they began figuring out where the danger zones were and how to avoid being caught in the damage burst that followed the world boss's absorption phase. Lady Sakuya, General Eugene, and Alicia Rue could be seen at the heads of their respective formations, coordinating the Sylphs, Salamanders, and Cait Sith in one of the largest battles Leafa had ever witnessed in the game.

Together, the hundreds of players slowly whittled down the grand serpent's HP bar bit by bit.

It was slow going, since many of them had come to the same conclusion that her brother and his friends had – it was safer to just sit back and bombard the boss with magic from afar, giving them more time to react to its counter-fire, and allowing tanks to move in to protect the mages.

Despite their inexperience with

NewALO

's magic system, Kirito and the others had settled in, too, and tried their own hands at casting offensive spells – and, the blonde Sylph admitted to herself, it felt refreshing to be the one who was showing her brother the ropes, for once. He'd never really shown much interest in the game's magic, preferring instead to solve all of his in-game problems with pure bladework alone. In a way, Leafa could understand him – she, too, prided herself on her skills as a

kendoka

, and the sword would forever be her first choice in battle. But her brother and his friends were even more stubbornly determined to cling to what they were used to, and the addition of sword skills and their associated elemental damage had allowed them to do so rather effectively.

Not that that ever stopped Kazu-nii before, the blonde Sylph pondered, recalling one particular instance where Kirito and Kizmel, along with the rest of their group, had simply pounded one particular boss into paste by sheer brute force alone, something that other guilds and raid groups would've considered an inefficient and rookie approach. And yet, they'd somehow managed to not only successfully defeat the boss, but done so in record time – much to the chagrin of the guild that had been waiting in line after them, jeering at what they perceived to be a futile attempt.

She smiled proudly as he clumsily tried to stumble his way through the odd pronunciation for each rune, repeating them after her, brows furrowed in concentration only to be rewarded when a small, ethereal arrow appeared on his open palm.

He slung his arm forward in the way she'd showed him before, and the arrow careened through the air – wildly off course until his eyes narrowed, causing the projectile to snap onto the correct path. It whistled through the air, striking true in the distance, far enough out that it was almost impossible to see without the aid of the Digital Focusing System.

"I can't believe I almost missed a hundred-meter tall target," the black-haired Sylph muttered to himself.

Leafa chuckled. "It's not a throw, Kirito. You don't control the direction of it with your arm as you release it. You were the one who wanted to do it in manual mode."

"I know, I know." He shook his head. "The HUD overlay for aiming and tracking is gonna take some getting used to. It's nothing like tab-targeting."

"Tabu...ta...getto, huh?"

"I'll explain later," he said with a wry smile. "Looks like you got people looking for you."

Recon arrived with a huff, speeding erratically through the air as he came to a screeching halt, wobbling up and down a little. "There you are! I've been looking all over for you!"

She chuckled a bit at her school friend's ruffled appearance – somehow, despite the fact that

NewALO

didn't really simulate dirt or wrinkles in their clothing, her short-statured fellow Sylph was looking more than a little disheveled. "Calm down, Recon. I thought you were with Lady Sakuya? What's going on?"

"I was, she sent me over," he answered after catching his breath. "I tried looking for you all the way at the front, thinking that's where you were going to be, but I couldn't find you at all."

Ah, so that's why he's looking like that

, Leafa realized.

Poor guy must've been flying through all that mess up right next to the boss looking for me.

"What's so urgent that she sent you?" the blonde wondered, hovering back a little bit from the fighting so that she wasn't in danger of being hit by a stray spell or projectile, and letting Recon catch his breath. "She could've just sent a message."

Her fellow Sylph shook his head. "She

did

, didn't you see it?"

That brought her up short.

She...did?

Quickly glancing at her HUD, Leafa found that the icon indicating a new message was indeed blinking. Opening up the messaging menu, she found that there were a number of them that she'd missed, and flushed bright red.

Oh, no. I think I got so caught up trying to follow Kazu-nii and the others that I lost track of everything else.

"Um…" waving the menu away, she quickly returned her attention back to Recon. "So...what did she want?"

He folded his arms in front of his chest with a stern look. "You got excited and missed them, didn't you."

"Eh...hehehehe…" the tall blonde chuckled nervously. "I'm sorry?"

"Do you have any idea how much of a nightmare it was trying to fly next to that boss?" Recon whined plaintively.

Oops.

"I'll make it up to you," Leafa promised. "How about...lunch next time we get the chance?"

"Okay." The crestfallen expression on her friend's face disappeared. "So, anyway, Lady Sakuya wanted to ask if you, Kirito, and your friends would like to work with the rest of us."

Leafa was left blinking in surprise at his sudden turn-about.

Did I...did he just…

Kirito leaned in with a grin, over her shoulder. "I think you've just been had, sister. Even I recognize that one."

"Gyah!"

Where did Kazu-nii come from? Did he just see that?

With an embarrassed shriek she couldn't believe had come from her own throat, her blush deepened even more. She hadn't even noticed him coming towards them, and instinctively ducked her head into her brother's shoulder to hide her mortification.

"So," she heard Kirito say over her head as he spoke to Recon instead, "sure thing. I don't think Asuna, Kizmel, or the others will mind, although...is it all right? Looks like everything is under control for now."

Recon shook his head. "For now, sure, but you don't really think that this is all this boss has, do you?"

"You noticed that, too, huh?" She could almost hear the grin in her brother's voice. "I've been keeping an eye on it, too. If it's gonna happen, it'll probably be at the halfway mark. Let me get the others together, and we'll head over."

"Sure thing!"

Kirito pulled away, much to Leafa's dismay, before giving her a mischievous grin. "I'll leave you two to it, I'm gonna go get the others together."

He was gone, speeding off into the distance before she could protest – or remind him that the others weren't

that

far away, leaving her in an unusually awkward silence with Recon.

Isn't Shinichi-kun supposed to be the awkward, shy one of the two of us?

"So, Leafa," he said with a grin, "lunch, huh?"

Aaaaah!

Idly, she couldn't help but wonder when her friend had gotten so comfortable around her to lose his nervousness...and when that nervousness had moved over to

her

.

-------------------------------

As Kirito had predicted, when Jörmungandr's life bar dropped to half, the world boss moved on to its second stage – though the change happened without fanfare and was so subtle that it took most players a while to realize what was happening. Kirito himself almost would have missed it as well, had he not been keeping an eye on the grand serpent's HP gauge while he darted around it, trading off with Asuna and Kizmel as they struck with high-level sword skills in turn, the trio having grown tired of sitting in the back lines with the rest of the casters. Overhead, massed spellfire arced through the air from the back of the massed army that was comprised of the amassed Cait Sith, Salamanders, and Sylph players that their respective faction leaders had pulled together for this event.

"It's healing now," he muttered, sharp eyes locked onto their opponent while he caught his breath, watching Kizmel as she launched herself into a Treble Scythe. "I don't think it's attack pattern has changed much, but…"

Up ahead, Eugene and his lancers broke off their attack the moment Argo shot a flare into the sky to signal them that the boss had begun absorbing their damage in preparation for its wide-area AoE. Kirito swept in and pulled his wife's avatar into his arms before rocketing away at the fastest speed his wings could muster, Asuna right next to him.

"...it's healing a

lot

," the blue-haired girl finished his thought.

"Yeah."

Not just a lot,

Kirito noted grimly, throwing a glance back over his shoulder as he silently counted down the seconds until the boss's reflect wave would fire off,

it's healing almost enough to completely offset whatever damage we did to it before.

By the time most of the players had noticed that the grand serpent's HP was ticking back up at an alarming rate once every few seconds, it was already too late for most of them to do anything about it. Many had already broken off their attack runs or didn't want to risk straying too close to the world boss and risk being caught in its AoE burst after seeing what had happened the first time. The mages in their back lines, however, were intensifying their spellcasting in response, but Kirito was left wondering how long their mana would hold out, even with potions to replenish it.

The swordsman himself fell back along with the rest of his friends as they watched helplessly while the world boss's regeneration peaked, restoring almost a tenth of its total life bar over the course of its absorption phase despite the increased bombardment.

At least it doesn't seem to restore it fully

, he noted silently,

it doesn't seem to go past half of its HP.

That particular revelation was only a small silver lining to an otherwise bitter pill, however.

By the time the nova went off, considerably stronger than the last few cycles due to the extra damage it had absorbed from the casters, the regeneration had wiped out the progress they'd just made over the past couple of minutes. None of the players around them seemed daunted by the setback, however, and instead roused themselves with a battle cry starting from Eugene's section of Salamanders until it spread all the way around. The Salamander General led from the front as he and his lancers dove head-first back into the fray, dragging everyone else with him in their zeal, determined to resume their attack with even more vigor, only to be met with the same result a few minutes later when the next absorption cycle began and the world boss's HP started to tick back up.

We can't keep this going the way we have

.

We've already been hitting it with everything we've got, we can't really squeeze much more DPS out unless we keep attacking while it's absorbing.

Kirito pulled away from the grand serpent as the post-skill delay from his Howling Octave wore off just before Argo's signal flare lit up the lightning-riddled sky behind the world boss to signal the beginning of the next cycle.

The black-clad Sylph was about to turn tail and boost away like the other players fighting in melee when something caught his eye – the serpent's scales were beginning to pulse with a faint light as they absorbed incoming damage, strengthening the nova burst it would unleash at the end of the next thirty seconds, but along its body the swordsman spotted one that seemed out of place, coated by a rainbow-hued shimmer.

Intrigued, he decided to ignore the former info-broker's warning and instead started a silent countdown in the back of his mind.

Twenty-three.

With a powerful flap of his wings Kirito shot upwards, gaining altitude while dragging his left wing to send him into a spiral around the world boss's body as he ascended towards his target.

Nineteen.

Drifting to the side to avoid a lightning bolt that whistled past, he could feel the static electricity left in its wake crackling around him, but ignored it and pushed further, corkscrewing around the World Tree while trying to locate the shimmer that had drawn his attention earlier.

Fifteen.

There!

Spotting it just on the underside of the grand serpent's head, just where it had begun to wrap its body around the World Tree. Putting on a burst of acceleration, Kirito lowered his body and brought the black sword in his hand to his right. Opening his shoulders, the sword pulled back until the tip was just ahead of his body, and the system took over as it recognized the pre-motion.

Eleven.

Pale-blue light wrapped around the edge like a dancing flame as the Rage Spike catapulted him forward faster than even his wings could carry him, crossing the ten-meter gap between him and his target in the blink of an eye. It was the same skill whose speed had allowed him to bypass Heathcliff the Paladin's defenses and unveil him as the immortal, invincible avatar of Akihiko Kayaba in the death game despite the man's system-assisted movement speed and augmented defenses.

Ten.

The blue-glowing tip of his blade struck Jörmungandr's rainbow scale with a harsh

crack

, and for a moment Kirito held his breath, wondering if his blade was going to break while the force of the impact traveled up his arm. Then, a second later, the scale ruptured into multi-coloured pixels as the attack breached the grand serpent's defenses, and a new icon appeared above its head, underneath its HP bar.

[

Defense Down

]

Spells roared in from all around him, showering Jörmungandr with explosions and bathing the grand serpent in flame and ice as the mages caught sight of the debuff, redoubling their efforts as the boss's life bar began shrinking in earnest, enough to offset at least a part of the regeneration.

Nine.

Rage Spike was a low-level sword skill that bore no elemental property, and it did correspondingly little damage considering its reach and quick execution time – but it also had a very quick cooldown and skill delay afterwards. Kirito grit his teeth, tensing the wings on his back the moment the system released control over his avatar and shot up and away, past the serpent's huge head and malevolently gleaming eyes as it snapped after him in rage.

Below, the pulsing around its body quickened as the absorption phase neared its end a few seconds later.

With a strained grunt, the Sylph pushed his fairy wings further as the shockwave erupted from below him, a rainbow-coloured kaleidoscope of lightning, fire, and ice as it expanded in all directions, quickly catching up to him. Flames licked at the tails of his black coat as they caught up before swallowing his avatar whole, and Kirito's HP began dropping at an alarming pace as his entire world plunged into a sea of red and orange.

He swerved to the left on instinct, watching as a crystalline arrow flashed past, just barely missing his wings, but the wake of ice and frost it trailed clawed at the swordsman's limbs.

Eight seconds to cross over a hundred meters – even with a head start, the swordsman struggled to stay ahead of the blast wave as it struck him from behind, buffeting him around and threatening to send him crashing back downwards as the turbulence made controlled flight nearly impossible. Kirito stopped trying to beat his wings and extended them outwards, catching the shockwave and riding it as best he could while wresting for some semblance of control.

Then, finally, he burst out of the inferno, HP gauge blinking an angry red at him at the top of his HUD, but the nova burst stopped expanding below. Kirito heaved a long, deep breath, and grinned.

-------------------------------

There were dozens of players darting around, assaulting the grand serpent that had wrapped itself around the base of the World Tree. Spells arced overhead in the hundreds from the backline as the mages and even healers joined in the assault. More than guilds, entire

factions

were at war with the world boss that had sprung up from beneath Alne, and with that came all the chaos associated with trying to shepherd hundreds of players.

It was bedlam.

There was no way for anyone to keep track of everything and everyone, Asuna thought to herself as she hooked right to avoid getting in the way of the pair of Imps as they streaked past her from behind, only narrowly avoiding being clipped by one of them. With Kirito's discovery of the world boss's weak spots during its absorption phase, all of the players had redoubled their efforts to attack it during the thirty seconds of vulnerability, diving in to do as much damage as possible before retreating back to a safe distance – although some were cutting it closer than others.

Up ahead, her former partner was whirling through a ten-hit Nova Ascension, the brilliant white light given off by his blade painting harsh shadows across the grand serpent's body. His first attack struck the weakpoint to afflict the world boss with the debuff that lowered its defense, allowing the players around him to deal more than double their usual damage, and Asuna was among those that took full advantage of that fact.

Eight rapid-fire thrusts lanced out as the system assist guided her into the motions of a Star Splash, silver light stabbing forward like laser bolts as she hammered Jörmungandr's tough hide, heedless of the spells coming her way. A whirlwind surrounded her, deflecting most projectiles that arced towards the Undine, while sapping the most powerful of them of most of their strength. They still stung, and Asuna grit her teeth as one particular ice arrow grazed her leg, its force blunted but not entirely spent by Leafa's wind barrier and the defense-increasing buff cast on their entire group by Yuna

as they used their spells and buffs to harden the group's defenses

.

Even with her HP bar blinking at her angrily at the damage she'd taken, Asuna was undeterred. Silently keeping count of how much time she had left, the blue-haired fencer chambered her rapier back in preparation for another attack the moment the post-skill delay wore off. Not even bothering to move, she homed in on her target, sword raise up and by her left shoulder, before lunging forward in mid-air. Blue light collected around the tip of her blade as it shot forward in quick succession, the five strikes of her Neutron landing in the same spot she'd just struck and causing the grand serpent to reel back under the players' combined assault.

Asuna glanced up at the air above the world boss's head; it's HP bar was steadily shrinking under the players' relentless assault, and even if it was slower going than in the first half of the battle, they were making good progress.

Maybe one or two more rounds like this, and we should have it beat,

the blue-haired fencer concluded.

"Fifteen seconds!"

A flare went out

on the far side of the world boss

as Argo's voice echoed across the battlefield, amplified by the Rat's loudspeaker item; the blonde Cait Sith was keeping track of the time for the assault from the back lines with Lady Sakuya's retinue to make sure everyone knew when to fall back.

Yellow...we've got a few seconds left to finish up an attack or wait out a post-motion delay before we have to bail.

For a moment, Asuna considered whether to throw one last attack at the world boss, but discarded the idea in the end – a Linear would be quick enough and allow her ample time to withdraw still, but it also didn't do nearly enough damage to justify the risk. Hovering backwards, the Undine ensured her back was clear before swooping around in an arc and accelerating away just as a red flare lit up the sky, signaling the players that it was time to go.

Now

.

Kirito and Kizmel were only a second behind her

as they got ready to bail at top speed, having pushed it as close as they were willing to risk. The rest of their friends fell into formation around them as they angled away from the grand serpent-

"Keep fighting!"

"Charge!"

"

We can kill it this turn!"

Asuna's head snapped to the side at the sudden shout, carried across the wind by some kind of loudspeaker item like the one Argo had been using – a common item for party leaders to use in raids, she'd learned from Leafa. A volley of spellfire from the backlines temporarily blanketing out her view with flame and ice, hiding their foe from view as she turned to look for a split second. Blue eyes widened when she scoured the area to find that maybe half of the players that were busy fighting Jörmungandr in melee had obeyed the sudden, shouted command despite everything, and were still stuck at point blank range even as the serpent's scales began to pulse quicker still.

They made no attempt to disengage...if anything, to the Undine it looked as though they were throwing themselves at the world boss with reckless abandon, instead.

What are they doing? They're never going to make it

out of there

in time

if they keep fighting

!

It only took her a moment to realize what their goal was. The world boss was at perilously low HP – less than five percent, and if they had maybe another

thirty

seconds

they could have finished it off. For just a second, the fencer hesitated, wondering if she should turn around. There was a chance that they could make it, before the boss's point-blank AoE went off and wiped them all out, but Asuna discarded that notion a second later.

With a grim expression she pulled away further, the others right behind her.

And then, the space around Jörmungandr erupted into utter devastation as the world boss discharged all of the damage it had stored up during the past thirty seconds into a single, ever-expanding burst that rippled through the air, swallowing entire parties whole and leaving nothing in its wake. The white-clad Undine shook her head in disappointment, not even needing to look to understand the scale of their casualties.

We were so close...just one more cycle, and we would've won.

This wasn't the end it would've been in the death game, she knew – many of those players caught in the blast would respawn, or they would rescue their End Flames when they charged in on their next turn to bring back for the healers to resurrect again, but it

was

a setback.

"Well, that sucked," Klein commented as the blast wave receded behind them. "That's what happens when you get greedy, I guess."

Asuna shook her head. "What a waste…"

The scruffy Salamander shrugged. "Hey, I guess they figured it was worth a try. Not like they lost anything except a little durability."

"Yeah, but now we have to waste time dragging their End Flames back," Leafa grumbled. "Which just makes the whole thing take longer."

The blue-haired Undine nodded in agreement, glancing to the side where she found that, to her surprise, Kirito was wearing an amused grin. "What?" the black-clad swordsman asked.

"You seem to be taking this in stride, Kirito-kun."

Her erstwhile partner chuckled. "It's not the first time I see someone running a Banzai charge into a boss," he answered, "remind me to tell you about this one guy that went viral back when my Mom was playing a western MMO. Lee something? Lee Jones? Larry Jenkins?"

"Leeroy Jenkins," Agil supplied helpfully as the tall Gnome let out a rumbling laugh. "Haven't heard that name in ages."

"

That's the one," Kirito nodded. "Come on, just roll with i

t

.

Besides, that just means there's more for us, right?

"

Asuna shook her head indulgently at the excited smile on his face

as their small group dove back into the fray

. "Once more unto the breach

then,

I suppose."

Setback or not, the blue-haired Undine thought as she dodged spellfire and accelerated towards their opponent, she couldn't help but be grateful for the fact this time together with her friends would last just a little bit longer.

Once more unto the breach, indeed.

-------------------------------

Despite the fact that the fighting was over, Kirito couldn't deny the excitement and anticipation he felt, so similar to stepping onto a new floor in

SAO

back when he'd often been the first one through. It was a thrill like no other, walking into the unknown with the knowledge that everything ahead was theirs to explore. The sentiment, he knew, was shared by pretty much everyone around him, that much wasn't difficult to see.

An expression similar to his own was plastered all over Kizmel's face as the dark elf-turned-Imp walked next to him, and on his other side, Leafa was looking every which way, her translucent green Sylph wings fluttering excitably. Philia,

having respawned after she got caught off-guard by the boss's death throes as it crossed its enrage timer just before being defeated

, was a ball of excited energy at the mere prospect of new treasure and loot to be uncovered. Rain

was

pulling at her sleeve while grinning so the blonde didn't get too far ahead of them all,

and

the pair kept a watchful lookout for traps and hidden areas. Yuna and Nautilus walked behind them a little more sedately, but the murmurs coming from the pair were no less lively.

Fuurinkazan's seven members brought up the rear, and between the

two big groups

walked Agil, Argo, Lisbeth and Silica, the three girls having roped in Asuna into their midst as they walked in between the two larger parties, and the Rat's merry cackle was a high-pitched counterpoint to Agil's mellow, rumbling laugh.

The swordsman couldn't help but throw a glance over his shoulder at where the tall, blue-haired Undine walked next to Lisbeth; the two girls had been close friends ever since the days of the death game, and out of all of them, the pink-haired Leprechaun smith probably knew Asuna the best. Not because he or Kizmel had deliberately shut her out of their lives, but somehow, life itself seemed to have conspired to keep the trio apart in some way or another ever since Asuna had left them to join the Knights of Blood back then.

He'd been tempted to invite Asuna to join them more than once – had, in fact, extended that invitation whenever it had been just him and Kizmel, but Kirito was beginning to realize how awkward it must've been for Fuurinkazan back when Sachi had joined them

in Aincrad

. There were seven slots in a party, and while they weren't all on at the same time, Asuna simply didn't play often enough to have a permanent spot.

Even so, he felt more than a little guilty every time he had to rearrange the group's members.

Which was why this little combined adventure was quite the relief to Kirito; even though they all weren't in the same party or even a cohesive raid group, they were all still

together

. He didn't have to worry about who was going to be in which party, or who would take up what slots...it simply didn't matter. What

did

, was that they were here, all of them.

In a way, it had been a long time since they'd all been together like this.

No, actually, I don't think we've

ever

been all together like this, not all of us

, he corrected himself. Back in

SAO

they'd never had the chance to really play together all that much; they'd all been too busy fighting for their own survival, but he'd still felt incredibly wistful at how the huge event battle they'd just been through had brought them all together.

It wasn't as complex or dangerous or thrilling as any of Aincrad's boss fights, but it had been

fun

,

without the danger of the death game's encounters.

They played together whenever they got the chance

of course, but between their varying schedules – some tied down by school, others by work or other real-life commitments – it was

rare for even half of them to make it online at the same time, and Asuna was busier than most of them. Kirito knew that his former partner missed this world and her friends, too, even more so since she was the only one of them who didn't attend the Survivors' School.

I think the last time I saw everyone here online together at the same time was when New Aincrad was launched

, the black-haired Sylph mused with a wistful smile.

And I don't think we've really done anything like this together as a group ever since we got out of

SAO.

And now they all were doing something that they really never had had the time to fully enjoy back during Kayaba's death game: share the amazing feeling of going somewhere entirely new, someplace so wondrous and magical that only full-dive could offer.

It was a chance to finally go back to those first days of wide-eyed wonder – though even back then, the fencer had been feisty and headstrong, resolutely sticking by his side even though it had probably made things infinitely more difficult for her. Kirito, back then, had been unable to put his own gratitude into words and instead resolved himself to not only protect and teach her, but also to show her the wonders of games like these, knowing that she'd never had the chance to experience video games before. It was his way of trying to distract her, and himself, perhaps, from the dark, terrifying thought that they might very well die in that world of swords.

That desire to explore was a large part of why they were walking, instead of flying, right now.

The corridor – though it was probably more apt to call it a tunnel – was the width of a subway station, one of many that had opened up in the major cities with the exception of Yggdrasil City after the initial event. Unlike the Legrue Corridor that connected the Sylph lands in the south-west of Alfheim's continent to the central Alne Plateau, however, it was lit by magical floating crystals. Argo had identified them as a version of the Undines' racial Rime Light spell, and as such, being lit, the tunnel actually allowed flight for those wanting to get to the other end quickly.

Unlike the death game, however, Kirito felt no particular urge to be the first to reach anywhere.

There was, however, a good reason to simply walk the course; one that had been demonstrated more than once already by both Philia and Lisbeth, as the two had eagerly dashed this way and that on occasion, spotting either hidden loot chests, collectibles, or crafting materials tucked away into nooks and darkened crannies. They would've been easy to miss for anyone passing by in a hurry or even just giving the cave a cursory glance, but between the seasoned eyes of Aincrad's premier treasure hunter and Lisbeth's keen blacksmith's gaze, they dug out a veritable treasure trove of stuff that other players were prone to just pass over in their haste to get to the new area.

Kirito had to admit to himself, as they got deeper into the cavern, that he was curious about what YMIR's developers had done with the Jötunheim zone. It wasn't difficult to guess where the tunnel was leading, considering it started in Alne, at the foot of the World Tree where the Frost Giants' invasion

and the subsequent emergency of Jörmungandr

had blasted open a gaping crater, and the fact that it had been taken offline for maintenance a few days ahead of the expansion's launch.

"What do you think the new area is going to be like, Kazu-nii?" his sister asked him, mirroring his thoughts.

He glanced over at her, to find green eyes peering back at him expectantly. "I don't know," the swordsman answered with a shrug. "My guess is as good as yours, really. They didn't really tell or show us anything, even while we were testing. If you don't believe, me, ask Klein and his guys."

Leafa hummed in thought. "I mean...do you think it'll be really different from last time?"

Kirito shrugged; he had been down here once, if only briefly, before YMIR's update, along with his sister and Recon as they used it to farm up the Yrd – the game's currency – that they'd needed in order to help them gear up and buy materials for Lisbeth.

Back then, he hadn't been too impressed with the area that was essentially a huge zone right underneath the center of Alfheim's main surface map, accessible only via hidden pathways in the World Tree's root system

that were positively labyrinthine in nature

.

A

fter all the effort of getting there, the entire field had been nothing more than a flat, open wasteland, its snow texture doing little to hide the fact that there was nothing but flat, featureless ground underneath.

"I don't know," he finally said.

"I hope they added at least something fun," Leafa murmured thoughtfully. "Maybe a town, or something. They'd better have added more mobs, too."

Kirito nodded in agreement. Because it was a

high-level zone, it was easy enough to make money, but that was the

only

thing that had dropped from the mobs there, as though the developers at the time hadn't

bothered to

program any item lists or loot tables. It had been a rather...boring experience, if he was honest, and even his sister and Recon had commented things to the same effect.

During their first time in Jötunheim, there had been no buildings and no towns for the players to make their hub in, which limited their ability to stay in the area, and there

ha

d only been two kinds of mobs: the frost giant, similar to the ones they'd just fought during the invasion event, which was a melee-type, and a kind of flying, almost octopus-like creature which few bothered with because they were entirely passive unless attacked.

"Pretty sure they did," Kirito commented, "Lind and his guys are pretty good at what they do, and if the zone is part of the event, then they probably did add stuff to it."

"Do you think they kept the Tonkys?"

He blinked, before remembering the strange nickname his sister had bestowed on the odd creature that she hadn't been able to bring herself to kill. "Um...I don't know?" Kirito answered honestly.

"I hope they kept them, they were cute."

The swordsman chuckled wryly – Leafa, he'd discovered, had a rather strange definition of the word "cute," at least when it came to in-game pets and monsters, and for some reason she'd decided that the giant passive mobs on that map were adorable. Exchanging a knowing, amused glance with Kizmel, he simply shrugged afterwards.

"Maybe. I guess since they didn't seem to do anything, I don't see a reason why they couldn't have repurposed the model for anything," Kirito answered, "although if they

did

keep them, they probably made them hostile. Which means…"

"I'm not killing Tonky!" Leafa protested sharply. "No, not happening."

Kirito shook his head under his wife's mirthful look. "I guess we'll just have to stay away from them, then. Hey, at least this time the mobs down there will at least have proper loot tables. There might even be uniques that might drop, or so I've heard."

"I imagine Philia is rather keen on finding those," the Imp next to him commented knowingly

as they halted when their resident treasure hunter darted off into another darkened crevasse

.

"Yeah, I bet." Kirito chuckled. "Well, it's a bit different from how things have been recently, but-"

His wife shook her head. "I find it rather refreshing to have a goal once more. While exploring Alfheim is an interesting task on its own, even in Aincrad we had our mission – to conquer the Ruby Palace."

"True. I suppose that

was

a quest, of sorts."

"

I'm surprised you guys aren't really into attacking the new floors of New Aincrad the moment they open up, though," Leafa commented.

Kirito shrugged, exchanging a quick look with Kizmel. It was true – they'd traveled around New Aincrad on occasion, visited their old haunts and places that held meaning to see how they had changed...but neither of them held any great desire to actually conquer this version of the steel castle.

We haven't even started the Legacy of the Forsaken quest chain yet,

he mulled silently, but it was Kizmel who answered for them.

"We have already challenged Aincrad once," the lilac-haired Imp explained with a nostalgic smile, "and we conquered its very pinnacle. As much as I am grateful for Lind and his team for bringing back the steel castle's familiar sights, however, it would feel...strange, to challenge it again."

Leafa nodded slowly, her blonde ponytail bobbing behind her. "I guess...there's probably a lot of memories you'd rather not be reminded of there, too, huh?"

"That, too," Kirito agreed, "but also...it'd feel a little bit like playing through a game for a second time. It'd feel kind of like cheating."

"Even with everything that's changed?"

"Yeah. And...it's not quite the same." The former Black Swordsman shook his head. As good a job as the team at YMIR had done when they had brought Aincrad into

NewALO

, there had always been something lacking about it when compared to its predecessor.

There was none of that spark of life that had so immersed him in

SAO

, that had made him feel as though that world was truly alive in a way no other MMO could replicate.

Cardinal's absence had a lot to do with it, he figured, but a small part of him also couldn't shake the thought that Akihiko Kayaba's death game and the resulting isolation and self-dependency that had forced the system into had played a role in how the world of swords had turned out when compared to Alfheim.

It certainly had when it came to the game's mental health counseling programs, he thought with a mournful thought of Strea and Yui.

And while Kizmel appreciated the familiar sights of New Aincrad, even she didn't think it was the same world –

something only further reinforced by her status as a player among other players here

.

It wasn't her home. It wasn't her world.

Which just leaves the question, which world

is

hers?

he couldn't help but wonder.

Which world does she consider "real," and where does she feel at home?

It wasn't Alfheim, he knew – while they both enjoyed the fairy world that RECT Progress had created and YMIR had inherited, it wasn't...it wasn't

Aincrad

. He'd felt a connection with that floating castle in the sky that he'd never felt before, felt at home and felt like

himself

, despite all of the terrible things that'd happened there, that he couldn't really put into words.

Kirito doubted that he ever would find a way to explain that feeling to his sister and parents.

"Kirito?" the Imp's voice came from next to him, a worried tinge evident.

He shook off those thoughts and opened his mouth to reply, but whatever he was going to say died on his lips

as they rounded a bend, stepping out of the protection of the tunnel and into the sunlight – and into a vista that took his breath away. Their group stopped, teetering precariously at the very edge of a sharp drop.

"Whoa," Klein muttered, striding up next to him as a blast of frigid air hit their faces, a low whistle escaping him as the scruffy-looking samurai was the first to find his voice. "Now

that

is cool."

Kirito nodded mutely, eyes wide and awestruck as he looked across the sight that spread out below them. Frozen hills could be seen peering through the occasional gap in the cloud cover, but it was the weather itself that drew his attention, fantastical and otherworldly as it was. Roiling dark thunderclouds danced across as far as the eye could see, hiding the valley below along with its icy rivers and frosty forests; only the snow-capped peaks of crystalline glaciers peeked above the storms in the distance.

The wind howled across the frigid basin, its drone turning into a sharp hiss as it passed through a series of jagged rocks that rose like a dragon's teeth, lining the winding path down as it disappeared into the stormy clouds. Thunder accompanied by rapid flashes of lightning sounded a sharp staccato of thunderous cracks that cut through the low whistling of gusts and the heavy air currents that threatened to drag them across the ground or rip them from the air.

Flight, the swordsman knew almost instinctively, was going to be next to impossible under these conditions, but that didn't really bother Kirito as a slow, wide grin began spreading across his lips.

Where before, Jötunheim had been a flat, unremarkable plain, now the impossibly huge storm whose black, foreboding clouds rolled like a tsunami wave across the surface of the world below offered tantalizingly teasing glimpses of an entirely new world to be seen, one unlike any place that could be found on Earth. Jagged, blue-white flashes lit up the sky, some reaching as far as the ground, striking with explosive force to match the gale winds that tore at his coat.

"This is so…" Leafa mumbled, dumbfounded as she stood wide-eyed, and Kirito could only nod.

"Yeah." The grin on his lips widened, and he looked back where the rest of the group were standing around, staring with similar expressions

of awe

on their faces. He found the person he was looking for, and blue eyes immediately met his own, as though she knew that he'd been searching for her.

"Come on," he called, shouting over the howling winds and waving towards Asuna and the others. "Let's go!"

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

October 10th, 2025

The howling winds of Jötunheim greeted Kirito even before he'd opened his eyes, accompanied by a chilling gust of air that the game's system was unable to entirely filter out, sending a shiver down his spine as he went from the warmth of early autumn Japan to the frigid wastes of

NewAlfheim Online

's underworld. He sucked in a deep breath, onyx eyes snapping open as the rainbow-coloured tunnel that led from his AmuSphere's local hub into the game faded away, and was replaced by the sight of the small encampment that they'd found at the foot of the mountain underneath the World Tree's roots.

Kizmel was already there – for her, the process of moving from Haven to

NewALO

was much quicker, of course, and his wife greeted him with a smile the moment she caught sight of him, both of them exactly where they'd left off a few days ago.

It's been a busy few days, but at least the initial crowd should be gone by now

, the black-haired Sylph mused to himself, not entirely unhappy about the fact that he'd miss out on the rush of players that always surged into a new zone immediately after its release.

The initial launch event had taken place on a weekday, which meant that most of them couldn't stay in the game all night; after the battle for Alne and taking their time to explore the tunnels and the immediate area of Jötunheim where they emerged, Kirito and Kizmel both had called it a night, logging out soon after they'd stumbled across this safe zone close by the entrance.

Between school and their work for Rath, neither of them had really found the time to return to the world of fairies until the weekend, although Kirito recalled with some amusement that Philia, Argo, and

Agil

, of all people, hadn't been able to wait and started exploring around the new zone, often late into the night.

"Will your sister be joining us today?" Kizmel asked as she pulled the thick, woolen cloak she'd retrieved from her inventory last time around herself to ward off the cold.

"In a couple of hours," he answered. "It's Saturday – she's got kendo club today, so she'll be home after practice. I just finished getting the dinner preparations ready, and you and Cardinal are linked into the home security so we should be all set to play until Mom comes home. What about Asuna, did you hear back from her?"

Kizmel inclined her head. "She mentioned that she had studies that would keep her busy until the evening today...prep class, I believe she called it?"

"Prep school." Kirito nodded. "Makes sense."

Even back in Aincrad, one of Asuna's early driving fears had been that she would miss out on her mock entrance exams for university. Now that they were back in the real world, he wasn't surprised that she was hitting the grind hard in order to make up for lost time since she would be looking at taking the actual entrance exams at the end of this school year.

Kirito figured she had nothing to worry about; he knew her work ethic better than almost anyone, and didn't doubt that she'd excel just as she had when pressed into leading the clearing group. Yuna and Nautilus, too, had promised to help her prepare and Professor Shigemura was willing to put in a good word, as well – not that any of that would stop Asuna from making her own preparations as best she could.

I've got another year before thinking about that, but...

the swordsman glanced over at Kizmel.

Maybe I should try and figure out what I want to do. Working with Rath is all well and good, but that isn't going to last forever. And Kizmel...I wonder what she wants to do.

For a moment, the weight of the real world and the future pressed down on his chest, but Kirito quickly shook it off. He was here, right now, with the woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. Figuring out the

how

could come a little later.

"Are you all right? You seem lost in thought, my love." Before he knew it, Kizmel had moved in closer, her face almost touching his as she leaned in. A curtain of lilac hair fell all around them, shielding them from the rest of the world.

Cheeks flushing with heat, Kirito coughed sharply. "Nothing. Just got thinking about the future for a bit there. It'll be fine...I think."

"Knowing you, I have no doubt," she agreed, dusky lips curling into a smile. "But remember, you need not bear that burden alone. I am here, as are your friends, and your family."

"I know." Deciding to be a little bold in the face of her concern and the fact that they seemed to be alone outside the palisades for now, he decided to sneak in a quick kiss, before pulling back. Clearing his throat, Kirito decided to ignore the playful glint in his wife's eyes. "So...Asuna's joining us tonight, then?"

"She did say so," Kizmel replied, "but that leaves just us for the time being." Her smile curled into something mischievous to match the look in her eyes as she stepped towards him.

"I guess it does." Chuckling, Kirito went along, taking a step back until he bumped into the outside of the palisade. Her hand found its way into his, and he was about to pull the Imp close-

"Ooooh! This is awesome!"

They both blinked at the unexpected – and familiar – voice that exclaimed with an unusual tinge of excitement. Turning their heads, they found a tall player looking around as he came down the mountainside, the wind tearing at his dark blue robes and flowing silver hair. A gnarled wooden staff with a crystal on top completed the look of a classic fantasy wizard

despite his clean-shaven face

, but that wasn't what surprised Kirito.

"Kikuoka?"

"Hm?" the man turned to look over at them, before grinning. "Ah, Kirito-kun, Kizmel-san. I didn't think I'd see you here, but I really shouldn't be surprised. Also, it's Chrysheight," the avatar controlled by Seijirou Kikuoka answered,

playfully wagging his index finger

. "

Chrysheight, remember?"

Kirito chuckled. "You here to do research for you-know-what?"

The man shook his head. "Not this time. It's actually my day off – hey, don't look so surprised! I do have a day to myself every now and then. And contrary to popular belief, I do

not

spend it all doing paperwork." He paused, staring back at them. "Why are you two looking like you don't believe a word I say?"

An amused snort escaped the former Black Swordsman's self-control – thankfully, Kizmel was a little more diplomatic in her choice of words than he would've been. Elegantly hiding a smile behind one hand, the lilac-haired Imp shook her head mirthfully. "I believe that Kirito's disbelief stems from the fact that he has trouble imagining you having...fun."

"I mean…" Kirito trailed off awkwardly. "I guess even evil genius masterminds need a break every now and then?"

Kizmel giggled. "They do, indeed."

Chrysheight's long elfin ears drooped as he clutched at his chest dramatically. "Really? Is that how you see me?" Before Kirito could answer, he cheered up immediately. "That hurts, it really does...Hey, I know – let me play with you guys for a bit, that'll make up for it."

"...hah?" Kirito could only stare blankly for a moment at the sheer speed with which the government agent changed his apparent mood.

"Oh, come on, I know I'm probably no match for either of you when it comes to the intricacies of the game. But it'd be fun to look around and explore together, right? Besides," Chrysheight pointed out, "I've let you two play in my world, but I don't think I've ever seen you in yours."

Looking at Kizmel for help, the swordsman found his wife staring back at him with an almost identical blank look, before she shrugged. "I suppose there is no harm in his company."

I guess so,

Kirito figured, although it felt a little strange still – even though he'd spent a lot of time around military men like Kikuoka and Lieutenant Nakanishi in the past few months, it was the first time he'd met the government agent outside of work.

And if he didn't know for certain that the man behind the Chrysheight avatar

was

, without a doubt, Seijirou Kikuoka, he would never have believed it, considering the way the older man practically skipped forward, head turning this way and that at the various sights that Jötunheim had to offer, an almost childlike look of wonder and awe on his face despite the relatively dreary environment. It was a jarring difference from the usually jovial, but otherwise calculating and composed government agent that Kirito was used to seeing. With a mutual shrug, Kirito and Kizmel decided to follow him, albeit at a somewhat more sedate pace as they, too, were curious about what this new part of the world of fairies was like.

The encampment that was designated as a safe zone was ringed by a simple, crude palisade – though it stood out by virtue of the fact that its walls, rather than made of wood, were formed of translucent ice crystals. They speared up and outward, rising up into the air at an angle as though to ward off someone the size of a giant charging towards them.

Which, considering the mobs that populated the zone, Kirito figured wasn't entirely inappropriate for a defensive measure.

There was no gate, however, just a human-sized gap in the wall where the trio entered, looking around with interest; this was, after all, not something they figured was made by the frost giants that had attacked Alne themselves. Bonfires crackled here and there, and rough shelters were dug out of snowdrifts...but what really struck Kirito about the scene was the NPCs.

Players aside, t

he camp was almost deserted apart from a handful of NPCs, and they looked absolutely beat – like they'd been on the losing end of a war. He'd seen scenes like that before, in a number of the dark elven camps during Aincrad's Elf War campaign. Back then, it had been when Kizmel's people had been on the losing end of a three-way war, oftentimes fighting to the last in their attempt to desperately stave off the end they all knew was coming, something that had just added fuel to his desire to help them. It wasn't any easier seeing the injured and wounded now, despite knowing it was just a game.

Chrysheight, too, lost his joviality for a moment, eyes sharpening as though he was remembering something, but it was gone before Kirito could figure out if he'd just imagined the man's sudden pause.

"This looks like a war zone," the black-haired Sylph muttered under his breath.

Kizmel nodded slowly. "And they appear to have lost."

"They better," Kirito pointed out, "because if this is what winning looks like, I don't wanna see the losers."

As they wandered through the camp and approached its center, one NPC approached them. Dark armour gleamed in the dull light from Jötunheim's stormy sky and unlike the rest, she stood tall and proud – although that did little to hide the battle-damage her armour had suffered. A winged helmet covered her head but

couldn't

hide the long, jet-black hair that cascaded down her back. The visor was up, allowing them to see the woman's harsh gaze and sharp, elegant features.

Distinctly

human

features.

"Halt! Who goes there?" she ordered, drawing the sword that hung from her waist, although it was not much of a threat, they discovered.

Just like its owner's armour, the blade was battered, chipped, and broken to half of its original length.

Still, Chrysheight stopped and raised his hands, before glancing over his shoulder at them. "Hey, Kirito-kun, you want to take this one? You're the expert here, after all."

"You are no Jötun," the woman continued, staring at them intently and choosing to ignore the Undine's exclamation, "and I do not recognize you as mine or my sisters' Einherjar."

Kirito cleared his throat, making a mental note to ask Argo about this place later. "We're not. We came from above, from Alfheim," he answered.

"You are...Alfs?" The armour-clad woman peered at them closely, her eyes widening.

"

Yes, we are."

She narrowed her eyes and stepped closer.

"You appear to speak the truth. Alfheim still stands?"

"Uh...yeah. It does."

She heaved a great sigh, before sheathing her sword. "This is...good news. I had feared the worst when Jörmungandr escaped

from us

."

"Who are you?" Kizmel chimed in with her own question. "What is this place?"

"We are…" The woman shook her head and sighed. "I am Hrist, eldest of the Valkyries, we sisters who govern death and destiny. What you see is the pitiful remnants of Asgard's might. The result of my failure."

"You fought a battle, and lost?" the Imp continued.

The woman – Hrist – scoffed. "'Twas no mere battle we fought. Surt, lord of Muspelheim, has conquered the lands of Jötunheim and stolen two of the Divine Treasures that maintain stability between the realms. He seeks to overthrow Lord Odin and bring down Yggdrasil itself. He seeks to begin Ragnarok."

"The ending of the world," Chrysheight breathed.

Kirito's eyes snapped over towards him. "You know what she's talking about?"

"A little bit." Adjusting his glasses, the taller Undine turned to explain. "Granted, I only know the bare minimum, but I did a little bit of reading when I started playing

Alfheim Online

, since it's based on Norse mythology."

"Norse?" Kizmel asked.

"You might know them better as vikings."

"

Baikingu

?" Kirito frowned. "Isn't that...all-you-can-eat buffet?"

Chrysheight let out an amused laugh. "No, no, not that kind of viking, Kirito-kun.

Baikingu

is a loan-word from English that we use for buffet. But what I'm talking about are the warriors from ancient times, from northern Europe. Longships, dragons, and all that."

"Oh." He still didn't really know what the older man was talking about, but shrugged. "And?"

"Okay, so in Norse mythology, Yggdrasil is the world tree that connects the nine realms. Alfheim is one of them, Jötunheim is another. In the middle sits Midgard, where the humans live. At the top of it all is Asgard, where the gods reside, ruled over by Odin the Allfather," Chrysheight explained, "and a part of their legends is an event they call

Ragnarok

. It's the apocalypse."

"The ending of the world," Kizmel repeated.

"That's right. But it's not just the ending – it's also a chance for new beginnings. I guess Eastern religions aren't the only ones that have a monopoly on the whole death and rebirth cycle." The Undine shrugged. "But yeah. It's an end-of-the-world type event where the forces of good and evil are supposed to clash."

Kirito nodded slowly. "Okay. And the Valkyries and Einherjar?"

Chrysheight shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine."

"I thought you said you knew a bit!"

"I do," the older man shot back with a cheeky grin. "A

little

bit."

Kirito sighed in exasperation,

unsure if he liked this version of Kikuoka

, before turning back towards Hrist. "What happened here?"

The warrior woman stared at him for a moment to allow their conversation to finish, before offering a sharp nod. "Follow me."

They did, and were led to the center of the encampment, where a huge crystal stood; entombed within, frozen in time, Kirito realized with a start, was another woman in armour similar to Hrist's own – though where their guide's armour and hair were black as night, hers was dyed a pale blue, and long blonde hair flowed behind her back. A third valkyrie was standing next to the crystal with one had placed atop it, along with a handful of battered-looking human NPCs.

"These are my sisters," Hrist explained quietly. "Lenneth and Silmeria. Together, we three valkyries are tasked with gathering the souls of warriors worthy of entering Asgard and induct them into the ranks of the Einherjar – divine warriors to aid us in battle when Ragnarok is at hand."

The valkyrie standing before the crystal turned, catching sight of them, and her eyes widened. A tired, but genuine smile curled at her lips. "

The Alfs

yet live," she breathed. "Alfheim is safe, then? Yggdrasil stands?"

"According to them, it does, sister," Hrist said.

The valkyrie in dark blue armour offered a curt bow, before pressing one fist to her chest in a salute. "Salutations, brave Alfs, I am Lenneth. I greet you in the name of Odin and the Aesir, though I wish it was under better circumstances. I am glad you bring good tidings, at last."

Hrist moved to stand beside her. "Any news on our sister's condition?"

Lenneth shook her head. "It was all we could to save her. The power of the Dragon Orb is too much even for us to bear. There is one man I can think of who might possess the arcane knowledge to undo the damage to Silmeria's soul, but…"

"You speak of that man." The black-clad valkyrie's expression twisted in distaste. "He is a mortal who rejected the honour of becoming an Einherjar. What is more, he spurned your direct offer, sister."

"And yet he is a mortal with enough power and knowledge to join the ranks of the Einherjar whilst alive, Hrist." Lenneth shook her head, before turning back towards the players. "And you do our guests a disservice by not introducing them properly."

The valkyrie in blue armour stepped forward. Without her helmet, long platinum silver hair could be seen flowing down her back almost to her ankles, tied off with a ribbon – it was the only pristine thing left on her body, as her armour was even more battered than Hrist's. "I do not know what brings you to these frozen wastes, mortals, but I beseech you for aid. If Surt is not stopped, he will bring death to us all. More than death, he will undo all of creation itself."

"You would ask

mortals

for help, sister? Have you no pride?"

Lenneth didn't falter under her sister's stern glare. "And yet, those mortals have succeeded where we have failed. With all of our strength and the might of the Einherjar, what have we accomplished? We have lost most of our forces, our sister's mortal wound is held at bay only by arcana and the will of the gods, and we have failed in our task to stop the Jötun from awakening Jörmungandr and unleashing the world serpent upon Yggdrasil itself!"

"That...failure is mine, sister, and mine alone." Hrist drew herself up. "But what can mere mortals do, when we have failed?"

"Their mere presence here is proof of their strength. You saw with your own eyes the army of Jötun that escaped ahead of the world serpent. And yet, Alfheim stands, and Yggdrasil has not fallen, because they accomplished what we could not. You must feel it, too...the world serpent slumbers once more, its soul purified and reborn." Steel-grey eyes hardened, before returning to Kirito and his companions. "So once more, I beseech you for aid. Help us stop Surt. Help us stop Ragnarok...and help us save our sister."

-------------------------------

October 13th, 2025

Argo had once jokingly asked if Kizmel "dreamt of electric sheep."

The former dark elf of Lyusula didn't know exactly what she meant by that, nor did she truly understand why Klein and Kirito had snickered noisily at the comment, but she did understand the gist of the question.

At the time, however, she had been unable to give an answer.

Did

she dream? In some ways, the elf would've said unequivocally yes. After all, it was her vague and yet impressing dreams of the beta test that had eventually led her to pursue Kirito, the man whose face she recalled in the deepest recess of her mind for some reason. There had been the occasional nightmare over the course of her life, as well. But after she'd left Aincrad behind?

Nothing.

She

slept

, of that she was certain, at least while she was in Aincrad, even if, like the other players, she no longer felt a sense of physical exertion like she had before her transformation. And after leaving the steel castle behind and moving to Kirito's world – or as close as Haven could come to her husband's world, at any rate – Kizmel couldn't recall a single instance in which a dream had left an impression upon her memory when she awoke, for good or ill. In fact, it had gotten to the point where she didn't even feel tired, which lent a whole new quality to the question of not just

did

she sleep, but did she

need

to sleep, in the same way that she knew she did not have need for sustenance in the same way that her husband did in his world.

In fact, now that Kizmel had more of a foundational understanding of what she truly was, though she suspected she had only begun to see the very pinnacle of the mountain shrouded by mists, it was a question she'd begun to ask herself.

When faced with that question, her mother had attempted to provide an answer, though Cardinal's words had done little to answer her question at the time. She could sleep and dream...

if she so wished

, the woman who'd once governed over the world of swords as a goddess had told her, much in the same way that Kizmel now was learning to rule over her own domain. Haven was hers, her world, her realm. It took Kizmel a while to understand that this extended even to her very own being – in Aincrad, she'd been created, and whether or not sleep and dreams were a part of that was not up to her.

But here, it

was

.

It was a strange, eerie feeling to know that not just the world around her but even her own existence was malleable by her own will. If she willed herself to require sleep, then she would feel tired and compelled to rest, though conversely, if she desired to remain alert, she could also do so indefinitely within the confines of Haven – though Kizmel suspected that her power to do so could extend far beyond the reach of just this little realm. The thought of it had unsettled the former dark elf for a long time; after all, she was no god, had no aspirations nor desires to become one, much like Cardinal who, for all her god-like power in these worlds born from the Seed, had no desire to be seen as a deity. And yet, for better or worse, in this place, at least, she might as well have been.

And so, Kizmel slept...sometimes, at least.

It was a comfort she allowed herself, much in the same way that the swordmasters maintained their own habits of eating while trapped in Aincrad, as it served as a source of comfort. A reminder, in a way, that she hadn't yet fully transcended her own mortality.

She still didn't

dream

, that much eluded her, but she found that if she wished to, she could sleep the same way she had in Aincrad, and she found that she was rather grateful for that fact. Other than feeling somewhat refreshed when she woke, it instilled a sense of normalcy into her daily routine that felt to be a welcome change the way her world had been upended after leaving the steel castle behind. Even months after first setting foot – in a ways, at least – into the greater world that was Kirito's, there were times when she felt overwhelmed by the sheer scale of everything, daunted by the task of learning about a world that was so much more vast than anything she'd known before.

On top of that came the awareness that her own being apparently wasn't done evolving yet. She'd gone from a native of Aincrad, an NPC whose fate, actions, and past were entirely predetermined by the creator of the world she lived in, to a swordmaster – a

player

, whose agency could alter the fate of others as well as the very world itself for good or ill. And now, she was...Kizmel didn't really know what she was; her husband, his friends, and Kikuoka called her an AI, an artificial intelligence, although the closest comparison she could draw was an arcane item inhabited by some sentience from the loremasters and tales of old, something that sounded fantastical even to her ears.

And just like those ancient enchanted items of legend, she had powers. Powers that she was gradually learning to master, along with her ever-expanding understanding of the realm she inhabited.

Sometimes, it simply left her thinking, contemplating everything she'd discovered that day or trying to come to grips with something she'd learned about the human world. Most of that time was spent on the porch of the little home she'd constructed for herself and Kirito in Haven, watching the endless sunset or whichever time of day or weather she felt like at that moment in time.

Tonight was one such night where she simply sat awake, caught in a sentimental reminiscence of the adventures they'd gone through in the steel castle; feeling no particularly imminent desire to sleep just yet, she'd simply opted to watch the flame-coloured horizon of her own little world, nursing a tinge of melancholy at the fact that the time spent with her friends and comrades had been all too brief. Despite all the dangers they'd faced back then, Kizmel couldn't help but look back upon their time spent together in Aincrad with fondness and, in some ways, she missed those easier times.

Glancing up into the sky from where she laid on her back, idly playing with the menu as she casually explored the arcane script, Kizmel traced the strange language that Kirito had called

English

. She had begun to study and learn its odd, simplistic lettering and was beginning to be able to understand words and phrases in the menus on her own without Argo's guide, when her eyes involuntarily fell onto one particular charm that allowed her to reach out and contact somebody in the human realm.

Listed there were names and a unique string of numbers for each, which she'd learned were one of the normal ways for the people in her husband's world to communicate with one another across vast distances. Including, in her case, across the gulf between his world and hers. Despite the fact that she'd long since grown accustomed to using this method, it still seemed like magic to her, and the amazement Kizmel felt at such a feat had yet to fade. More than written messages and records left for one another, the simple ability to

speak

, without delay, to someone a literal world away as though they were standing right beside her, and even see them, and for them to see her, was something she couldn't even begin to imagine the inner workings of.

The number of contacts she had was limited, of course – not many knew of her existence, much less how to reach her. As a result, other than her closest friends from the steel castle, the only other people she knew how to reach were those at Rath, as well as her husband's family.

More often than not, particularly early on, they had been the ones to reach out to Kizmel, usually in the form of asking Kirito to let them speak to her through the device they called a phone. As she became more comfortable, however, and adjusted to the things she could and couldn't do – although the latter seemed to be growing fewer by the day – the former elf found herself more often reaching out of her own accord to her friends. Part of it was because the people she could talk to were limited to begin with, and those were her friends, her

family

with whom she'd fought and shed blood, while another, perhaps larger, part was because she felt

lonely

.

While Haven was hers, Kizmel wasn't shackled to it in any way; Agent Kikuoka had made it very clear that she was welcome to do as she liked, as long as it didn't compromise the secret of what she was. But at the end of the day, while it was her refuge, it also often felt as though she was the only living being in this world at times.

Which is not untrue

, the elf thought with some amusement, and it was part of the reason she spent more time in Alfheim than here.

Cardinal was ever present, of course – her mother never really left, and even though she might be working on something in Underworld, like the omni-present deity she'd once been revered as in Aincrad, she truly

did

seem aware of whenever her daughter called out for her.

But it wasn't the same.

As a result, she often called upon Kirito, his sister, or even his mother in order to escape the oppressive feeling of loneliness that threatened to engulf her at times, or sought out a busy place in Alfheim and simply took comfort in the ambient noise of other players. It was a strange feeling, one that perhaps was only exacerbated by spending so much time peering through the looking-glass at her husband and his friends in their world. Kizmel loved their company, felt as close as she could be with them without them stepping into her world, but it was a double-edged sword.

At the end of the day, when she was left all alone, it only served as a reminder to drive home the point that there was an insurmountable gulf between them, and the best they could do was visit with one another. She would call Argo, or Sachi, or even Klein or any number of their friends simply to remind herself that she wasn't alone, but the time in their world right now prevented such a thing. Even without the glowing clock in the corner of her vision that had been part of her swordmasters' sight in the steel castle, Kizmel had to but think about time to instinctually know what time it was.

Three in the morning, just about

.

Of course, in Aincrad it hadn't been unusual for them to still be up at this time, exploring or fighting to raise their levels, but now, free from the world of swords, it was far too early – or late, depending on whom she asked – to call anybody, and she would not call and wake any of her friends for such a frivolous matter.

After all, I'll see them soon enough, in a few hours at school.

She shook her head, idly toying with strands of her long, lilac hair that flowed unbound. It wasn't the first time she'd had such thoughts, and she figured it wouldn't be the last, but there were other ways to somewhat alleviate the feeling of being alone.

So, whenever it was too late to bother anyone else, Kizmel found herself occupying her time with using the device given to them by Professor Shigemura, the one that would allow her image to be sent into Kirito's world while at the same time sending an image of his world to be superimposed upon her own immediate surroundings. How he'd accomplished this feat, she didn't really understand, and it was something she could consciously suppress to keep from happening, but more often than not the elf was happy to at least appear to be in the same room as her husband.

Right now, the device sat in a corner of Kirito's room on his desk, where he often kept it to spend time with her while he was studying or working on various things that kept him from the realms she inhabited, and this was as close as they could get without them both stepping foot into Alfheim, Haven, or Underworld.

She would usually use the device to simply watch over him – sometimes while he worked, or, more recently, as he slept, taking solace in at least appearing to be nearby even though in reality a huge gulf separated them. But at least to

her

it appeared she was perched on the corner of his desk, an illusion of his room all around her replacing Haven, and Kizmel would take this time to read, or perhaps simply think and watch his sleeping form fondly while wishing she could hold him in her arms.

At first, it had started because she'd felt lonely in Haven, missing her husband's presence that for the better part of a year had been by her side every night.

Soon enough, however, Kizmel grew concerned as she watched him sleep.

For a time, she had believed that he would finally be able to leave the demons haunting his sleep behind in the world of swords. Kirito's world was as peaceful as he'd promised, and there was no need for the Black Swordsman or the Violet Knight. So, once there, she had hoped that he could return to being the child that had first journeyed to Aincrad, eyes wide with wonder and excitement.

And, for the most part, it seemed that he had.

Whenever she saw him in Alfheim, he was eager and even happy, but Kizmel quickly realized how naive that kind of wishful thinking had been. As a knight, she knew first hand how scars of the mind could last a lifetime, festering even long after scars of the body had faded; she bore some of those herself, after all. But she was born of the violent world of swords, remembered vicious battles and had fought and killed with her own hands, so it was something she was used to.

Kirito, too, had slowly become accustomed to living in a world where strength of the blade dictated life and death; a world where might made right, Kikuoka had once called it, and he had been correct in a sense. Aincrad was unforgiving and brutal, a world where the strong could take what they wanted and impose their will upon others – she needed only look at PoH, Rosalia, and others of their ilk to see that even the swordmasters were not immune to these kinds of vices. The only reason it hadn't been far more common, she reckoned, was their sense of self-preservation and the morality and values instilled into these people by a world that was at peace.

But they had needed to adapt to survive, and Kirito had done just that.

The Black Swordsman was as ruthless and cruel a man as any born of the steel castle, capable of contending with the worst that world had to offer. He had to be, in order to not fall prey to some of the more unsavory even among the swordmasters themselves, and that very first night had been a harsh lesson in just that fact. Kirito had wrapped himself in a shroud of aloof indifference, calculated arrogance, and occasional cruelty, and he'd done so perhaps a little too well.

In some ways, he was much more like PoH than anyone realized, although Kizmel had a suspicion that Kirito

did

...and that was part of what was haunting him so. Laughing Coffin had been full of bloodthirsty, cruel individuals – but those were easy to understand.

Their enigmatic leader, on the other hand...Kizmel suppressed a shiver at the thought of the man who'd haunted even her nightmares at times. Casual cruelty, brutality, viciousness – these things weren't foreign to her. But PoH had combined them with the kind of dangerous charismatic veneer that hid his true motivations, the same kind of bluster and aloof arrogance that defined the Black Swordsman, and in a way, that scared her more than if he were to be driven by the urge for simple bloodshed like so many of his cohorts. PoH, and by extension, XaXa, his right-hand man, had been intelligent, cruel, and cunning, and she couldn't help but feel that even their bloody, costly victory against Laughing Coffin in the end had somehow not been all due to their own efforts.

But that was behind them now; becoming the Black Swordsman in order to survive had saved Kirito, both his life and soul, though Kizmel knew first hand that it had taken a toll on him. It was right there in the way he curled up on himself in the aftermath of every life he'd taken, of every unhesitating, merciless stroke of the blade that cut down those threatening the swordsman's loved ones.

A guilty part of her felt glad that he broke down like this, because it meant he

wasn't

like PoH, but at the same time, Kizmel had hoped that returning to this peaceful world would allay those demons at the very least. That, in a place where there was no need for the Black Swordsman, Kirito could perhaps find some measure of peace from the guilt he carried, and he had. With time and distance had come acceptance, and even Kikuoka had been helpful in giving the former swordsman perspective.

After all, their strange benefactor been in much the same position, for similar motivations in his younger years, and so there was an unspoken understanding between the three of them.

But what neither of them had counted on was the fact that, rather than allaying Kirito's guilt and fears, the things he'd done and experienced simply made him feel even more out of place among even his own flesh and blood family than anything else. It wasn't through any fault of Midori's or Leafa's – as far as Kizmel could see those two tried their hardest to help him come to grips with what had happened, but at the same time, none of them could ever truly understand the full extent of what he'd gone through.

The only ones who could were the people who'd survived the steel castle with him.

And, like Kizmel, he sometimes looked lost, as though he'd suddenly lost his purpose and was struggling to find his path in a world that no longer needed the skills that had defined them so thoroughly in the past. There was no conveniently marked road for them to walk upon, no castle to climb and no series of guardians to defeat. Instead, there was only the vague goal of adapting to life in this brave new world they'd both found themselves in, and no direction as to just how to go about achieving that goal.

It was, as Argo had once said in a moment of lucid wisdom, the very nature of being human, to find meaning for themselves.

While awake he put on a good front, but it was at night when he was at the mercy of his dreams, that she could tell whenever his insecurities, worries, or fears came back to the fore without a conscious mind to suppress them. Unlike their foes in Aincrad or Alfheim, however, this was not a foe that ascribed to reason or logic, was not one she could fight with technique or skill and predict with knowledge and experience as it struck seemingly at random and out of nowhere without warning. This time, there was nothing she could do about it, no matter how much she wished to take him into her arms.

Or is there...

she thought for a moment, sighing as he turned and tossed in bed. Tonight was especially bad – perhaps his mind had decided to conjure a particularly unwelcome memory from Aincrad, or maybe it was the same up-welling of guilt he sometimes felt for those the Black Swordsman perceived as having failed to save, she didn't know, but Kizmel decided that she'd finally had enough.

Forgive me, my love, for this act of selfishness.

Swiping her hand through the air to conjure up the menu, she selected the one arcana that would allow her to call him. Watching anxiously as the quiet chime of his phone grew louder, she waited for the moment that the sound would wake him. It took a few moments for the noise to pierce into his dreams and force him awake; eventually, he shot up, looking around in disorientation and confusion until Kirito blearily spotted the source of light on his nightstand.

Picking up the phone, he looked into the corner where her projection hovered above his desk, and Kizmel quickly schooled her expression into one of longing as his voice carried across the gulf between their worlds.

"Kizmel? What's wrong?"

"I…" she paused for a moment, looking for the right words. "I couldn't sleep. I'm sorry for waking you."

He shook his head, sitting upright and rubbing his eyes. "No, it's fine, it's fine. I was up anyway."

Kizmel shook her head, carefully hiding a smile at the blatant lie – but she allowed him this much to save face. "I was...lonely," she finally admitted, as much for her own sake as his. "I missed you."

"Oh." He blinked. "Yeah, I miss you, too."

She hadn't expected that. "Really?"

"Yeah." Kirito shrugged, the oversized shirt looking far too large for him and once again reminding Kizmel how young he was. "I mean, it feels weird waking up in bed alone. I kinda wish...I kinda wish you were here."

Looking back at her, he grinned wryly. "Looks like I'm not the only one, huh?"

"You are not," she agreed with a gentle smile. "I know that it is not good for you to sleep in my world, especially since it is a school day tomorrow, but…would you spend the night with me?"

If anything, he, too, looked relieved at the question. "Sure. I'll be there in a moment."

Kizmel weighed her options for a moment; it wouldn't be the first time he had spent the night resting in the virtual realm, although both Midori and Rinko had warned them not to make a habit of it. He would dive in without hesitation if she but asked – and while Kizmel herself was certain there would be no ill effects, considering he had spent two years in Aincrad, it could not be ruled out entirely. She wished for a moment that they could meet in Underworld, for even Rinko had admitted that it was far more similar to the humans' world than Haven or Alfheim, and there was something appealing about the raw, primal nature of that untouched world along with all of the sensations it offered. Alas, for the moment it was only possible for Kirito to enter that realm from the confines of Rath's office, which left them with few other options.

Besides, there was something comforting about the little cottage she had designed and made alongside Kirito and Cardinal – comfort she felt her husband needed at this very moment.

Finally, she made her decision.

Lady Midori will simply have to forgive me for this later

. "Please."

He reached over for the NerveGear. "Hang on. I'll be right there."

She closed the window to the other world, but didn't have to wait long. True to his word, Kirito appeared in Kizmel's private refuge only a few seconds later in the casual outfit that he'd chosen for himself when visiting her, and together they headed towards the bedroom in the back of the cottage, laying down under the starlight that the former elf had summoned into the sky.

It didn't take him long to fall asleep, and, for the rest of the night as she watched over the swordsman's sleeping form in her arms, his rest was, for once, undisturbed by demons and nightmares.

And Kizmel, too, slept – though, she would have to report to Argo one day, there were no sheep in her dreams, electric or otherwise.

-------------------------------

October 16th, 2025

More than a week after its release, Kirito had reasonably expected at least the starting area of Jötunheim to have mostly cleared out of players as they rushed ahead and explored the lands that had opened to them, much in the way that could be expected to happen to the newest zone of any popular MMO. And in some ways, the furor

had

died down a little, with many either moving on or returning to Alfheim or New Aincrad.

It kind of

reminded him almost of the day

SAO

had launched.

Back then, all of the players had filled the Town of Beginnings as they entered Ainicrad for the very first time, crowding the main plaza with wide-eyed excitement and awe at the prospects of exploring that world of swords and the adventures it must hold.

Of course, then we all got brought back into that plaza

again

, later that day, and things went...

he cut off that particular train of thought; thinking back to that day no longer hurt as it once had, but Kirito didn't think he'd ever shed the regret for what had happened fully.

Avoiding the spoilers from his friends as much as he could, he and Kizmel had spent their first full in-game day in Jötunheim exploring the Einherjar camp

while holding off on

the initial quest given to them by Lenneth until Kikuoka had taken his leave, and Asuna and Leafa had joined them in his stead. After all, neither Kirito nor his friends were the type to idle around for too long, and they all felt the itch to explore this new area that YMIR had created underneath the plane of Alfheim.

T

hey wanted to see where the story of the frost giants and their attack on Alne would take them, but they'd quickly been presented with another challenge.

Jötunheim wasn't called the realm of frost for nothing – the swordsman had to hand it to Lind's team at YMIR, who had done a phenomenal job at turning a place that was just monochromatic shades of white from the snow and ice into an area that felt anything

but

one-dimensional and plain. If nothing else, the ever-present thunderclouds and blizzard that surrounded their small encampment that was shielded from the elements by the tips of the World Tree's roots, were colourful in their own way. The bright flashes of lightning searing across the darkened skies and highlighted the sharp, jagged edges of the mountains and glaciers silhouetted in the distance, lending an air of danger and mystique to the zone.

As one helpful NPC, an Einherjar warrior by the name of Nanami clad in Shinto robes, had explained, the entire realm was clad in an eternal storm and frost so cold that without the immediate protection that the World Tree's roots offered, death was all but guaranteed. The valkyries and their Einherjar could stand it for a period of time thanks to their divinity, but according to her, the mortal Alfs had no such protection afforded to them from the perils of the frigid realm, and the further they went from the base of the World Tree, the worse it would get. That danger materialized itself in the form of a biting cold that slowed them down, a frost and hail that inexorably chipped away at their HP, and blizzard-like conditions at times that obscured vision and made flying anywhere hazardous at best, and impossible at worst.

The sheer amount of environmental effects and impairments present was rather impressive, and they had brought any kind of immediate exploration of the new zone to a grinding halt almost as soon as it had started.

For the first couple of days, it had left players wondering how they were supposed to explore more than just the area covered by the World Tree's

roots spanning overhead

– but, unsurprisingly to Kirito, it had been Argo and Philia who'd finally discovered the solution to their problem. After completing enough quests for the Einherjar around the camp and earning their trust, it had been the Aesir Eir, the camp's NPC healer, that had come to their rescue with a quest and finally given the players their hint as to how to survive in the frozen wastes of Jötunheim.

Kirito pulled up the collar of his newly-acquired thick pelt cloak as they made their way through the camp, beelining right towards the area that the crafters had claimed for themselves. "Here you go," he told the Pooka at one of the stands, retrieving the frost boar pelts they had harvested from the fields from his inventory.

"Looks good," the other player said, counting them, before nodding. "Yeah, they're all here, and I've got the other materials you dropped off earlier. I can make you the rest of the coats, shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes."

The Sylph swordsman nodded. "Thanks. We'll go warm up and be back later to pick them up, if that's okay."

"Sure."

He was about to turn away with Kizmel by his side, when the Pooka called out again. "Hey, um…"

"Yeah?"

Glancing over his shoulder, he found the shorter fairy tilting her head, looking a little hesitant, fiddling a bit. "Um...I know you guys are busy and all, but…"

"What can we help you with?"

Kizmel's soothing tone caused the Pooka to look down to hide a blush at being spoken to by a pretty girl, and Kirito suddenly realized from the pitch of the player's voice that it was probably a younger kid.

Maybe somewhere around Silica's age?

His own demeanour softened a little, and he turned around fully.

"Um...my friends and I wanted to go out and play here, too," the Pooka said haltingly, "but, um...they can't really hunt the frost boars to make our own cloaks. Since I'm a crafter, I was hoping to set up shop here and make them, so we could make enough Yrd to buy some for us, but no one actually wants to sell them, or the pelts, so…"

"I see." Kirito glanced over at his wife, meeting her violet eyes briefly as they realized what was going on.

You have to go out without protection, find them, then tank through the frost DoT and be quick enough to kill the boars before the storm gets you.

It was no surprise why some players would find it difficult – especially since the frost boars themselves were not exactly easy mobs to fight, either.

Looking over the crafter in front of him, the Pooka looked reasonably well-geared, although that still wouldn't protect him from the zone's environmental effects. And with the zone being so new, everyone wanted to keep the stuff they'd harvested to themselves – it would likely be a few more days, if not weeks, before the supply caught up with the demand, especially with all of the large guilds and groups like the ones led by Lady Sakuya and Eugene and Mortimer trying to get their share in before the others.

Odds are they aren't just battling the environment and the mobs for the drops.

He and Kizmel both had had to go out fairly far to avoid running into other hunting parties, themselves – and they had the benefit that either one of them alone could handle themselves, even hamstrung by all of the environmental effects if only by simple virtue of having the stats to tank straight through most of the debuffs for a good while. So, it didn't really surprise him that other groups of less experienced players weren't able to gather the materials, particularly considering the unique issues involved in getting around Jötunheim.

"You had trouble dealing with the debuffs here, huh?"

The younger player nodded sheepishly. "Yeah. I think we can kill the boars if we can just get to them, but the DoT from being outside the camp just kills us just after we find some. We got close once, but then another group came in and just stole the kill, and we all just died and respawned…"

"And the frost DoT is only one of the problems out there," Kirito finished, thinking about all of the hazards that were involved with traveling into the wastes of Jötunheim that limited their ability to move around the zone freely.

"Yeah."

The swordsman hummed in thought for a moment, before glancing at Kizmel again. She gave him an imperceptible nod, and he chuckled, not at all surprised at his wife's generousity. "Okay. Well, keep those pelts, then. We can get more."

"Wh-what?" The Pooka shook his head rapidly. "N-no, that's not what I meant! I just – look, I can pay you!"

"Nah, it's fine. We can easily get more, it's not a big deal-"

"It

is

a big deal!" the Pooka whined, before clutching the items to his chest and leaning forward, his voice dropping to a harsh whisper. "Look, I know how hard these are to get, and how competitive people get when they find a spawn. It must've taken you hours and a ton of Yrd in consumables just to find these. I'm a merchant, I can't just take stuff from you for free…"

Kirito blinked.

Um...don't people usually jump at the thought of getting free stuff? What's going on?

He glanced over at Kizmel, only to find her shrugging. "Look," he tried again, "it's really not that big a deal."

"I don't want or need your pity," the kid continued, "I can pay for it! I promise!"

The Sylph was about to wave him off and just walk away, leaving him with the pelts regardless, but an almost imperceptible shake of Kizmel's head stopped him. The Imp took a step towards the younger player.

"Of course, we would be happy to accept payment," she told him, looking over her shoulder to send a surreptitious wink towards Kirito. "However, as you said, unfortunately there are no others selling the pelts at the moment, and so there is no average price to consider. Therefore, the value of those pelts is...up to us to determine."

The Pooka's ears drooped as he suddenly realized what she was insinuating, and he hastily dug through his inventory. "Look, if my Yrd isn't enough, just sell me one, or two...I can give you items, too!" He looked to be on the verge of tears as he opened a trade window. "Just...just sell me one! Just one, so one of my friends can try and get more for us! Please!"

"One Yrd. Per pelt," Kizmel said firmly.

"I'll give you every...thing…" blinking rapidly, the kid trailed off. "...what?"

"One Yrd per pelt," she repeated dutifully. "That would make it eight Yrd."

"...eight?" he echoed dumbly. "Eight? Are you sure?"

Kizmel nodded kindly. "Yes. After all, we cannot simply give these away for free, isn't that right? But alas, since we have no guidelines on what they are worth, this is my suggested price based on the effort and resources my partner and I expended to acquire them. Will that be satisfactory?"

"Y-yeah…" the Pooka hastily scrounged together the proper funds and handed her the coins.

"Oi, oi, oi! If you're gonna sell those pelts to that runt, then you're better off selling them to us," a gruff, rough voice cut in. "We'll pay you a heck of a lot better than that runt can – one way or another," the player added with a wolfish grin at the beautiful Imp.

Kirito turned to find a trio of players standing not far off, having witnessed Kizmel's exchange with the Pooka, and his eyes ran over them appraisingly.

A Gnome, Sylph, and Salamander. Tank, DPS, and caster, huh?

They, too, were lacking the distinctive frost boar cloaks that allowed players to ignore the exposure debuff that caused frost damage over time every second they were out in the fields, and were eyeing the stand with greedy looks.

A wry grin crossed his lips.

Oh, not this type again.

He saw Kizmel shoot those three players the same kind of exasperated look as they approached the stall when the Gnome, who'd spoken, reached for the pelts that lay on the table; it wasn't as though he'd be able to steal it, the only people who could actually take from a player's trading platform were the two parties involved, but the intent was clear. Before he could touch them, however, Kirito reached over, grasping his wrist in an iron hold – the Gnome halted in surprise at the Sylph swordsman's unexpected strength, and glanced at him dismissively.

"You got a problem? I was talking to them, so you better just turn around and walk away," the taller Gnome growled.

Kirito shook his head in amusement, not even bothering to hide his smirk as the beater reared his head in his mind.

Oh, this is nostalgic. I actually almost missed it...and I have no idea what that says about me.

"Oh, I'm about to make it my problem."

"You want a beating that badly, huh?"

"You're a Sylph, right?" the second member of the trio – a dual-sword wielding, green-haired Sylph – added nastily. "I'm friends with Lady Sakuya, the girl who runs our faction. One word from me, and you'll be a renegade."

"Ooooh, I'm so scared," Kirito chuckled. "So you know Sakuya, huh?"

"That's right," the other Sylph answered proudly, drawing himself up to his full height. "So you better not get in our way."

The black-haired swordsman glanced over at the Salamander who, uncharacteristically for most other players of that race he'd met, was wearing mage robes and holding a staff. "I'm guessing that means you know Eugene."

"Y-yeah, I do!" he answered after pointed looks from his comrades. "H-he's my bud!"

"Okay…" Kirito drawled, slowly looking from one to the other as he took a slow step back, watching triumphant smirks grow on the trio's faces. "Don't care."

"W-what?"

The swordsman's retort, thrown out so casually, momentarily threw the three for a loop, causing Kirito's own smirk to grow as he caught sight of something behind the trio. "You can complain to them about me all you like, see if that gets you anywhere."

"You think we're bluffing?" the Gnome demanded angrily, yanking at his arm and trying to dislodge it from the grip Kirito still had on it.

Aincrad's most infamous player shook his head with a nasty grin. "Nah. I

know

you're bluffing."

"You'll see – when we get done reporting this to Lady Sakuya, you'll-"

"Report to me about

what

, exactly?" All three of them spun around at the sound of the elegant, soft voice that carried with it a hint of steel – only to find a tall, green-haired woman clad in a forest green kimono behind them, her long, signature

tachi

suspended behind her back while the frost boar cloak covered her shoulders almost like a shawl, and a small retinue following in her wake.

"Yo, Sakuya," Kirito waved, receiving a mirthful, merry wave in return. "What's up?"

The casual tone with which he addressed the woman who'd held the leadership over the Sylphs for almost an entire year on popularity, skill, and leadership, caused not only the trio in front of him, but also a large number of Sakuya's retinue to freeze in surprise and look at his audacity with a mixture of disdain and surprise. What was more, she didn't appear dismayed at being addressed so casually at all – in fact, if anything, she looked amused and pleasantly surprised.

"Ah, Kirito, Kizmel – what a surprise in meeting you here. I haven't seen you around in a while."

Kizmel inclined her head, giving a somewhat more diplomatic greeting, although her own smile betrayed their familiarity with the other woman. "Lady Sakuya – it is good to see you again. I'm afraid we have been busy recently, so we had little time to spare."

"Leafa did mention something along those lines," the green-haired Lord of the Sylphs nodded amiably, before turning back towards the other three players with an indulgent look, steely eyes zeroing in on her fellow Sylph among them. "You were saying about reporting someone to me?"

"Um…"

With a nervous gulp, the player looked towards his friends, only to find no help there. Kirito could see the Gnome prodding his Salamander buddy to speak up, but before either of them could say a word, someone pushed his way through Sakuya's retinue.

Tall, clad in polished crimson armour and wielding a distinctive two-handed sword said to be one of the most powerful weapons in the game, a man with flame-red hair and a craggy face stepped forward, before he broke into a wide grin. "Hey! Kirito, Kizmel! I thought I heard your names."

"Yo." Answering the Salamander's fist-bump with one of his own, Kirito grinned broadly, and next to him, Kizmel greeted him in the same manner and with an equally amicable smile.

"General Eugene."

Kirito watched with unconcealed amusement as the trio of players hastily scrambled, using the distraction of the two Lords greeting them to ma

k

e their exit before any more attention could fall on them. Eugene blinked in surprise, while Sakuya frowned, before turning towards them.

"So...what was that about?"

The swordsman shrugged. "Just a couple guys who wanted something we wouldn't sell to them."

She glanced at him skeptically, but then shrugged. "All right. I assume that you will reach out to me if they do something that would require my intervention. I'm not even going to

entertain the idea

that those three would even be capable of doing something the two of you couldn't handle."

"It's fine, it's not like it's the first time we've run into guys like that," Kirito answered.

"I think you can let them deal with it, Sakuya. I don't think they're the kind of people who'd have trouble with players like that," Eugene commented, earning himself a pointed look from the older woman. "What?" he asked with a shrug, "just sayin'. You know I'm right."

The green-haired Sylph stared at him a moment longer, before caving in with a sigh. "Oh, very well." Turning back towards Kirito and Kizmel, she smiled. "As for you two – we've got some stuff we're doing here, but maybe we can catch up later. I've been meaning to ask Leafa to get a hold of you, and I think you're going to like what we have to say."

"Um...sure?" Kirito blinked; his sister had been spending quite a bit of her time recently with both Sakuya and Recon, although he wasn't entirely sure what she got up to with the high-ranking members of Sylph leadership – nor did he really care. He'd just assumed it had to do with the expansion, and the way the Sylphs were organizing themselves to explore the new content.

"All right, we'll see you around!" With a wave, Sakuya gracefully spun and walked through the path being cleared by her retinue. Eugene gave them a grin and a thumbs up before following her.

It was only belatedly that he realized that the retinue was a mixture of greens and reds, hidden under their frost boar cloaks as they were, and a chuckle escaped the swordsman's throat. "So...those two, huh?"

"It would appear that they have...buried the hatchet, as you might say," Kizmel murmured in his ear, having clearly caught the same thing.

"Sure looks like it." Turning back towards the Pooka behind his stand, the black-clad Sylph found the younger player staring wide-eyed at the space the two faction leaders had just occupied, mouth open in slack-jawed surprise.

He blinked slowly, gathering his wits about himself, before almost robotically craning his neck to look from Kirito to his partner and back. "W-was that...was that really…"

"Sakuya and Eugene?" Kirito shrugged. "Yeah."

"Y-you know them?" the Pooka all but shrieked.

"I wouldn't say we

know

them…" trailing off, the swordsman paused. "Actually, no, I guess you could say that. We've both fought Eugene, and I guess we kind of know Sakuya."

"W-wow…" with an impressive dedication to his craft, the Pooka shook himself and returned his attention back to the pelts on the table and the negotiations that had been so rudely interrupted earlier. "Um...if you...if you bring back any more, I'll do the crafting on the house!"

Kizmel shook her head. "We appreciate the sentiment, but we cannot simply take advantage of your good will and services for free. Just as you have your pride as a craftsman, we have our own pride that will not allow us to take advantage of your kindness."

"Then...how about it? Let's call it a frequent customer discount. You've bought a lot of cloaks from me, so...I'll do all of your crafting for…" the Pooka scrunched his nose, "...one Yrd a piece."

The Imp chuckled at having her own argument turned back on herself, and nodded. "I suppose that would be acceptable, that's very kind of you."

Watching the awe-struck look on the kid's face with amusement, Kirito shook his head. "We'll be back in a couple hours with some more. Oh, and if you do go out there, make sure you bring fairy bonfires. If you don't have a coat, they'll keep the DoT and some of the other debuffs off of you, or clear them temporarily."

"Y-yeah, thanks! I'll be here, come back any time!" He waved at them merrily while they left the stall area, and Kirito turned towards his partner, only to find Kizmel with a knowing grin curling her own lips upward.

"What?"

"Nothing," she said, reaching out to wrap an arm around his waist. "Nothing at all, my love."

The black-haired Sylph shook his head, leaning into his wife and returning the gesture. "So...what did you want to do now?"

"Well...seeing as we still have to procure the necessary pelts for the rest of our group, we should perhaps take a rest and restock on supplies before heading back out," Kizmel answered, glancing at him through the fringe of her hair. "Though I do not think any of them would fault us for failing to obtain their coats."

"Nah, it's fine. I'm the one who gave them away, so I can get them."

"

We

will get them. Together."

Kirito opened his mouth to respond, only to shake his head in amusement. Kizmel was right – they'd do this, just like they did everything else.

Together.

-------------------------------

October 17th, 2025

Becoming a swordmaster had come with a dulling of her senses in some ways, something that had taken Kizmel a while to get used to, and it wasn't until she had entered Underworld for the first time that she realized how much she'd missed even the most ephemeral of sensations. There was some good to it, too, however – the sun no longer beat down on her as harshly as it once had, nor were extreme heat and cold that would have debilitated her before anything more than inconveniences to her now.

Jötunheim was one such place where the former dark elf was grateful for this gift; she didn't think any living thing could survive in the extreme cold that had created all of the frost and snow that seemed to eternally enshroud the realm. Still, she couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief as they stepped through the simple curtain of furs that was hung across the entryway to the camp's sole feasting hall. The blast of warm air that greeted her was a welcome change from the numbing cold outside that, even through the frost boar cloak that she wore. The former dark elf rubbed her hands together, thinking that she hadn't experienced a cold like this since Aincrad's fifty-fifth floor, whose icy plains and mountains bore no small resemblance to Jötunheim itself.

Although we have yet to find a frost dragon's lair,

Kizmel mused.

I have a feeling, however, that it might not take long, considering the other creatures we have encountered here so far.

Kirito, by her side, tilted his head towards an empty table in the corner in askance, and she nodded; the space was as makeshift as the rest of the camp and just as austere, but it was warm and bathed in the orange light of the dancing flames at the center. Taking their seats near one of the hall's hearth's was quite the relief after a day out in the frozen wasteland beyond the camp. Kirito paused for a moment to place their order at the bar with the hall's caretaker, a grim, craggy-faced Einherjar named Arngrim whose midnight-tinted sword dwarfed even his towering stature. Her husband returned to their table with their order of a warm drink and the local specialty.

Frostglow nectar and frost boar stew,

the Imp mused after perusing the limited menu,

I believe I am starting to see a pattern to this place.

The menu was simple and the selection limited – unsurprising, considering these were the remnants of Hrist's pre-emptive strike against the frost giants, though the Imp couldn't help but wonder why, as divine warriors and spirits the Einherjar needed food or drink.

Though perhaps it is much like it was with the swordmasters,

she mused,

a question of morale

.

To her surprise, Lenneth entered the place shortly, stepping through the door as she quietly conversed with another tall and imposing Einherjar by her side, whose sword seemed to compete with Arngrim's own, though his wild, long hair and fierce eyes lent him an impression more akin to that of a berserker than a warrior. They moved to a corner of the room and sat down without pausing their discussion; glancing over at Kirito, Kizmel wondered if he wished to approach them and inquire about another quest or mission that they might have.

But the black-clad Sylph was sitting back, eyes closed as he let the tension fade from his body, instead. He finally opened them, letting out a sigh. "Well...that tower was a pain to find. Took a bit longer than we'd planned, but at least it's done. Next time we can all go there together and see what's inside."

She nodded; once their group had obtained the means to endure a prolonged excursion into the frozen wastes, they had immediately begun to follow the trail the valkyrie sisters and their Einherjar had left behind during their ill-fated expedition. It had been a grueling slog through snow and across icy fields, but they had made some progress at last.

Lady Hrist mentioned divine treasures that needed to be retrieved, but Lady Lenneth wished for us to find the

sage

who could save their sister,

the Imp mused absently.

We were successful in locating the tower at last, even if we did not have enough time to enter it, but I wonder if the others had any more success in their search for the divine treasures or the palace?

"The weather is certainly a...challenge," Kizmel agreed, enjoying the warmth of the mead-like drink as it pooled in her belly after taking a sip. It wasn't as earthy as the Moontear wine that had been her own favourite from her homeland, and had a more fruity, sweet quality to it that reminded her of some of Aincrad's other unique beverages. Not necessarily better or worse, just...different. "The constant gales and hail and snow does not make flight easy."

"Yeah, it's a pain to navigate. I'd almost say they mean for us to explore this place on foot, but then it'd take forever to get anywhere." Kirito frowned for a moment, lost in thought. "The other problem is that this place is huge, and visibility is really bad, if we hadn't practically bumped into the tower, we would've walked right past it."

Her partner suppressed a yawn and stretched tiredly. "And the fairy bonfires work well as temporary shelters, but we can really only bring so many of them – plus, since more people are realizing how useful they are, the supplies are limited until people start bringing materials back to the crafters." He sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Considering how small this camp is, there's just so many side-quests to do, it's hard to figure out where to start."

Kizmel nodded in agreement – it was why they had ultimately decided to try and accomplish the mission set to them by the valkyrie sisters, after all. Even if that meant they had to do so without the support of the Einherjar, something the others were working on, since Kirito had noted that as long as they were in a party, the credit for the completed missions would extend to them as well. "There appears to be much to do here, even though the initial invasion by the frost giants has been averted."

"Considering we're trying to stop a demi-god from causing the end of the world? Yeah," Kirito chuckled. "Lind and his team really want to make this place interesting, huh? But hey, at least we solved one of our problems for now, so we can go see whatever the tower has in store for us once the others get here." Kirito chuckled, before reaching up and stretching with a slight yawn.

Kizmel watched him for a moment before shifting; moving around the table, she took a seat next to him, and leaned her head against his. "Maybe tomorrow, my love. We have a little bit of time before the others get here, you should rest a bit."

"I'm fi-" another yawn interrupted him mid-sentence, and Kirito stifled it with a blush. "I'm fine. But yeah. Tomorrow."

"I know you are, but at the same time, there is no reason not to rest while we can." She patted his arm. "After all, we need not push ourselves to the limit and beyond, here. I know you have been busy lately, and had little time to rest easy."

"Fair enough." The swordsman sighed, closing his eyes for a long moment, and Kizmel could feel the tension leaving his body as he relaxed, slumping against hers. "Just gonna take a minute here…"

"Rest as long as you need," she whispered, so quietly that she knew he'd never hear – because Kirito was already fast asleep, dozing off on her shoulder the moment he felt comfortable enough to do so, the flickering flames of the nearby hearth casting a warm glow across them both as Kizmel allowed herself a content smile of her own as she carefully rearranged her cloak to cover them both.

Keen violet eyes peered, half-lidded, across the room as most players there came and went, keeping a watchful eye out for anything that could disturb her husband's rest, but people left the pair tucked away into a corner alone. Most barely even took note of them as they went about their own business, sitting down with their own friends or warming up briefly before heading back out. She spent a few minutes watching the other players, observing as Salamanders and Undine mingled with Sylphs, Leprechauns, and even Cait Sith. Just like Alne and Yggdrasil City, this appeared to be a place which transcended the boundaries between the players' factions, and while they didn't always get along, it reminded Kizmel of the way the swordmasters had come together in the aftermath of their entrapment in Aincrad, and the camaraderie of the disparate parts of the clearing group.

It wasn't until a couple of familiar faces entered the hut that Kizmel fully opened her eyes, waving them over silently.

Argo was the first to settle down across from them, a knowing, mischievous smirk on her face as she glanced from Kirito to Kizmel. "Good on ya," she mouthed silently, giving the former elf a conspiratorial wink.

Leafa, too, grinned at the sight of her brother fast asleep. It was a pleasant change from the way he'd been in Aincrad; there, he'd never truly let himself really rest unless he was locked into a room inside a safe zone, in the presence of someone he knew and trusted – and for good reason. But here, in Alfheim, it was safe for Kirito to let his guard down, and the ever-vigilant Black Swordsman had finally allowed himself to be vulnerable even in the presence of others.

Still, Kizmel doubted that he would appreciate being left asleep while their friends arrived, and as much as she wanted him to rest, the Imp gently shook him awake.

"Hmm?" Onyx eyes blinked open sleepily, the crackling fire and overall warmth making for an invitation to nap that was difficult to resist. Catching sight of the others, he straightened up reluctantly "Oh. Hey."

"Sorry ta interrupt – ya looked real comfy there, Kii-bou," Argo teased.

The swordsman flushed, and Kizmel was close enough that she could feel the heat rising up his neck – unlike the early days in Aincrad, however, he refused to be

too

flustered by the blonde's good-natured ribbing, and just grinned back sheepishly.

Surprisingly, the blonde Cait Sith didn't push it any further, either, simply staring at the pair with a knowing smile, and Kizmel wondered for a moment if it wasn't just her partner who'd mellowed out after leaving Aincrad. Rain and Philia joined them in short order, and then their little group was complete, having filled their table nearly to capacity.

"So," Kirito began, suppressing another yawn, "any luck?"

Rain shook her head. "No. We went as deep as we could get before having to turn around, but if there's a palace anywhere, or a divine

anything

, it's probably deeper into the zone. Honestly, that entire quest seems like a raid prompt to me if I've ever heard one."

"You, too, huh?"

The redheaded Spriggan nodded. "Yeah. How about you guys?"

Kizmel placed a hand on Kirito's and took over for him. "We managed to locate and summon the tower as per Lady Lenneth's guidance, but we have not yet had the time to enter it."

"Looks like it's a challenge dungeon," her husband added. "According to what Lenneth told us, it's one-hundred floors with save points and teleporters at every ten. If we can get all the way to the top, we'll find the wizard she's looking for. Maybe."

"One hundred floors?" Leafa asked with a grimace. "That's going to take forever."

He shrugged. "Depends on the way it's laid out. If all we have to do is defeat a certain number of mobs, it shouldn't take long. If it's like the labyrinths in Aincrad...yeah, that could take a while. Tomorrow should be a good time to start though, it's Sunday so there's no school and you have no club."

"True," the Sylph's sister nodded. "All right, I'm in. We can let Mom know and start after lunch?"

"Sounds good."

"Also, yer in luck, Kii-bou," Argo chimed in, as Aincrad's most prolific info-broker grinned knowingly. She pushed a small leaflet across the table, the cat-like ears atop her head flicking in obvious amusement.

It was, as Kizmel had expected, a product of the blonde's industriousness, and she wasn't surprised that Argo had something at the ready already – after all, she'd heard that Argo's services had been retained by Lady Sakuya herself for the exploration of these new lands, and the info-broker was nothing if not thorough.

Without prompting, Kirito slid a number of coins across the table, and the Cait Sith exchanged them for a small booklet – Kizmel shook her head in mirth at watching their friend ply her old trade, even if she did so less intensely than when they had been in the steel castle.

Still, Argo is not one who is crossed lightly, regardless of how serious she takes her business in Alfheim,

the Imp mused, recalling a few instances where other players had sought to take advantage of her diminutive stature and seeming harmlessness.

Much to their detriment.

A merry cackle escaped from the blonde's throat as she pocketed the coins, and she grinned broadly. "Thankies fer yer patronage. Anyhow, while I didn't get very far either, here's a guide to the first twenty levels. When ya said you didn't want ta buy its location from me, I was beginning ta wonder if you were gonna abandon me for a bit there, Kii-bou."

Kizmel chuckled, exchanging a quick glance with the swordsman. "It was upon my request, Argo," the lilac-haired Imp answered. "This is a new world, and there is no rush in finding everything. I wanted to see everything...at my own pace."

"As the game intended, eh?" Argo chortled merrily. "I getcha, Kii-chan. But hey, if ya need anything…"

"We know where to find you," Kirito finished with a grin, before tapping the small booklet on the table. "So, how about it?" he asked finally. "Wanna come with us tomorrow and see what the other eighty floors have in store?"

-------------------------------

October 19th, 2025

Unlike the surface of Alfheim, the realm of fairies, the sun never truly set on the land of the frost giants. In that way, the realm of ice and frost was not dissimilar from Kizmel's Haven itself, but whereas her home was cast in an eternal, beautiful sunset because she wished it so, Jötunheim's perpetual twilight was shrouded by the storms that whipped across its plains that often made it seem as though it was nighttime.

A part of her wondered idly whether she could will the blizzard here to end – and something told her that she could.

Not that Kizmel would do something like that unless it was absolutely necessary, even though it made traveling difficult, particularly at night. It wasn't unusual for her to wander this world at night, earning herself the sobriquet of Wandering Knight, but there was little to be gained in trudging through the snow and ice in the dark unless there was a good reason for it.

And this night, her wanderings were no flight of fancy.

I wonder why Argo only asked me alone?

The Imp couldn't help but wonder; they had spent the day climbing the dungeon tower that rose in the northern wasteland of Jötunheim, but after they had all logged out and Kirito had gone to bed, Kizmel had received a message from Argo that prompted her to log back into the game. Her blonde friend had been waiting for her, and the pair had then set off for the outskirts of the camp, before leaving it behind entirely, the frost boar cloaks wrapped tightly around themselves to ward off the cold.

Argo had said little other than to follow her, so the former knight dutifully strode after her friend, knowing that it was rare for the former info-broker to call them out for no reason, and much rarer still for her to ask for help. Pushing their way through the storm that engulfed the Einherjar encampment, they left the zone protected by the roots of the World Tree, they found the area deserted – unsurprising for the early morning hour, though Kizmel didn't mind and her companion was of course used to prowling at hours that other people avoided.

Kizmel knew better than to push, and after a half hour had passed and they crossed well into the wasteland, Argo finally slowed down and turned around, an unpleasant smile curling at her lips.

"I know it's a bit selfish of me ta ask, Kii-chan, especially since this ain't the death game, but maybe Kii-bou's rubbing off on me a bit. Let's just say that there's been some people causin' trouble fer some other players, and I for one think that's rather unsportin' behaviour, don'tcha agree?"

It didn't take Kizmel much more than that to realize why Argo had asked her for help, rather than Kirito – aside from the late hour and the fact that he had school in the morning, while she needed little to no rest, herself. "I take it we will be crossing swords with others?"

"If my info's right, you can probably bet on it, yeah." The blonde sighed. "It'll probably get better in a couple more weeks when the supply saturates, but right now it's pretty much a race fer who can get the most stuff. You know people can get real competitive about things like that."

The Imp nodded in agreement – Kirito had told her as much about the swordmasters' situation in the steel castle in their early days. "What are we up against?"

"If it was just people kill-stealin', or driving people out of hunting spots, I wouldn't really bother. But these guys are goin' round ganking newbies, Kizmel. They specifically target new players who can't really defend themselves, or smaller groups that seem like easy targets. I figured ya probably wouldn't object too much ta slapping those kinds o' guys around a bit."

"Indeed not." Violet eyes darkened in understanding – yet another reason why Argo had come to her instead of Kirito. She didn't mind, and had even participated in, battles against other players, herself – often in regulated tournaments or challenges issued by friends, acquaintances, or others who simply wanted to test themselves against her. In fact, the Imp welcomed the opportunity, and General Eugene of the Salamanders and even her husband's sister Leafa often dueled with her for sport and practice.

Neither Kizmel nor Kirito even minded being attacked in the field by other players; such was simply the nature of games such as this, and while it wasn't a common occurrence, she wasn't unfamiliar with the concept of battling for the right to hunt on a particular field. But this kind of thing struck a little too close to home to the dark memories her husband did his best to keep buried.

"These guys are the worst of the bunch – they don't even let people go after they've given up the loot," Argo continued grimly. "They'll just carry through the gank fer the fun of it."

Those, she knew, were the worst. It wasn't until she'd been given the time to fully understand, at least as far as she could, the treacherous line her partner had been walking. To Kizmel, in Aincrad, their life had been in their hands, and it had been a matter of killing or being killed. For the swordmasters, however, it had been a game, much like

NewAlfheim Online

was.

No wonder it is easy for some of them to lose sight of where the line between reality and illusion blurs together

, she mused absently. Without the threat on their lives, it was easy enough for people to let the urge to be competitive spill over into hostilities at times. And yet, it was also far easier for that kind of thinking to spill beyond the boundaries of the game, just like it had for many of the red-name players in Aincrad.

"Then we stop them, at least for tonight," the Imp declared decisively.

We may not be able to stop them every time, but at least, for tonight, if it is within my power, none shall fall victim to them.

Argo's vicious grin matched the one Kizmel knew adorned her own lips. "I knew I could count on ya, Kii-chan. Anyway, their numbers vary, but it's maybe

six or seven

guys. Sometimes a couple less, but usually around there. They're geared well enough ta be dangerous, and from what I've heard, they're at least somewhat decent. They couldn't get away with their ganks if they weren't."

"In that case, should we not ask others for help? Especially if we will be fighting other players."

The blonde shook her head, knowing what she was asking. "

They're just goons that go after new players,

I'm pretty sure we can take them, Kii-chan. But I know what ya mean." Her eyes glowed in the darkness briefly. "This kind of thing...it's not exactly something I wanna be reminding Kii-bou or the others about," she answered quietly.

I see.

Fighting other players was fine with her and the other survivors, though some, she knew, still held deep-seated reservations about doing so, even knowing this was merely a game. Kirito, however...

He should never have to raise his blade against this kind of person ever again.

Her husband would help if asked, she knew, without a moment's hesitation, even if it brought up unpleasant memories – because that was the kind of person he was.

And Argo knew this.

Kizmel shook off those thoughts. Game or not, she was a knight, and a friend had asked for her aid in putting a stop to something she herself found untenable. They made their way across a particularly large snowdrift overlooking a valley, and Argo motioned for her to stop.

If there was to be an ambush, Kizmel figured, this would be a good place for it. It was dark, and visibility poor. On top of that, one side of the valley was bounded by a forest, while the other was overlooked by the hill they now stood upon, making for easy hiding spots.

The Cait Sith knelt and her diminutive, lithe form shimmered and wavered until it lost some of the vibrancry of its colours – the effects of the Hiding and Sneaking skills, Kizmel knew, and the only reason Argo was still visible to her own eyes was because they were in a party together. She followed suit herself, the simplest thing to do would be to ambush the would-be ambushers.

"So far, no one's been able to spot them," Argo explained, her eyes shining with the green light of the Search Skill as she scoured the area. "Even groups that were on the lookout for potential ganks were taken by surprise. Which tells me two things: one, they take their targets being prepared as a challenge, rather than a deterrent, and two…they've got someone who can hide from even a maxed-out Search skill."

That implies somebody extraordinarily skilled in sneaking and hiding,

Kizmel realized.

Now I understand why Argo brought me along, and why she's so intrigued by this.

While the Imp was not quite as skilled as Kirito or Philia in terms of detection, she was still far more competent than most others, and her own abilities to blend into the environment and disappear from sight were second to only Rain's, even without her old Mistmoon Cloak.

And with this...it is no contest,

she concluded, retrieving the Cloak of the Stars she had commissioned to replace the old Cloak of the Night Sky she'd had in Aincrad. Unlike its predecessor, it did not bear the remnants of the Mistmoon Cloak within, but it served a similar purpose nonetheless – and it still bore the crest of Lyusula as a reminder of where she had come from. Pulling it over herself and Argo, the pair virtually disappeared from even the most skilled hunters and their seeker spells.

It didn't take long for the sound of boots digging into the snow to reach her ears, and violet eyes shimmered in the darkness, tracking her quarry as seven players trekked across the snowy field.

-------------------------------

Ice

crunched underneath her boots as the group of seven players moved through the fields just outside of Jötunheim's main camp. The somewhat mismatched group – one Imp, an Undine, a Salamander, a Gnome, one Sylph, and two Spriggans – had spent a good amount of time marching the short distance, hindered by the blizzard that seemed omnipresent in the zone. One of the Spriggans trailed near the rear, a little behind the rest of the party that seemed to be a closely-knit group of friends. Her black cloak fluttered in the stormy winds, and she raised one black-gloved hand to her face to shield it from the snow and hail pouring down from above.

Did they really need help, though? She couldn't help but wonder. She'd only recently mustered up the courage to start playing the game just before the expansion had launched. Coming down to Jötunheim and more than a little lost on her own, she had met the others at the Einherjar camp there; their leader, a short-statured, energetic Imp, had rushed towards her excitedly, asking for a duel, though the entire thing had turned out to be a case of mistaken identity. Not that I'm entirely surprised, considering I chose to dress like this, the Spriggan thought with wry amusement. I guess he'll be infamous wherever he goes, at least among certain people.

Afterwards, once the misunderstanding had been cleared up in the wake of their fight, the group had invited her to join them, and she had accepted hesitantly. They all needed the frost boar pelts for their mantles, so there really hadn't been any reason to decline, and they'd set off almost immediately afterwards – but as expected, the fields were full of other players hunting for the exact same thing, and most spawning locations were already cleared out. Today was the second day in their attempt, and they'd chosen late at night to minimize the chance of running into others.

Just from watching them, it was clear to the black-haired Spriggan that this wasn't the first game those six mismatched players had played together; their coordination and teamwork were far too good for that as they moved like an experienced party. Despite most of them lacking high-end gear much like the Spriggan herself, they made up for it with skill in spades, leaving her to wonder if they weren't perhaps a group of the death game's survivors, too.

There was, of course, always the chance that this was a trap, but as she wiped the bangs from her eyes while looking at the laughing, bantering group ahead, she couldn't help but believe that they didn't seem like bad people. One of their tanks – a tall, well-built Gnome – ruffled their shorter Salamander's hair with a wide grin, further reinforcing that notion.

Yeah. They're nothing like...like…

she shook her head, squeezing her eyes shut for a moment against the dark memories.

They're nothing like Laughing Coffin.

A choked laugh escaped her throat at the thought.

Really, what are the odds that we're going to get attacked, anyway?

I wish…

bitter

memories of a past friend filled her mind.

"Hey, everything okay, Kuro?"

She blinked at the sudden call, and looked up, realizing that she'd been lost in thought. The others, noticing that she'd fallen behind, had slowed down and were looking back towards her worriedly. Their rear-guard, a tall Undine player with light blue hair that came down to her mid-back, was watching her in concern.

"Yeah, um, I just was thinking about something. Sorry about that."

"Don't worry about it." The older woman smiled kindly – and just like when they'd first asked her to join, the dark-clothed Spriggan was surprised by how genuine that niceness seemed to be. "I know we only met

yesterday

, but if you need help with anything, you're more than welcome to rely on us. Life's too short to be carrying worries around with you."

Nodding slowly, Kuro shook off her morose thoughts of the past and picked up the pace, closing in with the rest of the group – but an absent part of her mind couldn't help but wonder what had happened to the one friend she'd had back then, if she had gotten away after everything that had happened.

"We're here," their party leader, the sole Imp of the group, announced, swinging the torch in her left hand around to cast its orange glow across the area. "Looks like none of the frost boars have spawned yet, but they should appear soon. Let's get enough pelts for us all!"

"Right!" various voices responded as they spread out, weapons drawn while the leader placed down a fairy bonfire from her inventory. Within moments the item unfurled into a campfire that light up like a pyre, sending a large, roiling flame up into the air and bathing the immediate area around them in its warm glow.

As they had made their way out of the camp, the party left a trail of these in their wake, using their burn time to recover what HP they'd lost and let the debuffs from the frost and hail run out. The sheer cost and number of items they needed to use made this method almost prohibitively expensive if used to travel anywhere further than the immediate areas around the camp, however –

still, Kuro was glad she'd chosen to pool her resources with the others to buy them instead of having to get them all on her own

.

Feeling the cold subside almost instantly, the other players in the party heaved a sigh of relief as they passed around health potions and warmed up. Kuro herself was no exception, but her eyes kept peering into the area around them, past the boundary lit by the fire as she searched for the mobs that were their target. The fairy bonfire would hold the damage-over-time effect of the blizzard at bay – but it was the light it was casting in the immediate vicinity for a good fifteen meters in all directions that would be the most help, freeing up their off-hands that had been tied up with carrying torches or lanterns.

Their two tanks immediately unlimbered shields from their backs, the Salamander and Gnome taking up position while the Undine who'd spoken to her earlier took up a two-handed staff in preparation

as a quiet warble filled the air in response to the players' presence

.

"Stay frosty! Here they come!"

A collective groan answered the terrible pun, and the group immediately turned their attention towards where

sudden roar echoed in the night

.

Here they come.

The group readied their weapons, and a low chant started up from the support caster in their midst as they waited for their quarry to get closer, and buff effects began appearing around each one of them. The monsters didn't leave them waiting long, and two of the large, meter-and-a-half tall boar-like creatures charged out of the darkness.

Each of their tanks moved to intercept one, taking the brunt of the impact on their shields as they braced themselves, and their DPS leapt in from the sides, their Sylph player and the other Spriggan of the group setting on them immediately, their swords swinging wildly.

For a moment, Kuro considered joining in with them, but something – a survival instinct instilled into her during the long years of the death game, perhaps – held her back. It wasn't just her, either; a brief glance around located their party leader also standing still while their comrades fought, the diminutive Imp girl staring out intently into the darkness surrounding them.

The reason for that became obvious a heartbeat later, as another pair of mobs – wolves, this time, smaller and far more agile than the larger boars – sped in from the sides, leaping towards the bonfire that shone like a beacon...and the caster that was standing next to it.

"Kuro! The other side!" Without waiting for a reply, the Imp launched herself to the left, sword already flashing out of her scabbard as she struck.

Raising the sword in her hand over her right shoulder, the black-haired Spriggan launched herself towards the frost wolf coming in from the other side, sliding into the familiar activation motion for a Sonic Leap. The system pulled her forward, closing the five-meter gap between them as the two opponents lunged towards one another. A blue glow suffused the weapon in her right hand, arcing down from where it had been chambered over her shoulder as it slashed through the space in between them.

A glowing red damage mark was left across the frost wolf's torso as they passed by one another, before the monster's momentum reversed and it was flung away from the impact of the sword skill, its HP bar dropping by a quarter from the simple sword skill alone.

W

olves are the easiest mobs on this floor,

Kuro reminded herself,

they're quick and their attacks are almost always crits to make up for their low damage.

The white-furred wolf got back to its feet, snarling as it picked up speed towards her, but the Spriggan swordswoman had already recovered from her own post-skill delay. Stepping forward and stomping down with her lead foot, her sword took on a blazing azure glow as it swung down onto the frost wolf's leaping form, striking it clean on the head – but she was far from finished. Before it could bounce back out of sword-reach, she stepped in towards it, the system assist keeping her posture straight even if the upwards strike that followed would've easily sent her off-balance otherwise.

It carved straight through the wolf from below as she spun on her axis, a second upward swing drawing a parallel line through its body as the momentum carried Kuro high into the air. For a moment, the Spriggan hung there before gravity reasserted itself and pulled her down in a powerful overhead strike that would've split the monster in two, had it not already shattered into pixels from the previous

blow

, the rest of its HP depleted by the third of her Vertical Square's four strokes.

Landing in a crouch as the last swing fizzled out without a target, she took a moment while her avatar was locked in the mid-level skill's post-motion stiffness to look around. On the other side, their party leader was a blur of black and violet, darting from mob to mob as she swung her own sword like a madwoman, though without sword skills it was difficult to track the path her edge was describing other than by the occasional glint of moonlight off the edge.

Still, she's dropping them left and right – whatever she's lacking in power, she makes up for in speed. That's something I'd expect to see from a Sylph. She'd seen swordsmanship of that caliber only a handful of times before, but Kuro didn't have much time to remain idle herself. More wolves melted from darkness beyond the bonfire's light and she readied herself to meet their charge.

Wait

.

Something caught her eye, a brief glint of light in the darkness, one that disappeared so quickly she almost thought she'd imagined it – but long-ingrained instincts from two years spent fearing for her life in Akihiko Kayaba's death game screamed at her that this was

something

. Lips parted to shout a warning, though before she could even utter a word, the red glint was back, stretching into a spear of brilliant crimson light that lanced out from the cover of darkness.

Right towards them.

"Get down!" Kuro shouted hoarsely towards their healer, reaching over her left shoulder for the second blade that was sheathed there.

Her avatar's fingers scrambled for a long, heart-stopping moment as she struggled against the post-skill delay that held her in place, but finally, with a savage, desperate yell, she managed to rip it free of its scabbard. Short black hair fluttered as the howling blizzard obscured her vision and billowed her long, silver-trimmed black cloak.

Faster

, she urged her virtual body to move, fully aware of where the spear of crimson light was headed.

Faster!

The gleaming silver edge of the blackened sword in her left hand swung down as she spun, arcing through the night like a silver crescent until – by sheer luck or skill – it intersected the path of the blazing projectile. It was late; Kuro didn't have the reflexes, skill, or sheer speed of some of Aincrad's most infamous players, but she managed to clip the tail end of the shot.

It was enough...barely.

T

he point

where her blade intersected the projectile's path

flashed with the blue-white light of a perfect parry.

The arrow wobbled, its trajectory disturbed by the sudden deflection as it veered into the ground. Burying itself into the snow drift by their Undine healer's feet, the skill shot detonated with a concussive blast that sent a curtain of snow upward from where it had struck, but it did no damage. A second attack arced in, this one a little slower as it emerged from the darkness – a fireball this time, a roiling mass of flames that

would

deal damage over an area even if it missed its intended target, but traded speed for this in exchange.

Before the spell could strike home, however, a wall of water rose in front of the Spriggan, hissing as steam and smoke heralded the fireball cooking off against the Undine's defensive barrier, the sound of clashing spells bringing Kuro back to her senses.

All around her, more spells and arrows landed among the group, some of whom were still in the middle of

fending off

the frost boars

and wolves

– she watched with dread coiling in her gut as at least one of her party members' HP bar winked out on the display at the side of her HUD. The rest reacted almost immediately to the surprise attack, disengaging where they could, but one of their DPS, the other Spriggan of the group, was caught in the middle of a vicious melee with one of the tough boars after her partner had gone down.

They both disappeared underneath a volley of spell

s

and arrow

s

.

Kuro's dark eyes flickered around, nervously scouring the darkness beyond the bonfire's light for their attackers, but she came up with nothing – whoever the gankers were, they had concealed themselves too well to be found.

And being able to launch attacks and sword skills from stealth means they're specifically built for that, too,

she realized grimly. Whoever was attacking them, they had planned for

exactly

this situation – that knowledge struck her hard for a moment, almost robbing her of breath.

One person, however, didn't lose her cool.

"We're under attack! Fall back to the fire!" Like a whirlwind, the Imp that led the party spun almost in mid-air, her wings buzzing as she

used them

to speed across the battlefield.

Galvanized by their party leader's shout, the group tightened up as more arrows rained down upon them from the darkness, almost half of them glowing with the malicious light of the bow skills being used to shoot them. The night hid most of their attackers but she could just about make out a few human-shaped shadows moving just beyond the bonfire's light. Both of her hands tightened around the twin swords in her palms as they charged towards them with a vicious scream, and another of her party members disappeared.

The four of them that were left backed up, bringing up their weapons and shields defensively, and

their Undine caster

extended the water wall around them all.

It

sizzled and hissed angrily as spells and arrows struck it, some with the force of weapon skills behind them, but it held...for the moment. Kuro's eyes met hers, however, and the strained, anxious look in them betrayed the knowledge that it couldn't hold forever. Sooner or later, her MP would run out.

"Run or fight?" their Sylph asked as they caught their breath. "I can't see any of them!"

"We'll get picked off if we run," the Imp answered, hefting the sword in her hand over her shoulder, looking surprisingly cheerful for having just gotten ambushed and watching half her friends being wiped out. "But…"

"Our odds aren't really all that great," the Undine chimed in.

A wry grin curled at the Imp girl's lips as she looked around the group, before her crimson eyes settled on Kuro. "Sorry for dragging you into this. There's a chance we'll probably all be going back to spawn tonight."

She didn't look all that sorry, though – if anything, the other girl looked

excited

by the prospect of fighting like this, not unlike when she'd first rushed towards Kuro, asking for a duel to test her mettle because she'd heard rumours of a black-haired, black-coated swordsman's skill. Like them, fighting was her element.

For a moment, the Spriggan's breath hitched as she forced her trembling hands to clutch the pair of swords she held. Now that the adrenaline was beginning to fade, she couldn't help but remember the terror from back then, fear and nausea threatening her control over the avatar. Reaching for a mark on her leg that was no longer there, she found herself clenching her fists for a moment, before, with a forceful exhale, Kuro banished those memories with a thought to the people who had saved her the last time.

Those days were past. The Black Swordsman and the Violet Knight had put an end to them for good, had set her free. Her tormentors were gone, the death game cleared, all of the terror she'd experienced back then a thing of the past. There was no longer anything to fear. The only thing they stood to lose was some time in this game. Delicate fingers bore down on the handles of her twin swords in a white-knuckled grip.

She'd been given a second chance. She'd been freed, and this time, she swore to herself, she wouldn't go down without a fight, whether it was a game or not. That was what the people she admired would do –

it was what the person she'd styled herself after would do

.

"Let's not let them have it easy, then."

Matching almost competitive grins lit up on the other three players' faces, and the Imp girl almost bounced with excitement. "That's the spirit! You want us? Come and get us!"

-------------------------------

"Looks like they showed, Kii-chan."

The former dark elf nodded in agreement. "So it would appear," she murmured, keen violet eyes following the crimson spear that shot through the darkness.

As much as it vexed Kizmel, they had been unable to locate their quarry thus far.

S

he had to give the ambushers credit for remaining so well-hidden as not even the use of a sword skill had given their position away. It meant that whoever the shooter was, they were either extraordinarily skilled in hiding or had specialized equipment for the task since neither of the two veterans of Aincrad were able to locate the player who had launched the Snipe – the long-range, powerful shot that was the archer's version of the one-handed sword's Vorpal Strike.

But I can see its path, and that is enough. And, as good as their concealment is, their own ability to perceive us seems to be lacking.

"Shall we?" she asked quietly, reaching for the hilt of the weapon that Lisbeth had crafted for her recently. Even though it was new and not connected in any way to the sabers she had once wielded in Aincrad,

Virtuous Treaty

felt oddly comforting and familiar in her hand.

As expected of Aincrad's master smith.

"Just like we planned. You swing left, I'll swing right.

Hit 'em hard and l

et's try to not let any of them get away."

"Of course." Kizmel watched as the Cait Sith next to her clambered out from underneath her Cloak of Stars and dashed off into the darkness. Argo remained visible for only a brief instant before her own skills took effect, practically erasing her presence as she moved through the night, shallow footprints in the snow the only evidence of her passing.

The former knight of Lyusula followed, lowering the cloak around her shoulders as she made her way across the field herself

while

keeping low to ensure she would not be spotted. She still couldn't see her enemy even after closing in, nor did she know how many of them there were.

But just because I cannot see my enemy, does not mean he isn't there.

A brief glint of light flashed before her, stretching out into another powerful arrow shot from the archer's bow. Violet eyes narrowed.

There.

Snapping her saber up, she lunged forward the moment she came into range.

Silver light flickered around the tip of her blade for a moment, and yet she held it back, straining against the sword skill that threatened to take control of her body. It wasn't until she was within range of where she estimated her target to be that Kizmel dropped all pretense of stealth, closing the last few steps with fairy wings beating furiously as she allowed the skill to fully take hold. Her body streaked across the snowy ground at a speed only a handful could match.

The dim flicker around the tip of

Virtuous Treaty

blossomed into a corona of brilliant silvery-white light, utterly erasing the Imp's concealment and announcing her presence to the entire world, but it was far too late for her target to do anything about it. Her Linear speared towards her invisible target with a speed that no ordinary player had a chance of reacting to, and even though she could not see him,

Virtuous Treaty

found its mark.

Its tip reached something, stopping seemingly in mid-air for the briefest of moments as it encountered resistance, the impact sending a ripple that distorted the very air itself washing across the space in front of Kizmel that revealed the other player's body.

There was no time for him to even scream before the Linear discharged with a blinding flare of light and a thunderous blast that flung him back, careening out of control – but what should have been a lethal strike on all but the most armoured and toughest players in the game was rendered survivable by the simple fact that the dark elf's strike had missed hitting him full-on as a result of her guesswork. Clicking her tongue in annoyance at the miscalculation, Kizmel whirled to find her next target, now that her presence had been exposed.

By the time the skill's hold on her avatar had worn off, the archer's companions realized that they were being attacked, themselves – but unaware of the identity of their assailant, Kizmel watched as some chose to press their own ambush against the beleaguered party by the bonfire they had been stalking. Others, foolishly, swiveled to face the Imp in their midst as she counted almost a dozen in all. Two more PKers melted from the darkness, one launching himself at the Imp, two-handed sword held up high. The other, Kizmel noticed from the corner of her vision, hefted a bow and nocked an arrow, its tip glowing a menacing green.

I won't let you!

A furious beat of her wings sent Kizmel gliding past the wild swing of the man attacking her, flickering ambient light from the bonfire far away reflecting on scuffed white armour plate. Not even bothering with him, she slid towards the archer in the back, his eyes widening at the impossible sight of her closing the distance between them almost recklessly. Panicked, he loosed his shot, the green comet releasing from his bowstring as it sped across the snow towards her.

Raising her shield, Kizmel swung it into the path of the oncoming projectile with a grunt as the impact threatened to numb her arm. She closed her eyes against the blinding light of the explosion that rattled her frame, but continued driving forward, finding her path on instinct alone even as the attack drained part of her own life bar. She shrugged it off, her trusty shield reducing the damage she would've taken otherwise to a minimum – her opponent let out a terrified scream as the Imp ploughed right through his shot and continued on towards him.

Virtuous Treaty

lashed out as she snapped her arm forward, not bothering with a skill of her own as the blade carved a glowing red line across his waist, and then Kizmel spun past him, slamming her shield into the archer's side to send him tumbling into the powdery snow at her feet.

Muttering a brief incantation, the former dark elf disappeared into the darkness, only to burst out of the shadow of her first attacker back where she'd first begun her mad charge; he let out a cry of shock at her sudden appearance, whirling around to clumsily swing his massive weapon towards her to no avail. She matched his strokes easily, the larger blade clanging easily against the stout wood of her shield before she arced in a thrust around its edge that pierced deep into his shoulder, sending up a spray of glowing red motes of light.

He stumbled backwards – of course, in this world, just like Aincrad, players felt no pain, but fear was written across his face plain as day

when

Kizmel p

ress

ed after him like a spectre in the darkness. With a keening wail, her saber struck the massive sword in his hand

once, twice, until

, with a

harsh

clang

, the larger weapon

was sent into the ground by the impact. Taking advantage of the opening, Kizmel

retracted her right arm and unleashed a point-blank Linear into the other player's chest. The tip of

Virtuous Treaty

pierced both plate and player, emerging from his back with a radiant silver glow before his body shattered, leaving the Imp behind in darkness.

But not alone.

Heaving a breath, Kizmel's eyes flickered around, taking stock of her position.

Four of them in all, two among them archers,

she counted.

I suppose that might account for about a third of them all.

Turning to face the others that had come to their compatriot's aid, the former knight allowed a grim smile to hush across her lips – this was, by far, not the worst odds she had ever faced, and if they thought she would be easy prey, then they would be in for a rude awakening.

Fire erupted at her feet, the pillar of flame a distinctive spell of the Salamanders; Kizmel dove to the side to avoid the burning heat as it burst into existence from nothing, before dashing off to her left, knowing that the initial surprise of the flame column was not its true danger. That, she had learned before, was the fact that the pillar would continue to follow her until the spell's duration ended, or its conjurer ran out of MP. A second and then a third erupted around her, threatening to trap the Imp in between them.

It was a good strategy, and she had to applaud the caster – managing three spells at the same time was no mean feat, and the Flame Pillar was by no means a low-level spell; even just one of them could do considerable damage to Kizmel should they reach her. Of course, the former knight of Lyusula had no intention of letting such a thing to happen, much less allowing all three to converge on her.

The glow of the flames lit her figure, casting long shadows in the darkness of the blizzard as they fought, but it was enough for her foes to

spot

the Imp's gleaming black armour and

shield

, causing panicked shouts to reach her elfin ears.

"

Shit! Get him! Get him!

"

"

Dammit, no one else was supposed to be here! How'd he even find us?

"

"Doesn't matter,

it's just

one

guy

!

It's

a tank, he's just here to stall! Just nuke h

im

with all you've got!"

But that light also illuminated the mage's comrade who'd been rushing at her under the cover of darkness.

With a shout, Kizmel wound back, tucking her arms close to her body as she threw herself forward, extending her saber mid-motion. Purple light suffused the blade, and her spin accelerated as she was pulled into the sword skill that had been the knight's signature attack in Aincrad.

A glowing, violet line appeared in there air where her saber had passed, and for a moment, nothing seemed to happen…but then the pyres that had been a raging inferno reaching for the heavens were blown sideways, their flames flickering precariously as her attack threatened to snuff them out. Kizmel's body followed, continuing to revolve around its axis as she moved forward, the sheer gust from her passing causing the burning fire to flicker and die, blown out by the sheer weight of her attack as she burst through the embers to give her assailant a first-hand introduction to the knight's signature Treble Scythe.

The second stroke battered his weapon aside with ease, the weight of the sword skill and Kizmel's considerable momentum behind it, before the third carved deeply into his avatar itself, cleaving the other player in two before he'd even managed to try and defend himself.

The light around the lilac-haired knight dimmed as the skill ended, locking her into position for the duration of its backlash, something that didn't go unnoticed by her remaining foes.

"Ha! We've got you now!" the pair of archers howled victoriously, loosing arrows towards her immobile form.

The first thumped into the shield that Kizmel had raised in preparation for such an occasion, knowing that she would be left vulnerable for a precious few moments after her Treble Scythe allowed her to escape the fiery trap set by her opponents. But even so, they were not unskilled, and more arrows rained down on her position, some playing a sharp staccato against the shield interspersed with the metallic

tink

s of metal arrowheads striking steel armour.

But the rapid strikes from the one archer's bow weren't what she was worried about.

Here it comes

. The archer's compatriot hadn't been idle in the meantime; while one was keeping her pinned down behind her shield during the Treble Scythe's backlash, the other had been preparing his own attack. The arrow, imbued with a violent crimson hue, left his bowstring after a moment of preparation, leaving her foe locked in his own backlash.

It struck her unprotected right flank, and for a moment her world was dyed red as she was swallowed by the thunderous explosion that enveloped her – had it not been for the armour painstakingly created by Lisbeth, this might have been the end as even so the Imp's life bar fell dangerously into the red, but she trusted her friend's ability and craftsmanship. Distantly, Kizmel could hear her opponents crowing in glee, certain of their victory, even while their mage started to chant anew.

Despite being sure of their victory, they're not being complacent and preparing a follow-up. They're not half bad,

she had to admit with a grin; despite herself and the situation, the former knight couldn't deny that a part of her was beginning to enjoy this kind of contest – and in this kind of world, she was inclined to give her opponents the benefit of the doubt when it came to whether their actions were purely driven out of malice. It had been a while since she'd had a challenging battle, and without the stakes of their lives at risk, it was far more enjoyable than similar contests had been in the past.

This was not Aincrad, after all, and there was no need to aim for their lives with all her might.

But she still had her own pride; and while her opponents were skilled and well-practiced, she had once stood at the pinnacle of the swordmasters herself. Without a fighter to take the brunt of her assault, penned in by the very blizzard they had used to ambush countless others, they had never really stood a chance. They'd had their opening to defeat her, and failed – now it was her turn.

Kizmel burst out of the flames like a fiery demon, cloak billowing behind her.

-------------------------------

Kuro,

along with everyone else in their party,

had been ready to make a heroic last stand against overwhelming odds – after all, regardless of how much bravado she put on, she had enough sense to recognize losing odds. Even if the rest of her party members were immensely skilled, the enemy had the advantage of the cover of darkness and surprise, not to mention numbers; if they stayed together, they'd eventually be overwhelmed from a distance. If they split up and fought, they'd be picked off one by one against a numerically superior foe.

It was not looking good, no matter how she looked at it.

Still, they weren't going to make it easy on them.

Between their healer's defensive wall, and the way their leader shot off into the darkness, only for the sound of clashing steel to follow, they were clinging on by the skin of their teeth, giving as good as they got as she fired off the few offensive spells she'd bothered to learn. It wouldn't do much – they were basic, low-tier, low-damage spells, but it was

something

.

They were holding on, barely, just managing to snipe back at the flashes of sword skills that came flying out of the night towards them.

For just a moment, Kuro couldn't help but wonder if the gankers would ever come out of the darkness to finish them in person, or if they were simply content to shoot at them from a distance until they were done.

And then, suddenly, the screaming started.

Not from near them, but out

there

.

Flames erupted in the darkness suddenly, great pillars of fire that lit up the night, and in their flickering light, Kuro spotted a shadow moving, sprinting, accompanied by the silver glint of a sword's edge as it carved and cut. Violet light flared up, and the Spriggan's breath caught in her throat, the sight reminding her of the past.

Suddenly, the attention

placed

on their small group

by the gankers

wavered and broke, granting them some relief.

Crimson spears crisscrossed in the darkness like laser bolts as their would-be ambushers were in turn ambushed, trying to find whoever was striking at them so boldly. But that wasn't the only thing – from the other side, too, the attacks stopped suddenly, and Kuro's ears picked up the faint

whoosh

of End Flames as

something

moved through the night almost unseen, like a predator stalking its unaware prey. The dismantlement of their would-be attackers was almost...clinical.

Her throat tightened, and suddenly felt dry.

In a way, it was even more terrifying than the snarling, jeering PKers she was used to, because this was simply cold, calculated efficiency. One side distracted them with a vicious, flashy attack, while the other was...assassinated. The only thing they could see in the darkness was the occasional flash of discharging sword skills or arrows as the two sides went at each other until, finally, it was all silent.

They tightened their guard, and Kuro was relieved to see that her fellow party members didn't seem to take the fact that the fighting had stopped as a sign that they were out of the woods yet – for all they knew, their ambushers could've been attacked by another group planning to do the exact same thing.

Best case, the two groups killed each other,

she mused grimly, grip tightening on her twin swords.

Unfortunately, her wish would not be granted. It was faint at first, but she could clearly hear the sound of boots sinking into snow, crunching the delicate crystals underfoot – it took Kuro a moment to realize that they were heading

away

from them.

Breathing out a sigh of relief, the Spriggan was about to return her weapons to

their scabbards

when their party leader shouted out. "Wait!

Show yourselves!

"

The black-haired girl's

eyes snapped over to the Imp.

Is she

insane

? Why is she calling out to them?

"

Are you nuts? Why're you calling out to them!" one of her fellow party members echoed Kuro's thoughts.

But their fearless leader ignored them – s

he

moved

a few

paces

into the darkness, and the footsteps halted, before returning, growing louder this time – and Kuro managed to make out two distinct pairs, one lighter than the other, just barely out of sync. She sucked in a deep breath, waiting to see what would come out of the night, only for the light of their fairy bonfire to

reveal a pair of mismatched figures, one standing a head taller than the other.

They both had their weapons stashed away and weren't trying to be particularly silent, something Kuro knew they could've accomplished very well judging on how no one had even spotted them until now.

That fact alone gave them reason to relax a bit; if the two coming towards them wanted to fight, then they would've been fighting already, so their Undine turned back towards the task of collecting their party members' End Flames and casting the necessary resurrection spells.

The shorter one was clearly a Cait Sith, as indicated by the cat-ears that tented the hood she wore, while her partner had a shield slung across her shoulder. It wasn't until the lowered the cowls of their cloaks that the group got a better look at their saviours – the shorter one was wearing a mischievous cat-like grin fitting her disposition as a Cait Sith, replete with playfully swishing tail, but the other…

Kuro's breath caught.

She'd seen her a few times from afar, but...

It has to be a coincidence, right?

the black-haired Spriggan wondered silently.

It can't be her, I mean, what are the odds…

Purple eyes gleamed kindly, and lilac hair swayed in a long braid, longer than when she'd seen her last, the one and only time she'd seen her from anything resembling up close, but to Kuro, she was as unmistakable as the Black Swordsman himself.

The Violet Knight...

that's...that's impossible. She can't be here...right?

"Kizmel?"

"...Yuuki?"

"Oh, you two know each other?"

The cat-like ears atop the shorter woman twitched in amusement, and it was only then that Kuro's vague memory recalled her, as well.

That's...the Rat, isn't it? Aincrad's most notorious info-broker, someone not even

they

wanted to cross. That explains how they found us, but...

her eyes returned towards the taller of their two rescuers.

But

her

...they said she was an NPC. How can she be here?

"We met when I first began to play this game –

before it was acquired by YMIR

. I'll say, this is quite a surprise,"

came the answer, a small smile tugging at dusky lips.

"Oho…"

The short Imp

at the head of their party

nodded excitedly, almost bouncing on her feet with seemingly limitless energy –

the same that she'd shown when she'd mistakenly challenged Kuro to a duel the other day only to switch tracks immediately

. "That's right! Back then, we had our first adventure in Alfheim together!

I'm glad I got to meet you again, especially after we all thought the game was gonna shut down.

" She ducked out of the arm one of her friends had slung over her shoulder to ruffle her hair. "These are my friends! That's Jun and Tecchi, the Undine over there is Siune, and that dour-looking girl she just rezzed is Nori, and that's Talken."

"Greetings," the former elf went, "

This is Argo, and I am Kizmel.

It is a pleasure to meet you all."

"

Oh," Yuuki added, pulling on Kuro's sleeve as she practically dragged the Spriggan with her, "and this is Kuro. We met her the other day, but she's pretty much one of us by now."

Kuro could see Kizmel delicately hide a smile behind one hand at their antics, but the short, blonde Cait Sith was far less restrained about her reaction, if the audible snicker was anything to go by. Still, the way she'd been staring at two of Aincrad's most notorious players hadn't gone entirely unnoticed.

"I'm sorry," Kizmel started, violet eyes that had given her her moniker turning towards the Spriggan, "but...have we met before?"

"Um…

" she froze for a moment under the Violet Knight's intense scrutiny, before finally managing to find her voice, mind still whirling with conflicting thoughts and memories she'd rather forget. "N...no?" Kuro finally squeaked out, as though questioning her own answer, before realizing why the other woman was staring.

Of course, I'm dressed just like

him

, and if anyone would realize that, it's them.

"I, um, I've heard a lot about you, though. You and Kirito-sama both."

Not to mention all the times those guys were screaming about you and how you two had managed to get in their way

, she recalled with a shudder.

It hadn't gone unnoticed by Kizmel, and the Violet Knight leaned towards her. "Are you all right?"

"Y-yeah," she stammered slowly. "Sorry, just...some bad memories. From, uh, from

before

.

In that other game.

"

"...

I see."

And she did, the Spriggan realized, seeing the understanding glimmer in the older woman's violet eyes that had given her her moniker. Kuro had never gotten to meet either of her two heroes back in the death game, only catching the occasional glimpses from afar or hearing about them through the grapevine. She hadn't known they had led the charge, storming into Laughing Coffin's lair and put

ting

an end to the death game's murder guild until after she'd turned herself in to Argo.

She'd finally mustered up the courage

to hand over the location of the PKers' hideout even if it risked incurring their murderous wrath,

and she remembered waiting for the group to return with bated breath alongside the friends of those who'd gone.

She remembered seeing the group of clearers return, greatly diminished in number, haunted-looking, somber and grim-faced from the losses they had suffered and unwilling to truly celebrate their victory. She remembered seeing the two of them at the head of it all, striding forward, heads held high and backs straight at the front of the procession as they came home, before returning to the company of their friends where they would suffer the aftermath of what they'd done.

It was then, that she'd decided.

Whomever the Black Swordsman and the Violet Knight were to others, to

her

, they would be heroes.

She never thought she'd get the chance

to thank them for finally putting an end to Laughing Coffin

, after the death game ended – especially since one of them was an NPC who was tied to that very game itself.

Unless they lied, but...

Kuro shook her head.

No, they wouldn't have any reason to lie about it, and there were rumours like that all around, too. That the Black Swordsman was hanging out with an NPC.

They had died down in the latter days of the death game, especially as the Black Swordsman's reputation took a turn from the egotistical beta-tester and perpetual loner to the kind of grim reaper, the boogeyman of red players and those that would prey on the weak. Back then, he had been the executioner, and the Violet Knight the saviour, at least that had been the legend passed around on the mid-level floors,

especially after the destruction of Laughing Coffin

.

Her eyes fell onto Kizmel as she chatted quietly with Yuuki and her friends.

But she's here. She's a

player

. So maybe…

Maybe PoH and the others had

just

been full of it.

Maybe they'd simply looked for a way to deride a woman who'd crossed their paths and lived to tell the tale time and again, foiling their plans and spoiling their "fun."

Besides, there was no way one of the game's NPCs could've done everything she'd heard the PKers accuse her of doing –

from following a player around to participating in raids, and going out on her own to hunt red players out of her own free will

.

A

nd

what was the alternative? That there was another player running around in

NewALO

bearing the Violet Knight's name and demeanour? That would've been too much of a coincidence, and besides, she

knew

. She knew the Black Swordsman.

Kuro sighed, deciding to banish these thoughts for another day – she didn't particularly want to dredge up anything that could remind her of the time she'd spent as a captive of Laughing Coffin, and besides, what stock was there to put in the words of murderers and killers, anyway?

If Kizmel noticed her intense stare, she didn't show it. Instead,

it was Yuuki who turned towards the Spriggan. "Hey, Kuro! Guess what? She actually knows the guy I was looking for!"

"You mean the guy you mistook her for when you ran up and shouted '

fight me

!' at her?" Jun pointed out with a grin, causing the short Imp to duck her head in embarrassment.

"I got excited, okay?"

Argo barked out a friendly laugh. "I'm not surprised ya mistook her fer him, the resemblance is uncanny."

Behind the info-broker's amicable tone, however, Kuro saw a calculating glint she was very familiar with –

as though she was staring right through her, peeling away her very existence to find out what made her tick

, and the Spriggan couldn't help the shiver that ran down her spine.

Oh no…

"Forgive my curiousity," Kizmel shook her head with a

placating

smile. "I'm merely surprised to see someone who would choose to willingly garb themselves akin to the Black Swordsman."

Kuro couldn't fault her, exactly,

surprise or no

.

"I guess you would be. Most of the stories around him weren't...well,"

she

muttered, "they tended to not be very flattering."

"

That is...a bit of an understatement," Kizmel agreed with an amused snort. "Though I do not think you put much stock in those rumours,

lest you would not choose to garb yourself as such –

though I do admit to wondering why you did

."

The Spriggan sighed, looking down at her hands. "You'd...probably consider it a childish reason."

"

Hardly," Kizmel snorted delicately, "you do not carry yourself as a mockery or a fool."

K

uro sighed, before mustering up her courage to speak. Now was the one time she could give voice to the feelings within, that had made her choose to dress herself in the same manner as the Black Swordsman, that had compelled her to pick up a second sword and practice until she could at least muster a reasonable facsimile of his Dual Blades style.

Casting a surreptitious glance at Yuuki and the others to make sure she wouldn't be heard, the Spriggan leaned in close to Kizmel. "You and Kirito-sama, you saved me...saved

us

," she whispered, correcting herself at the very end. "Not just from the death game, but I guess I have him to thank for that, too…"

"

Saved you?"

Kuro nodded slowly. "When you...when you fought with Laughing Coffin, and the other PKers. I heard about it. I heard about how he cut them down…"

It was just one more thing that had cemented the legend of the Black Swordsman as some kind of ominous, deathly figure – she figured the stories were far overblown, of course, because it was hard to imagine Kirito sweeping into battle with a black cape and mask trailing behind him like some kind of avenging western vigilante, but that hadn't stopped people from talking.

About how cold-blooded he'd seemed about it all.

But Kuro could only imagine how much courage taking that step must've taken that small group of players who'd saved her life – even today, her hands still trembled as she imagined the repercussions had they been just a day later, and if PoH or any of the others had found her afterwards.

She glanced at Kizmel. "I'm...I'm not like you," Kuro murmured. "I'm not a knight. I don't have that kind of courage and bravery

to stand tall

. But Kirito-sama...

I could see it in his eyes, how much he was hurting when he came back, but he went and fought them anyway. L

ike you said, most people didn't really think highly of the Black Swordsman. I just...I wanted to show that I admired him, at least a little bit. Go ahead and laugh at it if you want..."

"I would not dream of it," Kizmel shook her head. "While Kirito would be mortified, I do believe he would also be honoured. And then he would tell you that he does not deserve such praise or adoration for what he did. In fact, he once said something very similar – that he was not a knight, nor a hero. That he was simply a man – a boy, even, who simply wanted to survive."

Kuro looked down at her hands. "H

e was one of the people who saved me. And then he defeated Heathcliff in the end, and saved us all."

At least, that was what she'd heard; like most people she hadn't really known what had happened when the announcement suddenly went off that the death game had been cleared and the log-out function was re-enabled, but later on she'd spoken with a few people who'd heard through gossip that it had been the Black Swordsman who dueled Akihiko Kayaba to the death and ended their two-year long captivity in Aincrad.

The

older woman

nodded, idly toying with her braid. "He did. But it is not something he is necessarily proud of doing. In his mind, everything he did, he simply did to survive.

Both the good...and the bad.

" Kizmel paused for a moment, eyes looking off into the distance. "We all bear our burdens from that place. But we need not bear them alone – and sometimes, we all need a reminder that what we did mattered to someone else."

Kuro

couldn't help but wonder

if she was still talking about Kirito, or someone else.

-------------------------------

Kizmel watched with a fond smile as Yuuki and the rest of her group departed into the night with a wave after they had returned to the Einherjar camp. Some left the game entirely, while others had mentioned searching for a place to rest back on the surface of Alfheim itself – she was a little confused by this, but perhaps wondered if they were only going to take a brief reprieve before continuing their adventures. Her eyes followed two forms in particular as they melted into the darkness, only occasionally illuminated by the flickering torches that dotted the encampment, the only sounds this late at night coming from some muted conversations among those few players still awake and the NPCs shuffling about without needing rest.

A small

ping

at the edge of her awareness drew the former knight's attention to a sigil glowing on her swordmasters' sight, and touching it brought her a message that she had six new friend requests

from Yuuki's friends

.

With a

chuckle, she swiped across them, watching as the new entries appeared in her ethereal list.

Argo sidled up to her, stretching languidly in a manner reminiscent of the cat that her avatar resembled, before letting out a quiet yawn. "Ah...all in a day's work, eh? Been a while since I've burned the midnight oil like this, but them's the breaks. Right, Kii-chan?"

"Indeed." Turning violet eyes towards her companion, Kizmel shook her head in amusement. It was indeed fortuitous that she needed no sleep if she so willed it, and even despite the late hour and the exertion of the battle, she felt as awake as during the day. And, she wasn't above admitting to herself, a part of her missed these late-night excursions that had so often filled their evenings and early mornings back in the steel castle. When it was just her and her partner, and the open sky above.

Those were the days when Kirito and I could easily see the stars on Aincrad's horizon, just the two of us...

Alfheim had its own beauty to it, but nothing would ever replace or surpass the sense of wonder when she first stood on the very edge of the steel castle, on the wall that bounded that very world with nothing but the open sky above and beyond – it was a sentiment she suspected Kirito shared, as well.

She shook herself from those melancholy thoughts; there would be other places to explore, and new worlds to see aplenty. Her husband's first and foremost among them all.

"So, what do ya make of

that

, Kii-chan?"

It wasn't hard to figure out what, exactly her blonde friend meant. "I'll admit that I did not expect to see someone fashioning themselves in Kirito's image."

"Ha! That's one way ta put it," Argo chuckled. "Still, I didn't expect ta run into another Survivor tonight. She seemed ta have taken a real shine to you and Kii-bou."

"I think that much is rather obvious," Kizmel retorted dryly.

The former info-broker's tail flicked through the air. "Still – ya don't remember her?"

She shook her head. "I think I would remember someone like that, Argo."

"

I don't think she'd have been running around Aincrad dressed like

that

, or we'd definitely have heard about it." Argo chortled with amusement.

"Just askin', 'cause it sounds like she's got a pretty strong case of hero-worship for both of ya. That sorta thing doesn't just come from nothing. It almost sounded like the two of ya saved her personally, or something."

Kizmel took a moment to think – she did not easily forget, but try as she might, the former dark elf could not find any recollection of ever meeting Kuro, or someone who looked like her.

Of course, in Aincrad her particular choice of garb would have immediately attracted attention...most of it unwanted,

she added silently. No, her chosen appearance, aside from her face, gave them little to go on, but neither did the girl's name.

"I...do not remember. She mentioned Laughing Coffin," the Imp murmured quietly, invoking the name of their old nemesis. "Perhaps she was a victim of theirs?"

"It's possible," Argo replied with a shrug. "

I mean, you two got real busy there towards the end. Maybe she's from one of the groups you bailed out?"

"Perhaps, but I would remember her face if that were the case. Maybe she is one of those we never managed to reach in time." The encounter with her had been a sharp reminder of battles of old, against perhaps the most vicious, deadly foe she could remember, and the trail of victims left in their wake. The girl named Kuro claimed that Kirito and Kizmel had saved her, but she couldn't help but wonder how true of an assessment that truly was. For every one attack they had stopped, for every criminal and murderer they removed from the death game by capture or death, how many others had struck in another place? I wonder how many we failed to save...perhaps we'll never know.

Argo's eyes snapped back to her, the Cait Sith's playful demeanour disappearing instantly. "Don't. Don't you start doing this, Kii-chan." She stood up as far as she could reach, almost glaring at the taller Imp. "Ya did what you could. You both did. In fact, you did

more

, more than anyone could've asked of ya. Yer only human, Kii-chan."

"Am I?"

"You are. I'll hammer it into yer head as many times as it takes." Argo let out an exasperated sigh. "Maybe Kii-bou isn't the only one who needs a reminder. I'll admit, you seemed so used to it all, being a knight and all, that it's easy ta forget, Kii-chan. But yes...what you did mattered. It mattered a whole lot, to a whole bunch of people. And I bet you that the faces you remember, the ones you looked at as you fought for them? They're not the only ones you saved. How many others did you save by stopping those murderers? How many victims did you prevent by takin' them out, hm? I'll put good money on them way outnumbering the ones you did save with your own hands. There's only so much you can do, Kii-chan. Current circumstances notwithstanding, yer not some kind of omnipotent god that can snap her fingers and erase all evil from the world."

Kizmel remained silent for a long moment, before letting out a long breath. A small smile slowly curled at her lips,

tension slowly leaving her body.

How could I forget such a fundamental truth? Father would have words for me if he ever heard that I'd forgotten something so simple

. "Thank you, Argo."

"Hey, no problem. We all need a reminder every now and then, yer hubby's the prime example of that. He needs

constant

reminders, heh," the blonde grinned. "And...I'm sorry, Kii-chan. I guess we've all kind of been taking it for granted that you're somehow

okay

with everything that happened, just because you came from that world."

Perhaps, Kizmel mused, it would never be possible to truly accept how many they had lost, but she could find comfort in the fact that she had exerted herself to her utmost and beyond to fight for what she believed in. The faces of those she did remember flashed before her memory – filled with relief

and gratitude as the terror faded away, joined by the faceless number of those she had not met, but that had been touched by their actions all the same.

Maybe they had failed some,

and she would never know how many

. But they had also saved whomever they could reach – which, t

o Kizmel, was far better than not having tried to save anyone at all.

The Imp shook her head. "It's fine, Argo. I'm fine,

or I will be

– but thank you for your concern."

And...it would be.

"Heh. Unlike when Kii-bou says it, I actually believe ya," her friend said with a smirk, before her amusement vanished. "So...what do you wanna do about this girl?"

"...do about her?" Kizmel paused, before realizing what her friend meant.

Her very existence, after all, was a secret so dangerous that the consequences of word getting out were potentially catastrophic – not merely for herself, but for her friends and family and even possibly the country that Kirito resided in. Only a select few who were sworn to absolute secrecy knew the full extent of her origins and existence, and Ser Kikuoka had been content to let the other rumours die out slowly.

After all, a rumour that is fed will only persist for longer.

There were many people who remembered her from Aincrad, but few of those actually knew that she had once been an NPC of the steel castle. While rumous abounded, they had eventually died down as she remained with the clearing group, and only its members had understood that she was not human like them. Of them, she knew many – but she'd never expected to meet someone else who knew about her.

Violet eyes narrowed. "You...think she knows?"

Argo shrugged. "I don't know if she

knows

, but I think she suspects. The way she's been staring at ya? That's more than just hero-worship, Kii-chan. I dunno if it's because she ran the quest back then, or if she heard from someone else. I don't think it's the former, because as quick as Kii-bou and A-chan got to yer quest, it'd take some work to beat them to it. And ta be fair, she had a point – there were plenty of stories and rumours about both of ya, even down on the lower floors. Can't stop gossip."

"

This is true," Kizmel admitted, and the Imp's brow furrowed in thought. But

she

couldn't get the haunted look in the Spriggan's eyes out of her mind, so similar to her own husband's that Kizmel found it difficult to ascribe any malice to her. Still…

"Perhaps we should keep an eye on her," she finally

said,

knowing what Argo was asking of her.

"Ya don't wanna kick it up the chain?"

The Imp shook her head. "I don't believe that will be necessary. And even if she knew – as Ser Kikuoka pointed out, what could she do about it without proof? As distasteful as

the thought

is, he has a point that people would not take her seriously."

"Ya got me there, Kii-chan," Argo admitted. "Yeah, people tend ta look at us a little funny, so ya might be right. Want me to keep digging a little, just in case?"

Kizmel frowned for a moment, before nodding.

"

I suppose so

.

But

Argo...be discreet. Please."

The blonde cackled merrily. "Who do ya take me fer, Kii-chan?"

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

October 25th, 2025

"Bye, Tonky! Thanks for the ride!"

Kirito couldn't help the chuckle that escaped him at the sight of his sister cheerfully waving off the giant, lumbering creature that had dropped them off and was now slowly gliding away into the overcast skies. Its answering trumpet, lifting the elephant-like trunk while waving one of the jellyfish-like appendages below its bulbous body, in response to his sister caused him to shake his head in amusement. He couldn't be sure, of course, but he had a feeling that this particular one was the same creature that his sister had originally bonded with during their first excursion into Jötunheim, before the zone's revamp by YMIR.

Honestly, considering that they brought Pina over as a unique carry-over and saved all of her data for Silica, I wouldn't be surprised,

the black-clad Sylph pondered.

Their ride had dropped them off at a tattered flag that was billowing from atop a rickety wooden platform bearing the crest of the Valkyries – remnants of a prior expedition, if he recalled the NPCs' stories right, but now they served as fast-travel points for the Tonky Express. He couldn't help but feel the name was a little underwhelming, but since it was his sister who'd discovered the creatures and that they could be used as mounts while drifting along air currents that ran around the zone, she was the one who'd gotten to name their ride.

"Brr...I don't think I'll ever get used to the weather in this place," Leafa said, turning back to them while rubbing her arms underneath her frost boar cloak – not that such an action would help her, since she wasn't

actually

freezing. "I don't mind being cold, but this just feels weird. Did it ever get this cold in Aincrad?"

Kirito mulled over the question for a moment, before nodding. "Yeah, once. Um...there was this place on the fifty-fifth floor, it was all the way on top of a mountain, like some kind of frozen volcano. It got really, really cold there...colder than here, actually."

Whereas

the area closest to the

entry point into Jötunheim underneath Alne was somewhat protected by the World Tree's roots

, the outer fringes of Jötunheim were enveloped in a

n even worse

blizzard that made traveling without the right equipment precarious at best as a result of the numbing cold and freezing debuffs. Even so, just like in the frozen caldera of the Western Mountains on Aincrad's fifty-fifth floor; the cold itself was not as debilitating as it would have been in the real world – it was, at the end of the day, a game after all.

In fact, even more extreme temperatures in

NewALO

felt more muted than they had in

SAO

, and a lot less harsh overall – more like a full-body tingling sensation of mild discomfort than the near-debilitating numbness he'd felt back then, almost as though the game tried to replicate the

loss of feeling from freezing

but didn't quite get there.

Kirito figured it probably had to do with hardware limitations; Underworld, with Rath's more powerful equipment, seemed to have no problems recreating a far greater depth of sensation, all the way down to the absolutely blinding pain of stubbing a toe in the dark as he'd found out while spending one particular night there.

I wonder if that's

because of

the difference in signal output between the NerveGear and the AmuSphere? Doctor Koujiro mentioned something about that, and how its more difficult to reproduce realistic sensations on the AmuSphere because of its limitations...

he shook his head, figuring it was something he could ask about later.

Just how strong is the signal from the tech we use to dive into Underworld, then?

Leafa shook her head, pulling her clothing tighter around herself for as little good as that would do her. "I think I prefer it up in Alfheim, where it's nice and warm. I mean, we did have a winter event where it snowed last year, and we got to decorate the World Tree for Christmas, but it was never

cold

like this. We've got enough of that coming up in the real world, thank you very much. I'll be happy when we've finished with this place and can get back up there." She looked up at the stormy, turbulent sky. "Plus, I miss flying."

"True," Kirito nodded – for his sister, who loved the absolute freedom that her wings gave her in

NewALO

, being grounded was far more restrictive than it was for him or Kizmel. "But hey, look on the bright side," he pointed out, "at least you don't have to worry about catching a cold here."

"Good point. It feels strange to be this cold and not even have to sneeze."

Kirito chuckled, before looking back out into the snowstorm that threatened to wipe out their footprints as quickly as they made them. "Which way are we going?"

"It's not far," Leafa answered, checking her map. "Come on, Recon said it's only a couple of minutes in this direction."

He followed her obligingly as she led the way, grunting as he struggled to free his left boot from the powdery prison it had almost gotten stuck in. A rushing gale tore at his coat, making Kirito feel as though he was standing next to a

passing

train, but at least the visibility was better than in other parts of Jötunheim. While the outskirts of the Einherjar camp had been somewhat protected

from the unending storm

by the World Tree's roots, further out the blizzards had only continued to worsen until they became a nearly constant feature, alongside the snow and hail they brought to the point that even

the

fairy bonfires that had been their lifeline early on were of little help, earning the further out areas the moniker "The Badlands."

This place, however, where Tonky had dropped them off was at the extreme fringes of Jötunheim itself, a place where even the usual frost giants and the zone's native wildlife had given way to something far more eerie and unsettling: the undead. The Wastelands of Rura Penthe were thus aptly named as they were devoid of anything living and even the snow and ice gleamed with an unholy obsidian shine, though Kirito figured there was probably a story even to that, judging by the way that both Lind and Argo had snickered in amusement at the area's mention.

Here, past the tempestuous Badlands, the winds and storms finally quieted down a bit, only to be replaced by an unnatural darkness, but true to his sister's word, it didn't take long for them to arrive at their destination, an obsidian structure that rose out of the snow ahead, hidden from detection by the worsening storm and hail the closer they got.

"So," he asked as they stomped their way across a particularly tall snowdrift to get closer, "why'd you ask me to come with you?"

It wasn't that he minded, of course, but it was unusual that they were setting off on their own without either of their friends. The sharp look he got from her told him he probably should've said that last part out loud, but thankfully, Leafa didn't jump to conclusions and knew what he meant.

"Do I need an excuse to play with my brother?" she shot back, before her expression softened. "No, I didn't mean it like that. It's just...we're always around other people and your old friends, I just...missed spending time with you. Just the two of us, doing things together. Like it was when you first came back."

Oh.

Thinking back to it, he couldn't help but realize that she had a point. When he'd first started playing

ALO

, she'd been there for him, and along for the ride, with a joyful expression he hadn't seen since they were much younger. And for a while, it had just been the two of them – plus Recon, on occasion – while they wandered through the fairy world. In a way, it reminded him a lot of the time he spent alone with Asuna or Kizmel, before the others had managed to insert themselves into their lives.

And now, their small group had become an almost constant fixture around him.

Yeah, it's been a while since the two of us did something on our own,

he admitted silently.

Kizmel was helping Kikuoka's team with Underworld's development today, and the rest of his friends were busy with something or another, so it was as good a time as any to fix that.

"Well," Leafa continued quietly, "I guess it was just my luck that Kizmel was out today."

Kirito shrugged. "It happens. She's out at work today,

and I can't exactly ditch school on a weekday to go to Roppongi,

"

the swordsman said with a chuckle

and his sister knew better than to ask, considering the sheer amount of paperwork that Kikuoka had brought by for his family to sign when they'd asked about what he and Kizmel actually did for the man.

But that didn't stop her from needling him about it good-naturedly, apparently. "Really? I thought the two of you were attached at the hip," she pointed out. "I

t just feels a little strange that

you're not at work with her."

He couldn't really deny that, considering how much time they spent together. "Yeah, but a lot of that was because there really wasn't any other choice. Now…" the swordsman trailed off, wiping at some of the snow that had found its way onto his face, "well, I think it's good for her to be a little more...normal, you know. Get to know people, go to work, find something to do in life other than fighting."

"Normal?" Leafa stared back at him for a moment. "Kazu-nii, the two of you are the least normal people I know."

Yeah, I guess I can't really deny that, either

, he mused with a wry grin. "You said you wanted to farm for the fire sword from this dungeon, right?" Kirito changed gears instead.

His blonde sister looked at him strangely for a moment, before chuckling. "Yeah, that's right. Lisbeth told me that she could help make

Mikazuki

stronger, and with the new enchantments and reinforcement materials from this zone, I figured it was time."

"You're gonna replace your sword?" That was surprising to him – even though in

SAO

, levels made it necessary for them to update their equipment, even Kirito had found it difficult to part with the weapons that had served him well.

I figured she'd hold on to that katana forever.

She shook her head. "Recon said the sword could be broken down and used for materials. I'm hoping that it'll work."

"If anyone can make it happen, it's Lisbeth," Kirito remarked.

"Yeah, you're probably right," his sister agreed with a chuckle. "You...you're not worried about your gear for the big raid that's coming up at all, are you."

The black-clad Sylph paused for a moment; it hadn't been long ago that he'd received an invitation from Lady Sakuya to bring his group to the big capstone raid clear the Sylphs and Salamanders were planning. Kirito himself hadn't attempted it yet, even though it could be done with as little as a single party on the lowest difficulty, while on the highest, the Battle of Utgard Citadel promised to be the largest non-world boss fight in the game, able to accommodate multiple raid groups at the same time.

So far, Argo had told him, no one had managed to beat it on its highest difficulty yet, though not for lack of trying. There was no shortage of guilds racing to put together a successful attempt for the bragging rights of being the first to complete the hardest content in the game. The Sylphs and Salamanders were no exception to this, but Kirito had been surprised when Sakuya had extended a personal invitation to him, his party, and anyone else he could recommend to join them, a sentiment that Eugene had seconded without hesitation.

Their reasoning had been straightforward and pragmatic, which made him less suspicious of any sort of ulterior motive; they simply wanted the strongest, most reliable players they could get for this show of force, and apparently his recommendation carried quite a bit of weight among the circles that knew him. He didn't

have

to go, but there was a part of him that couldn't turn down the challenge, even if it was for fun.

Especially

because it was for fun.

"Not really," he finally answered with a grin, tapping the hilt of the oversized hand-and-a-half sword that Lisbeth had made for him a while ago. "I'm good with what I've got. But if you want an upgrade, then let's get you one, Leafa."

-------------------------------

October 29th, 2025

The first thing that hit her was the biting cold, fresh air – so different than the humid, occasionally warm days of fading summer and early autumn in Japan. It was crisp and clear and harsh in its chill, and when she opened her eyes, Asuna could see her breath misting in front of her. Once she'd finished loading into
NewALO
, the tall, blue-haired Undine took a moment to look around. It had been a while since she'd logged into the game last, but she was determined to make time this weekend to spend with her friends for the upcoming Halloween festivities.

It's only been a little over a week, but it feels a lot longer,
she mused. She'd fully expected to be left behind, however, considering how quickly she knew players could move through a new area. It was a pace she was exceedingly familiar with, particularly from the early days of Aincrad when it had been Asuna herself alongside Kirito who'd set most of that pace, themselves.
Those were the days...it was easy to level up, and we moved so quickly through the floors…

But eventually, even the clearing group's breakneck pace from the first year had
been forced to
slow down. Despite the floors getting smaller, it took them longer to acquire the necessary
equipment
and levels to move up safely, and even when they did, the clearers often charged so far ahead of the other players that only the most reckless and foolhardy – or the most daring and skilled – had any hope of surviving alongside them. As a result, towns on the higher floors were often deserted, and sometimes even entirely devoid of players at all.

Here in Jötunheim, however, the world felt much more alive as players had begun arriving after the initial onrush on launch day, and over the next few weeks had begun building up the desolate encampment of a dozen or so NPCs into a thriving pseudo-town, with merchant players hawking their wares and entire guilds having moved their headquarters here as they put up temporary lodgings. It wasn't just the players, either – as the story progressed, more and more NPCs arrived at the camp, saved by players during quests or returning to duty after being healed, many of which came with their own quests for enterprising players to delve into.

In a way, Asuna felt reminded of the way the towns in Aincrad had been filled with NPCs simply going about their day even without the players present, but the most striking change was to be found near where the players had set up their impromptu market.

Rising at the center of the camp was an entirely new structure, and for a while Asuna puzzled as to the purpose of the large, square wooden platform that rose about a dozen meters into the air, made from rough timbers and partly unprocessed logs with a flag fluttering from a pole mounted at its center. The answer presented itself quickly enough when a shadow fell overhead, causing her to look up at the creature that gently floated overhead, its long trunk and elephant-like head looking more than a little fantastical on the rest of its jellyfish-looking body.

That's right, Leafa-chan managed to tame one of these animals and figured out that we could use them to ride around,

the Undine recalled what she'd heard in passing from her friends, even if she hadn't seen the creatures herself until now.

With a chuckle she was reminded of

Kizmel telling her the story

about

how Kirito's sister had taken a liking to the passive monsters and stepped in to protect one from a hunting party, only to be rewarded with it carrying her aloft and above the storms that enveloped Jötunheim's surface.

Word of this had spread rather quickly, and other players, mostly tamers, had rushed to make a business out of it, taming and offering their services to haul cargo and players from place to place quicker than the Tonkys' natural routes – often in exchange for payment or information from the groups they ferried aloft.

One of them in particular seemed

exceptionally

enterprising

by the looks of it

; by the platform, Asuna could see a short Cait Sith with long green hair wearing a white coat with oversized sleeves overseeing the exchange of cargo from her three mounts.

"No, no, that one was meant for the other customer, nya!"

Asuna chuckled as she passed by, catching fragments of conversation between the Cait Sith and her friends.

"That one's supposed to go there, nya! You, quick, get your passengers aboard! Hurry up, or no bonus for you, nya!"

Passing by the fast travel platform, where a somewhat haphazard sign at the stall by its base proclaimed it the location for "Akashi's Tonky Ferry Service" in scrawly handwriting, the blue-haired Undine made her way towards the meeting point by the gate.

Murmurs sprang up around her as she went through the more crowded areas of the camp; after all, the appearance of the tall, striking Undine hadn't gone unnoticed, and even though many players like the Cait Sith at the loading dock weren't paying much attention to anything except their own business, several heads still turned as Asuna continued down the street. It didn't matter that the Berserk Healer had somewhat less of a well-known reputation than the Flash, her appearance alone ensured that she tended to inevitably draw stares wherever she went.

Guess it'll be the same in every game,

she thought to herself with an exasperated sigh, recalling how parties had quite literally fought over her to join them back in Aincrad. She'd eventually gotten used to the attention that came along with being a girl in an MMO and learned how to deal with those kinds of proposition

s

, even if the one thing she still found herself struggling with was once again having to politely turn down people...a lot. Joining the Knights of Blood in

SAO

had curtailed a lot of the requests made towards her, but in Alfheim, she didn't have that kind of shield.

Ugh...and the worst part is, the more people call out, the more other people are going to start looking...

and the more people looked, the more attention she drew in turn, until it reached a point where she was practically swarmed by other players. Some simply wanted to ask her to join their party, seeing a lone player out and about and seeing their chance to maybe nab a skilled Undine healer, while others did actually recognize her as the Berserk Healer.

Eventually, even Asuna's limitless patience and polite facade, honed by her mother's lessons and tested in the crucible that was

SAO

's clearing group strategy meetings, was starting to reach its limits.

"Asuna! You made it!"

Thankfully, the blue-haired Undine was saved from having to make an inelegant exit by the timely arrival of her erstwhile partner's sister. Leafa was a distinct streak of green and yellow as the speed-loving Sylph hurried towards her with a wide grin.

"Leafa-chan," Asuna greeted her, "sorry, did I keep you waiting long?"

The energetic blonde shook her head, sending her long ponytail swinging, even as mutters started up around the two girls. "Not really. I just got back down here from Alne – I had some shopping to do and met up with Recon. He had a message from Lady Sakuya, but I'll tell you about that later, when the others get here."

The ease with which she dropped one of the more famous names in the game didn't escape Asuna, or the rest of their audience. All around them, players leaned in curiously, wondering what one of the Four Great Sylphs and ostensibly the Sylph leader's de-facto right-hand woman had to say.

Leafa smiled apologetically. "I'm sorry for calling you out of the blue, but Kazu-nii and Kizmel aren't around, and I was going to get together with some of the other girls so we thought that maybe you'd...like to play the game with us, too?"

Asuna shook her head. "I don't mind at all. Thank you for thinking of me."

Truth be told, she'd been surprised when her erstwhile partner's sister had messaged her out of the blue and invited her to spend some time in

NewALO

, before

quickly

explaining that she was planning on going with a few others from Kirito's usual group, plus Lisbeth and Silica. It wasn't that they were strangers, but out of all of them, the Undine figured that she was the one Leafa had spent the least amount of time around.

But she'd accepted anyway, and part of her had even been quite happy to receive an invitation unprompted – it certainly beat studying the same material for the umpteenth time at home, or enduring another of her mother's lectures, even though her in-home tutor had declared her well and truly caught up.

"I heard he was at university with Nautilus-kun today," the blue-haired fencer answered glibly. "Something about helping him and Professor Shigemura with a project for a couple of days?"

Leafa nodded. "Yeah, that's what he told me. And he doesn't even go to uni yet.

Other times he just takes off to Roppongi for an entire weekend to work on other stuff.

I swear," she huffed playfully, "sometimes I have no idea what that brother of mine gets up to."

"You could always go with him, you know," Asuna pointed out. "I'm sure neither of them would mind."

The blonde Sylph shook her head. "No, I'd just get in their way. He did tell us he'd be busy after school for a bit, and that he was doing it as a favour, or something." She let out a sigh. "I don't know...sometimes, it just seems like he goes off on his own again, and I'm never going to be able to reach him, no matter how much progress I make."

"Believe it or not, I do know how that feels, Leafa-chan," came Asuna's reply.

"Really? I thought you were super close with him and Kizmel?"

Asuna laughed. "Sorry to disappoint, but if anything, you know more about what Kirito-kun is up to these days than I do." Despite her jovial tone, there was a slight tinge of bitterness in her words that the fencer herself knew was entirely undeserved – thankfully, though, Leafa didn't seem to have noticed it.

"Really? I thought-"

The blue-haired girl shook her head. "Maybe back then, when we spent a lot of time together. But ever since we all came back, well...we've all been busy, I guess." Her lips turned up in a sardonic smile. "I haven't...I haven't really been able to keep in touch much."

"Guess it's tough when you guys don't go to the same school, huh?" Leafa hummed sagely. "Besides, I bet you've got all sorts of other obligations, what with everything you've got going on and stuff." The blonde glanced around, and suddenly seemed to realize the two of them were beginning to draw quite a crowd.

"Oh, uh, we better get out of here," she said. "Come on, we can wait for the others over there!"

Pulling her hand and practically dragging the Undine with her, Kirito's sister pushed through the crowd that was beginning to form around the pair; most of the players made way for them – and those that didn't, were summarily ignored. Following the blonde into one of the camp's side-streets that ran off from the main gate, a bewildered Asuna caught disappointed murmurs from behind as the players lamented the missed opportunity to talk to or invite either of them to their groups, along with chuckles and laughter at how futile such an attempt would've been by their compatriots.

Finally they came to a stop after dipping behind a building, and Asuna could only grin in

fond exasperation

when her companion suddenly realized that she'd been holding on to her hand the entire time –

it was endearingly similar to the way her brother's habit of acting before thinking

. With a deep crimson flush so reminiscent of

Kirito

, Leafa let go and took a hasty step back.

"Oh! Uh...I'm, I'm so sorry! I just – I got carried away a little," she squeaked.

Asuna smiled. "It's quite all right. You're

rather

forceful when you want to be, Leafa-chan." If anything, the blonde's cheeks reddened even further, but she decided to put her friend's sister out of her misery. "

Don't worry about it

. Thanks for saving me the trouble of having to deal with all of those people."

"Ahaha...I guess it's true what Kazu-nii told me. You really do attract attention wherever you go. Not that I can blame them."

Asuna chuckled, and shook her head, thankful for the sudden change in topic as their sudden flight had washed away the melancholy that had threatened to come forth and replaced it with amusement at how similar brother and sister were after all. "You're one to talk, Leafa-chan. At least half of them were in awe at being in your presence."

"You win

one

PvP tournament, and all of a sudden people think you're the best thing since sliced bread," the blonde bemoaned. "And I'm

still

convinced Lady Sakuya threw that match. She was way too happy about pinning that trophy on me to not be, and after that she pretty much dragged me into the Sylphs' leadership circles. I bet the only reason she let me win was because she didn't want to deal with the rumours of it being a rigged match if she won. Plus, if you or Kazu-nii had participated, I would've been toast."

She didn't really know Lady Sakuya, but Asuna had heard about the crafty, well-liked Sylph leader who'd been elected over and over for both her popularity and skill at leading the faction. On top of that, she appeared to be a fairly skilled swordswoman, and wily and intelligent as well.

"Grrr...if he'd told me the reason he didn't participate was because he was expecting Sakuya to pull something like this and use the tournament to promote its winner, I wouldn't have bothered signing up, either!" the blonde mumbled, mostly to herself, it seemed.

"From what Kirito-kun tells me, you've been quite popular even before the game's re-launch," Asuna pointed out dryly.

Though, it's kind of adorable how similar Kirito-kun and his sister are in wanting to avoid being put in any kind of position of leadership.

With a great heaving sigh, Leafa shook her head. "I guess. Honestly, I don't really care about the factions or guild politics and all that – I just want to enjoy the game with my friends. It was probably the same for you, back then, huh? Girl gamer among all of those boys, bet it wasn't easy."

"I wouldn't exactly call myself a

gamer

," the Undine retorted quietly. "But I get what you mean."

She'd heard from the Kirito about the last time his sister had been in a guild, after all.

Leafa eyed her for a moment as the pair fell silent, before looking up with a strange look in her eyes. "I guess you would, huh?" The blonde turned back towards her. "I also never got the chance to say thank you."

"What's that for?" Asuna asked.

"For taking care of my brother when you were…" the Sylph gestured vaguely. "When you were in the death game," she finally whispered.

"Oh." Closing her eyes, the blue-haired girl took a slow, deep breath. "I think...Kirito-kun took care of me more than the other way around, really."

"That's not what he said." Leafa chuckled dryly. "Listening to Kazu-nii and reading between the lines...he thinks that if it hadn't been for you, he wouldn't have made it as far as he did, and I think he's right."

Asuna smiled fondly. "I think that feeling is more than mutual. We saved each other, in more ways than one, I think."

"It's just...you're a big part of the reason why I think my brother came back. Who knows what would've happened without you or Kizmel there. Or any of the other friends he made." Leafa idly toyed with her ponytail. "So...thank you. I know it couldn't have been easy for you back then, either."

"Back then..."

Blue eyes blinked as her vision suddenly blurred. For a moment, Asuna's breath left her, as the realization suddenly struck with all the force of a freight train. Life had simply been far too busy for her to dwell on what had happened or process not just the two years in Aincrad but also her captivity at the hands of Nobuyuki Sugou. She hadn't even managed to properly mourn Yui and Strea, the two AIs that had sacrificed themselves for them not just once, but twice despite watching Kirito grieve for them right in front of her.

But other than a few days in the hospital right after waking up, Asuna hadn't really had much time to do any reflection before she was transferred to home care.

The benefits of having a wealthy, influential family

, the Undine thought bitterly, recalling the elaborate preparations that had to be made to accommodate her personal physiotherapist, dietitian, and exercise regimen all so she could get back on her feat as quickly as humanly capable,

everything she needed for her body to be back in tip-top shape

.

Not to mention the slew of academic tutors that had taken up even her resting time so that she could catch up on the education she'd missed while stuck in Akihiko Kayaba's death game.

Throughout it all, Asuna had simply pushed aside any thoughts of what had happened, not really having much time to deal with it all. Even the time she spent with Kirito and Kizmel or even some of the other survivors was more of a distraction than anything else – none of them really asked, and Asuna hadn't dared to actively seek out counseling or talk to anyone else about things she herself didn't want to dredge up.

It made her a little envious to see how well others seemingly were coping with what had happened, able to move on with their lives. She knew it was most likely a facade, but if it was, they certainly didn't let on as they dove back into the virtual world with smiles of wonder and excitement. After all the time she'd spent there, Asuna herself couldn't deny an attachment to these worlds as well, regardless of how terrible and horrifying their experience had been at times.

If anyone could understand her conflicted feelings, it was them, others who had lived through the same thing.

But she

always

found herself a bit reserved to talk about these matters with the other members of Kirito's party whenever the subject came up, feeling a bit like an outsider ever since realizing that her former partner had at some point set out and grown on his own, without her watching over him, and found others to rely on.

They had all been through a lot together, but of all of them, Asuna only really knew Kirito and Kizmel. Rain, Philia, Yuna and Nautilus had all come along only after she'd joined the Knights of Blood and drifted apart from the pair. As a result, she'd never really had the time to get to know them much outside of her duties as the leader of the clearing group. There simply was a distance between them that Asuna couldn't bring herself to cross, at least not yet.

Something, however, was different about Leafa. For some reason, Asuna felt compelled to answer Kirito's sister – perhaps it was because she looked like she truly

did

want to understand what had happened during those two years, what they'd gone through. Or maybe it was because it didn't look like Leafa would judge her for what she'd heard,

in the same manner that she didn't seem to judge Kirito for what he'd been through

; Asuna knew that her erstwhile partner had told his family about everything that had happened, including everything he'd done and been forced to do.

Especially the parts he wasn't proud of.

And they'd still accepted him, wanted to help him even if they didn't know how. A pang she recognized as jealousy went through her, but Asuna suppressed it ruthlessly – if anything, she was glad her best friend had a supportive family. Even now, there was something utterly earnest in the Sylph's eyes that made the carefully built walls around her own memories and experiences crumble. Walls that had been strained by deliberate neglect and nearly bursting from the tide they were struggling to hold back finally cracked and splintered, breaking only to release a cascade of emotions that the blue-haired fencer had long since believed locked away.

Memories of fighting desperately to live, to make it back home.

The absolute and utter fear and disbelief of what had happened.

Determination bordering on stubbornness to force her way out of the deadly place she'd found herself in.

Horror at the realization of what her first friend was doing, and

the sheer pride she felt when she understood

why he'd chosen the path he did.

Nights spent fighting, learning until she'd engraved every movement of her rapier, every sword skill, every pre-motion and tell to memory, even past the point of exhaustion.

Sitting around a fire on a starlit night, laughing, smiling with the

first

true friends she'd ever found.

The sickening feeling as player avatars shattered around her, knowing that these people had died under

her

leadership.

Feeling abandoned as a black-cloaked figure turned away and strode into the night, leaving her behind.

Waking up, after finally winning their freedom, only to open her eyes in a gilded cage, prisoner of a madman who viewed her as a possession.

Finding her best friend locked in a life-and-death battle with her captor, bleeding and struggling for a knife,

and forgetting everything other than the burning need to save him

.

The relief when she realized that it was finally, truly over.

Catharsis

.

Her vision swam before she even realized it, and the only thing she became aware of throughout this whirlwind of memories was a warm touch on her arm.

-------------------------------

Leafa turned, wondering why Asuna had suddenly stopped, only for her heart to leap into her throat. The blue-haired girl, whom she'd always seen as a composed, well-put together young lady in the entire time they'd known each other, was breaking down, tears silently streaming down her cheeks and staring off into the distance.

For a moment, she didn't know what to do, before realizing that she'd been in this exact same place before.

Instinctively, her arms went around the older girl, pulling her closer as she wept; Leafa didn't have much to say – she hadn't been there, hadn't lived through everything that her brother and the other Survivors had. Anything she might say would just sound hollow and empty, so she did the only thing she could.

None of them ever really talked to anyone about what happened,

the blonde Sylph realized grimly. Sure, her brother had told them about what he'd done, but he'd remained tight-lipped about his own feelings on the matter. Outwardly, Kirito appeared fine, but underneath, Leafa couldn't help but wonder if her brother was actually all right.

After all, he'd been right behind Kizmel as she volunteered to dive

back

into a death game, to fight against impossible odds, all on the longest of long shots to save their friends when they had been caught and imprisoned by Nobuyuki Sugou. There was no explanation in the world that she could come up with why he would do such a thing, and then everyone else had followed suit, as though it was the most natural thing to do, after just escaping the last one.

No, there is one. I may not like it, but there is one,

Leafa admitted to herself.

They're family. They're as much family as flesh and blood, maybe even more so.

Looking up at the cloudy, stormy skies of Jötunheim that seemed to reflect the turmoil in both girls' thoughts perfectly, she let out a long sigh.

Who would they even talk to? None of us...no one could understand what they've gone through, what's made them into who they are now. Not unless they'd fought and bled and watched their friends die right in front of them.

It was a grim, uncharitable thought, she knew. But no matter how much the blonde tried to put herself in her brother's place, there was no scenario in which she could see herself doing what he had done. The realization filled her with equal parts disappointment and shame at herself; he'd been unhesitating and unequivocal when it came to risking his own life for those he cared about, but she didn't even know if she could do the same.

She'd never voiced that fear and doubt to him, nor their parents, and Leafa never would.

But in the dark corner of her mind, she couldn't help but think that, had she been in his place, would she have the same strength as those few who had stood with him that day?

Eventually Asuna's tears ran their course; Leafa turned down to look at her tentatively, unsure of whether to give the other girl some privacy.

"I'm sorry," the blue-haired Undine said with a wet laugh while wiping at her tear-streaked face. "I didn't...I don't know what came over me there."

"No, no, I'm sorry for bringing up bad memories. I wasn't thinking, and it was a stupid and insensitive thing to say and-"

"Lonely," Asuna cut her off suddenly.

Leafa blinked at the single, one-word reply. "...what?"

"It was...lonely," Asuna repeated slowly. "In the beginning, I mean. More than anything, it was lonely."

The Undine seemed to struggle for words for a minute, before speaking again. "I never really played any games," she explained, almost absently. "I was always the model student at home, good grades, nothing on my mind except studying and making connections with others for my future, and preparing to enter university. But at some point, I just...I wanted a break. When my brother came home with the NerveGear for this new game he was super excited to try out, I couldn't help myself. I wanted to try it out, just once. I didn't think I'd like it, but I guess I ended up being rebellious for once in my life, so I snuck into his room and borrowed the NerveGear."

"And then the death game happened," Leafa murmured quietly.

Asuna nodded. "At first, it was terrifying. I didn't know anything about that world, or how games worked." A bitter laugh escaped her throat. "I'd only just gotten the hang of how to buy items from a vendor when we were all told what had happened. I was too busy spending all day wandering around looking at places to really

play

the game, if you know what I mean."

"Yeah, I do." This time, there was a small, nostalgic smile curling at the blonde's lips. "I was the same way when I first started playing

ALO

. These places are something else, aren't they? I never really understood what drew Kazu-nii to them until I came here."

"They really are," Asuna agreed, "but when we were told...that we were trapped, and that death in the game would mean death in the real world, everyone just panicked. But for some reason I just...I didn't. I wasn't afraid for my life, as silly as that sounds, I was more terrified of what my parents would say if they found out I'd snuck out to play a video game instead of studying, and that I would be missing my mock placement exams."

"You're kidding, right?" Leafa blinked in surprise.

"Not at all. You can ask Kirito-kun about it, if you want, it's a bit embarrassing, but…" the fencer giggled almost nervously. "Anyway, for the first few weeks, people went absolutely crazy. Some went mad and tried to get out by getting their avatars killed, jumped off the edge of the world, or went on rampages in the fields because they didn't believe what Kayaba had told us. Others hid in the towns, and some banded together to form parties. A lot of players who'd known each other before the game did that. But I…"

Green eyes widened in understanding. "You were all alone. You hadn't ever played a game before, and you didn't know anyone there…"

"Yeah."

"But...but Kazu-nii said when he met you, you were fighting really well, and-"

Asuna shrugged. "I had to learn. I kind of approached it like I did any of my studies, I just threw myself into it. Even more so because my life quite literally depended upon it. So...even though I didn't really know a whole lot about the game, I just bought a bunch of weapons and decided to try and push my way out of the game, to try and escape, by any means I could, even if it meant almost killing myself. And then I met your brother." She sucked in a deep breath and leaned back. "I don't know for sure, but I think he must've felt the same in a lot of ways. Alone, and terrified in this place, but determined to push through and...

survive

. No matter what the reason was, we both wanted to

live

."

"I can't imagine there being a lot of people who didn't," Leafa remarked dryly.

"No, there wouldn't," she replied with a chuckle, "but we were...alike in a lot of ways, really. And for the first time since that whole nightmare started, I wasn't alone. Honestly, I was probably the most obnoxious...what do you call it? A noob? You could imagine. I practically was all over him the moment I found out he had a

bath

in his house. Back then, regardless of how much he tried to portray himself as aloof and uncaring, I could still tell how terrified he was underneath it all."

Green eyes blinked in surprise. "Really? From everything I've heard, he and Kizmel and the rest of you might as well have been fearless heroes."

A bright laugh escaped Asuna's throat at that. "Fearless? Far from it. We were all terrified, but I guess we had different ways of dealing with it. Honestly, I didn't really think much of your brother until...well, until that first boss battle, even if he'd saved my life twice by then already."

"The raid against Ilfang, right?" Leafa nodded slowly. "Kazu-nii told us about that."

Leaning her head back against the bench, the Undine let out a long sigh. "When he went and declared to all the world that he was the beater, my heart nearly stopped," she told the swordsman's sister. "I thought for a moment that he'd lost his mind, at least until I realized what he was doing. He deliberately turned his back on all of us and left, but for some reason I couldn't...I couldn't just let him walk away like that.

He'd chosen to carry this burden for some reason, and I couldn't let him do it alone, not after everything I'd seen him do.

So I found him again, and

somehow

, he didn't really seem to put much effort into getting me to leave him alone."

"Because he was just as lonely as you were."

"...yes. And

at times

I felt like I was the only one who bothered trying." Leafa watched as Asuna's eyes closed as though she were admitting some deeply-hidden truth to not just the Sylph, but also to herself. "

T

hose months spent traveling, playing, and living with Kirito-kun

were

one of the best times of my life."

"Then why'd you leave?" She couldn't really understand it; if staying with Kirito was what Asuna really wanted, if it was safer, then why choose to go to the KoB? Why take on the responsibility of leading not just one group, but

all

of the clearing efforts in the game? Leafa couldn't imagine herself stepping up to something like that in the same way she suspected her brother had been unable to.

"I suppose...because it was necessary," Asuna finally answered, looking down at hands folded in her lap. "Even if I didn't want to admit it at the time, Kirito-kun was right. In the heat of the moment, I just went with the flow, and there were times when I doubted my decision, or felt abandoned and lonely, but in the end, it turned out to be the right one. As much as I might have been happier sticking with Kirito-kun and Kizmel-chan, I don't think we'd be here right now."

"You weren't the only one."

"I guess so." The older girl brightened up a little. "On the plus side, I think Kirito-kun was quite happy I wasn't around when Kizmel-chan turned up again – I was a little...well, zealous in maintaining propriety and boundaries. They might not have gotten together if I'd been there all the time."

"I think they'd have found a way. Kizmel doesn't strike me as the kind to give up so easily," Leafa said with a giggle, before sobering up. "When he told me about that, I could see how much fun he had. I was...really jealous, to be honest."

"I don't think you'd have wanted to be stuck in his place."

"No," the blonde said, shaking her head, "I meant of

you

. Because...because I could tell how, despite himself, he let you in, when he'd kept us all at arm's length for so long. I just wished that…" she trailed off. "Nevermind."

"You wished you could've been there with him." It wasn't a question, but Leafa nodded in response anyway. Asuna sighed, before patting the Sylph on her shoulder comfortingly. "I think Kirito-kun knows how you feel, Leafa-chan."

For a moment, the swordsman's sister remained silent, but when she looked up, Asuna could see something in her eyes. "Yeah," she murmured, "I know. I know how hard he fought to come back to us, at least what he told us. It's just...he's a lot different now than how he used to be. And according to him, a lot of that is because of Kizmel...and you."

"...me?" the blue-haired girl parroted, somewhat bewildered.

"Yeah." Leafa giggled, idly playing with her long, blonde hair. "Kazu-nii is really good at pushing people away when he doesn't want to be close to them, because he's afraid of getting hurt. But you stuck with him, and that meant more to him than he probably let on. You did what I couldn't."

The blonde paused for a moment. "I can see it in his eyes, sometimes. When he thinks no one's watching," Leafa explained. "He gets this...this look. Like he's surprised and awed when he's looking at his friends. It took me a while to recognize that it's because they're still there. They're with him still. They haven't abandoned him."

"For all of the reputation he had as a dangerous lone wolf, Kirito-kun always

did

seem very surprised whenever someone stood up for him," Asuna agreed.

"Yeah, that's it. After he came back, we started talking. And...it took a while. Mom and Dad and him...they had some heart-to-heart talks." A bitter laugh escaped Leafa's throat. "The whole reason he pushed us away back then was because of a misunderstanding. Because he thought that because he was adopted, he somehow wasn't

wanted

. That we were only pretending to be his family. It's getting better now, and I think he's starting to understand that family isn't necessarily just who you're related to by blood, but also those you choose to be."

Green eyes settled back onto the tall Undine. "And that's something he learned from you. Kizmel and Rain and the others, too, of course, but you were the first. You were the first one who didn't give up on him. The first one to refuse to be pushed away."

"But I did," Asuna said in a low whisper. "I...left him."

"When you went to the KoB, and Kazu-nii didn't?"

Asuna nodded after a moment. "Yes. I guess...I know it was for the best, and deep down I know he'd never really have fit in with the others, but there were a lot of times when I wished he'd joined along with me. That maybe he'd have been able to do more if he'd been the vice-commander, instead."

"I don't think that would've worked out well," Leafa commented with an amused grimace. "No matter what, I can't really see him doing something like that."

"Perhaps not." A rumbling chuckle left her throat, "but maybe I was still feeling a little inadequate. He'd taught me pretty much everything I knew about the game and how to survive up until that point, I couldn't really help but feel that he was...failing to step up, in a way, when he'd finally been given the chance."

Leafa couldn't really blame her – from what she'd heard, her brother had been the person who'd taken Asuna under his wing and taught her everything she needed to survive. Even more so, as she'd just learned, the other girl had never played a game like

SAO

before in her life.

And then after months, he just...lets her go. Doesn't say anything, doesn't argue or ask her not to go, but he just...turns around and walks away as though he'd expected to be left again.

"I understand him now, I really do," the Undine continued after a moment, "but at the time I didn't know if I felt...disappointed, or abandoned."

"But-"

Asuna shook her head. "It took him smacking some sense into me to realize that he'd

known

. He'd always known – that he couldn't do what we needed to pull everyone together, but that at the same time, there were things only he could do. That he

needed

to do, so others wouldn't have to. At some point, I'd just...lost sight of that."

"And now?" Leafa's green eyes blinked inquisitively.

"I-" Asuna cut herself off abruptly, and a shiver went through her. "It's not like it can be helped, you know. Do I miss having to fight for my life every waking moment and being responsible for the lives of everyone in the clearing group during a raid? Absolutely not. But...is it wrong that sometimes I wish I was back in those early days, where it was just Kirito-kun, Kizmel-chan, and myself? For everything terrible that happened in Aincrad, there were some good times, too. And...I miss those."

Leafa watched as the Undine almost seemed to shrink into herself, as though she was afraid of her, or what she would say. It took her a moment to realize how what Asuna had just said might be taken, and she shook her head with a smile.

"Kazu-nii said the same thing. I don't – I don't really get it, and I know Mom is really worried because of it, but I think...he came out different from

SAO

. He came out all kinds of hurt and battered, and he might never really go back to how he was. He's different, and maybe he's become someone that even he needs time to get used to. But at the end of the day, he isn't...he isn't

broken

, and if anything, between Kizmel, and you, and all of his other friends, I think he's at least...

whole

."

"I...I wouldn't go that far," Asuna said slowly, one hand rising to touch her cheek that was no longer tear-stained, as if realizing that memories and trauma couldn't simply be wiped away like their avatars refreshed their own appearance in the blink of an eye, leaving no trace behind. "I don't think any of us are ever really going to be whole in a way that's right for the real world, at least not for a long time."

Leafa nodded slowly. "Maybe not," the blonde said slowly, "but you're all here. I know my brother's really bad at saying these kinds of things, but I can tell. To him, you're just as much family as me or Kizmel. Maybe you're not going to be the same. Maybe you changed. But you're alive, and you're with family. And that's what counts."

-------------------------------

"Asuna! Leafa!"

True to the Sylph's word, Lisbeth and Silica arrived soon after Asuna had managed to put herself back together – and where Silica went, Pina wasn't far. The feathered little dragon had always been strangely perceptive of the moods of those around it, even back in Aincrad, and it seemed to take matters into its own wings.

With a trilled greeting, Pina took off towards Asuna, who hurriedly extended one arm to catch the little dragon. It rubbed its head against her cheek in greeting in a way that made it impossible for the girl to remain morose and all but demanded to be pet.

With a fond chuckle, the Undine gladly obliged it. "Hello, Pina. Ah – that – ah, that tickles!"

Sometimes, Asuna couldn't help but wonder; given that Kizmel, as well as her cousins Strea and Yui had been so lifelike and human, not to mention Cardinal, if Pina was just one more to add to the count. There had always been something a little different about Silica's pet dragon that set it apart from other tamed mobs, but it was impossible to know if that was because Pina was unique, or a result of how its mistress treated it.

The Leprechaun and Cait Sith followed behind at a more sedate pace as they greeted, and Asuna found herself looking away as Lisbeth's eyes bored into her. They'd known each other long enough that the smith could tell something was off about her, but Asuna didn't feel like digging it all back up immediately after the fact.

Thankfully, her friend seemed to understand her desire and decided not to ask. Instead, she put on a big smile s they got closer. "So, Leafa-chan, sounded like you got bored without your brother and Kizmel around, huh?"

"...maybe a little bit," the blonde replied with a sheepish chuckle. "But, uh...I also wanted to get ready for the big raid a little more. He's always been really laid back about things like that, and I know he doesn't really

need

the extra gear, but…"

"I get you," Lisbeth nodded. "Although, you know, I think it's nice to see that he has an

off

-mode. When I first met him in

SAO

, I thought he was going full-throttle all the time. Not gonna lie, he kind of scared me with that intensity at first. At least he's taking it easy now."

Asuna nodded. "I think that's something we can all agree on."

"Yep. But I'm guessing you're not feeling quite ready yet, huh?" Lisbeth grinned and looked over at the blonde Sylph.

"Y-yeah."

"Well, we're in," came the answer, "isn't that right, Silica-chan?"

"That's right!" the younger girl agreed cheerfully, and even Pina trilled an agreement.

"Sorry I'm late," Philia huffed as she made her way over, "ended up talking to Rain. She's not going to be able to make it today, she's out with Yuna and Nautilus."

Next to her, Asuna blinked in surprise at tha

t

. "Really? I didn't know those three were close."

"Mhmm." The blonde Imp nodded. "You know how Yuna loves to sing and wants to be an idol, right?"

"Yes..." It was hard to forget the songstress of Aincrad, after all. Asuna hadn't been able to keep in touch with the older pair much, but she had figured that perhaps university would

restrict

the time Yuna had

available

to spend on her passion.

Clearly, that was not the case.

Philia grinned. "Well, did you know that Rain does, too?"

"Huh." Asuna tilted her head in surprise – she hadn't really figured that the quiet swordswoman was inclined towards performing. "Really? I had no idea."

The blonde Imp chuckled. "She doesn't really advertise it – if anything, Rain's really shy about her singing, but I've heard her once or twice, and she's really, really good at it. So ever since we all got together outside of the game, she's been getting together with Yuna to practice – and poor Nautilus is along for the ride, but I don't think he really minds all that much. They both want to be idols, and while Yuna's more outgoing with it, Rain has done a couple of video uploads using an anonymous avatar. And she's been getting pretty popular, so since they both want to be idols and singers, well…"

"Wow."

"Well, there's probably a little more to it, but that's pretty much what she's been up to in her free time," Philia said. "Oh, and working in a maid cafe in Akiba."

Now

that

one was a surprise.

A maid cafe, of all things?

Asuna had never been to one, and she'd always imagined that the girls who worked there were a certain kind of outgoing personality – something she hadn't really expected from Rain, at least from what she knew of the jovial but usually reserved Spriggan player.

"That sounds she has an awful lot of things going on," Leafa pointed out. "I'm surprised she still finds time to hang out and play as much as she does."

"Yeah, well, I'm pretty sure they'll be fine," Philia noted dismissively, "between those two, an audience would have to be dead to not feel all the heart and soul they're pouring into the lyrics. And you know they're working hard at it, so I don't think they'll have any problems." The treasure hunter turned towards Leafa. "But enough about that. So, what's the plan, o' fearless leader?"

Asuna watched with amusement as it took the blonde Sylph a moment to realize that the question was addressed towards her. It was...refreshing to not be in charge, for once. Of course, the burden of a party leader was far less in

NewALO

than it had been in the death game, but even so, it was nice to not be the one everyone else looked to for guidance, for once.

"Oh! Um…" Leafa hesitated for a moment, before nodding to herself. "There's one dungeon that drops a lot of materials, but it's guarded by a boss. It's a tough one, so it's not one I

can

clear solo on my own…"

"A boss, huh?" Philia asked. "Which one?"

"Um...Fragment of Nidhogg," came the answer, causing the other blonde to frown.

"That's the undead dragon one, out in Rura Penthe, right?" Scratching her chin, the Imp hummed in thought. "Rain and I tried that one before, but we had a tough time with it. Had to ask Agil and Sachi for help, and some of the guys from Fuurinkazan came along, too. It's a tough one, definitely not something you could solo easily, yeah."

"I know," Leafa answered. "But, um, I was thinking maybe we could try anyway?"

Lisbeth hummed in thought. "We've got the damage for it, for sure, but we've got no tanks. Rain's not here, so we don't even have an off-tank, and Sachi and Nautilus aren't around, either. We

could

pick up a PUG, but…"

Asuna shook her head. "I don't think we'd do well with a random member just off the street, Lisbeth."

"Yeah, you're probably right."

"So...I guess we can't do it, then?" Leafa asked almost plaintively – Asuna could almost see her shrink into herself at the thought of having called them out here only to fail at the first hurdle of picking something to do.

The blue-haired fencer shook her head with a grin. "We didn't say that, Leafa-chan. It's true, a normal group would want a tank or two at least, but that doesn't mean that's the only way to go about it. We'll just have to get...creative."

In Aincrad, she'd never even have entertained the notion of doing something as reckless as going without a tank or a plan, but that was the beauty of

NewALO

– there were no stakes, and she could try all of the often outlandish strategies and tactics that had made Kirito and Kizmel such an unpredictable and successful part of their battles.

"We could kite it around," Philia suggested. "Hit and run should work – Asuna and Lisbeth can hit pretty hard, and the rest of us are quick enough to keep up. Back then our problem was that I couldn't do much to help Rain, and she was stuck trying to tank and attack it at the same time. I was mostly just a distraction."

Asuna's mind whirled with options and possibilities, before turning to meet Leafa's gaze. "I think we can do this," she told the younger girl. Green eyes wavered for a moment, before the blonde's face broke into a relieved smile.

"Really?"

"Really," the Undine confirmed, a small grin spreading across her lips. "Come on, we can't just rely on Kirito-kun and Kizmel-chan to lead the charge all the time. The rest of us aren't slouches."

Philia nodded in agreement. "That's right. We can't let those two have the monopoly on doing the impossible, after all. Besides," she said with a shrug, "what's the worst that happens? We wipe, and come back and try something different, right?"

"...right." Leafa's response was cut off when the Sylph suddenly found something to stare at, and her green eyes went wide with shock. Following her gaze, Asuna realized why the blonde looked so surprised – standing in front of them, fidgeting a little nervously, was a familiar figure she'd only seen once before, months ago, but it was hard to forget someone who left such an impression.

"You're the girl that came into my shop a while back, right?" Lisbeth asked with a grin.

"A...um...I'm sorry for just showing up," the girl with short black hair, a long black coat, and twin swords crossed over her back said hesitantly, "I'm...I'm Kuro. I, uh, I was...asked by a mutual acquaintance to meet you here today and help?"

-------------------------------

"Switch!" Asuna hollered,
causing
Leafa and Lisbeth to
charge
into the fray. The smith already had a sword skill chambered and ready, her mace glowing bright orange as she bought it to bear.

The Sylph edged ahead, using her speed to slip underneath the towering undead dragon's attack before gripping
Mikazuki
in both hands and bringing its blade down in a vicious overhead cut. Flipping her wrists around, she reversed the sword's direction, wrenching it back upwards in a diagonal stroke that bit deeply into the Fragment of Nidhogg's front claw.

Lisbeth's own attack came in a fraction of a second later, smashing into the side of the dragon and very nearly knocking it off-balance from the force of the impact. Light flared from where the mace struck its flayed skin, discharging with a thunderous report and
rocking
their opponent
onto its hind legs
.

The pair fell back, allowing Silica and Kuro to take their place as they came from behind and to the left of the dragon, forcing it to turn its bulk around to face the new threat.

I think Asuna's plan is actually working!
The blonde Sylph huffed with a flush of excitement.
Surrounding it and pairing up light and heavy attacks to make sure neither group fully pulls aggro and just kiting it around in circles...yeah, I think we can do this!

It was a carefully choreographed, high-stakes ballet that balanced damage, distance, and speed and required all of them to be perfectly in sync – not a plan an ordinary group was capable of pulling off as well as these players.

But just because they were doing okay, didn't mean they were out of the woods yet.

Philia said that once it hits a quarter of its HP, it'll enrage – and then it'll do extra damage and won't be vulnerable to stagger anymore,
the blonde remembered. And they were about to come up to that threshold, just as Kuro and Silica finished their attacks.
Here it comes
, she thought as the dragon's flayed, black skin took on a malevolent crimson glow. It roared and shook off its stagger effect, before taking one lumbering step towards the two girls that were hastily pulling back.

And then it swung.

The long, whip-like tail snapped around with a speed that surprised even her, but someone managed to react in time. Kuro stood her ground, twin swords crossed in front of her as she met the offending appendage head-on. For a moment, it looked as though she would make it, but ultimately, the Spriggan had neither Kirito's strength nor the
experience to deal with physically far stronger opponents that Leafa's brother had earned over the course of his battles.

Matching strength with a dragon was a losing proposition, and Kuro was flung off her feet to land in a heap a few meters away even while Asuna and Philia crashed into its back, determined to pull aggro
away from their vulnerable comrade
. To their surprise however, the Fragment of Nidhogg summarily ignored them and chased after the downed Spriggan
above whose head now floated the icon for the Stun effect along with a ten second timer
.

Letting out a wordless swear Leafa sprang forward, regardless of whether it was her turn or not; Tumble was one thing, but Stun...short of the Paralysis effect, Stun was one of the longest-lasting debuffs that impaired a player's movement completely, and Kuro had been struck with its maximum duration. Nearby, Asuna similarly discarded their plan and continued to press her own attack, the Undine's rapier little more than a blur of silver light as she flowed from one sword skill to the next, keeping them short and aggressive.

Rushing forward, Leafa reached the undead dragon just before it was within striking range of the
immobilized
Spriggan, sword already raised above her head for a decisive blow when the Fragment of Nidhogg opened its jaws wide and a jet-black sphere began to coalesce within its maw. Gritting her teeth, Leafa aborted her attack and began the chant for a protective barrier instead, but despite her familiarity with the spell, their foe had a head start.

I'm not gonna make it!

The dragon spat forth a virulent black beam.

"No!" A wall of bubbles sprang into being between the dragon and Kuro and its breath attack hissed and steamed as it warred with Pina's barrier, before burning its way through – but before it could strike the prone Spriggan, the familiar's young tamer stepped into its path, dagger and buckler stretched out protectively in front of her as she took the brunt of the
beam
.

Leafa's barrier whistled into existence around Kuro's avatar uselessly just as the beam cut out, leaving a panting Silica standing there, her HP gauge half empty.

Don't just stand there,
do
something,
the blonde Sylph reminded herself, drawing
Mikazuki
once more and attacking the dragon.

"Fall back, Silica-chan! Let Pina patch you up!" she could hear Asuna continue to
calmly
issue orders despite the chaos – and a detached part of her could easily imagine the older girl remaining just as calm during desperate boss fights in Aincrad as she struggled to keep the clearing group together and alive.

Banishing any extraneous thoughts from her mind, Leafa focused on the sword in her hand and the opponent in front of her.

It was rough – their original plan had fallen apart completely, and with the Fragment of Nidhogg immune to being staggered by sword skills, it was now even more dangerous to hit it with anything that could leave them vulnerable for more than a split second.
Plus, now its aggro pattern is random, so we can't even predict who it's going to go after.

Leafa huffed tiredly, taking a moment to down a potion while she was fortunate enough to not be the center of the boss's focus.

Pina passed by overhead with a trill, the feathered dragon's healing bubbles washing over her and adding to the healing effect of the potion. Waving her thanks, the blonde tracked its flight path back to find Silica in the back standing protectively over Kuro, who'd...not moved,
despite the fact that her stun had since worn off.

Blinking in surprise, Leafa was about to call out when she caught sight of the other girl's eyes.

Wide, unseeing eyes staring into nothingness.

No, not into nothingness...Leafa
knew
that look. She'd seen it more than once, when her brother would sometimes just freeze in the middle of doing something, when he
remembered
something that he'd thought buried,
something that had scarred him so deeply that he would likely never forget
.
Just like with him, it was accompanied by a stiff, frozen smile of forced acceptance, of bitterness, and regret.

Whatever protest she had for the Spriggan's inaction died on her lips.

I guess we'll just have to make do with the five of us.
It would sting to have to do the battle all over again if they failed here but they could always try again,
and
it was a
small
price to pay for giving Kuro the time she needed to sort out whatever demon had sunk its claws into her right now.
And besides,
Leafa thought to herself with a sidelong glance at where Asuna was
little more than
a white and blue streak,
striking over and over without pause or fail
,
we're not out of this yet.

If there was one thing she'd learned from spending time with her brother and his girlfriend, it was that "impossible" was little more than a challenge to
be
overcome. And while neither Kirito nor Kizmel were here, the third member of their trio
was
, and she was every bit their equal.

If Asuna is giving it her all, then I've got to do the same!
Slapping her cheeks, the blonde mustered her focus and darted back into the fight with a bellowed shout of her own.

-------------------------------

Dammit, I wasn't fast enough.

Getting hit by the dragon's tail didn't hurt so much as it knocked the wind out of Kuro, but the Spriggan knew she was done for when the stun icon appeared on her HUD and the Fragment of Nidhogg kept coming towards her. Closing her eyes, Kuro suppressed the
subconscious
shiver of fear that ran through her – this was a game, the black-haired girl kept repeating in her mind,
expecting to wake up in the monochrome vision of a Remain Light waiting for resurrection or respawn.

But then her imminent end was averted when someone stepped into the path of Kuro's demise
to take the brunt of the dragon's
breath
.

For just a second, Silica's form overlapped with another.

The shadow of another player. Another game, in another time.

For just a second, she was back
there
. Back in the world of swords.

Her lips moved to form a silent scream.

Rossa!

"
Kuro-
san
? Kuro-
san
! Are you okay?"

Silica's panicked voice finally managed to penetrate the fog that threatened to envelop her mind, tearing her back to the present. Blinking through the tears that had begun, she saw the blurry figure of the young tamer, Pina perched watchfully on her shoulder as they both looked at her with a concerned expression.

"Are you okay, Kuro?"

No, not again.
Fingers clenched around the hilts of her swords in a white-knuckled grip.
I got stronger. I
promised
myself I'd be stronger than that time. Strong like Kirito-sama and Kizmel-sama. Strong enough to never need to be protected ever again.

Strong enough so that no one would ever have to die protecting me again.

By the time she'd mustered the strength to look back up, the fight
getting desperate
– Asuna was a streak of light, living up to her former nickname of Lightning Flash as she careened like an out of control comet into the undead dragon's bulk to send it reeling. Lisbeth was already high up in the air to take advantage of the set-up, crimson light wreathing the Leprechaun's mace as she brought it down from on high with enough force to send the Fragment of Nidhogg crashing into the ground.

With a roar that answered the dragon's wounded cry, the black-haired Spriggan pushed herself to her feet, ignoring Silica's worried look, and tore after her target. The blades in her hands sang as she spun and slashed, diving headfirst towards the Fragment of Nidhogg with a vicious Sonic Leap that struck while it was still
picking itself up off the ground
from Lisbeth's prior attack.

Wrenching her avatar free of the momentary restriction of the skill's post-motion delay, Kuro spun, lashing out with the blade in her off-hand as she
twirled the sword in her right into the pre-motion for a Phantom Rave. The weapon took on a pale violet glow as it arced around in a figure eight, leaving a crossed trail of crimson marks on the dragon's body. A third cut angled in from above her right shoulder, stopping as the system halted its momentum at the Spriggan's waist before she lunged forward, extending her entire body into a thrust that sent a flare of violet light bursting from out the Fragment of Nidhogg's back.

It tried to swing at her blindly, immune to being knocked around by the high-level sword skill's impact, but she wasn't done. Pulsing with a bright shimmer, Kuro's weapon spun above her head defensively, knocking the dragon's claw aside as she whirled backwards, twisting the sword behind her back to carry the momentum into the skill's final two slashes.

Six points glowed fiercely on the undead dragon's body
where her blade had found its mark
for an instant before bursting into flame, and
the creature
let out a final roar as it shattered into pixels, leaving her panting for breath.

"-ro? Kuro!"

Ever so slowly, she turned around to find five pairs of eyes staring at her in concern,
the treasure chest that had been left behind in the aftermath of the boss's defeat forgotten
. "Ah...oh…"

Her eyes fell on Silica; the young girl was smiling broadly even as she looked a little worse for wear. Kuro knew that it was only superficial damage, because the game denoted the equipment's stat
e of disrepair
with scuffs and tears, but the black-haired Spriggan found it hard to shake the guilt that welled up inside.

I screwed up. I got myself caught out again and put them all in danger because of that
. Kuro's expression fell.
Even if this isn't the death game, I should...I should've…

"
Kuro-san!" the shorter Cait Sith barreled into her, and Kuro only just barely managed to reach out and catch her before the impact knocked the wind from her lungs. "I'm so glad you're okay."

Looking down at the much younger girl in her arms, she closed her eyes, fighting the lump in her throat. "I'm sorry, Silica-chan. I'm sorry for worrying you."

Red eyes looked up at her worriedly. "Are you really okay now?"

Kuro nodded slowly. "Yeah," she said, "just...some bad memories. I'm sorry I dropped the ball there," the Spriggan added with a forced laugh.

"That's not what we're worried about," Asuna answered kindly. "It's not our place to ask, but…" the blue-haired girl closed her eyes for a moment with a bitter smile. "Anyway. I'm
sorry that we brought up something unpleasant for you
."

An awkward silence fell across the group, and Kuro couldn't help but wince at the thought that it was her fault; before, they'd been chatting happily and laughing as they played the game together, only for that jovial atmosphere to be replaced by concerned glances and worried silence as they quietly emptied the dungeon's chest and proceeded towards the exit.

I guess this is how it's always going to be,
the black-haired girl sighed to herself.
We're all walking on eggshells around each other.

"Hey, you're really good, though."
Leafa's voice cut through the tension with ease, and even though some of the brightness in her tone was clearly forced, not all of it was. Five pairs of eyes turned towards the blonde Sylph as she spoke up.

Green eyes locked onto Kuro. "I mean it," she continued. "I don't think I've ever seen anyone other than my brother
be
able to fight with two swords like that so naturally."

The Spriggan ducked her head at the unexpected praise. "Um...thanks. I'm nowhere near as good as
Kirito-sama, though."
Her eyes fell onto Asuna. "Or the others that helped clear the death game."

"You're a Survivor, too, then?"

Kuro nodded slowly. "Yeah...aren't you?"

Leafa shook her head. "No. My brother is, but not me."

That was surprising, considering the Sylph seemed to have a casual friendship with the Flash,
although Kuro figured that it wasn't impossible for her to have cultivated that in
NewALO
exclusively
. "
Sorry, I guess I'm just surprised since you seem to be surrounded by so many
of us
. Then again, I
suppose
there aren't that many of us to begin with.

After all we've been through, I think most normal people would want to forget it ever happened,

"
the Spriggan added with a bitter smile.

"I guess you're right," the blonde chuckled. "

My brother's just...different, I guess. He's always had this love for the virtual world.

I met most of them through
him
,
so it's not like I did anything exceptional, not like he did
."

"So, he plays

NewALO

, too?" Kuro asked curiously.

"Yeah. I'm just a little surprised you're mentioning him and Kizmel with such deference," Leafa answered.

"...I'm sorry?"

It took a moment for her to process it all, and when it finally clicked, t

he black-haired Spriggan turned to look from one to the next, wondering if the other girl was joking, but all of the others simply nodded as though she'd been stating just a fact. "K-Kirito-sama is your...brother?"

"Yeah," Leafa replied nonchalantly. "But

m

y brother is...well, he's his own person.

W

hatever you see in him, I haven't done anything to deserve it.

If anything, you're not the only one trying to get strong like him.

"

Green eyes drifted towards the hilts of the twin swords protruding over Kuro's shoulders. "You must like him an awful lot if you've decided to fight like Ka-, um, Kirito does."

"Even though it may look like it, I can't really fight like Kirito-sama does."

With a shake of her head, the Spriggan reached up to touch the pommels of her weapons, before looking back at Leafa. "At best, it's a pale imitation of the Black Swordsman."

"But

ALO

doesn't have any dual-wielding skills, right?"

The Spriggan nodded at Asuna's observation. "That's

part of it

.

U

sing one-handed sword skills with either hand is really the best I can do, but I'm not really ambidextrous enough for it.

I'm mostly using the second blade to parry, so really, this dual blades thing is just for show. It might look fancy, but I'm not all that strong. Not like some others."

The Undine shrugged. "Doesn't that apply to everyone, though? Even Kirito-kun had his Dual Blades unique skill in

SAO

. Here, where it doesn't exist, he's handicapped just like you, isn't he?"

"Even so," the black-haired girl said with a self-deprecating smile, "even without the

sword

skills, I bet that he or Kizmel-sama wouldn't have any trouble fighting any opponent.

So...

I want to be stronger. Just like

Kirito-sama

, I want to be strong enough so that I don't have to be afraid of anything anymore.

I want to be strong enough to not need to be protected.

If I had been, then maybe...maybe…"

She trailed off, but Asuna shook her head. "I don't think you've got the right idea of those two," the blue-haired fencer said, drawing the girl's attention. "It's not that Kirito-kun and Kizmel-chan aren't afraid of anything. They're not fearless at all. If anything, I think those two feared more than some others. It's what they did

in spite

of that fear that matters."

"

But...they cleared the death game all on their own, didn't they? They lived and thrived on their own, survived everything that the death game threw at them, and then they beat Akihiko Kayaba, right?"

"Maybe," the blue-haired Undine said, "but I think you're mistaken on one thing. I don't know how much you know about them, but the heroes you revere so much? They'd be the last ones to claim that they did anything

alone

."

"But-"

Silica nodded emphatically. "Kirito-san once said that it was everyone who lived through

SAO

that succeeded in freeing it. Those on the lower and middle floors who supported the clearers, those on the front lines who fought alongside them. Even those that didn't fight, they offered their thoughts, prayers and companionship."

"It was everyone's combined determination that saw us through," Asuna added. "If everyone on the lower floors had given up, perhaps Kayaba would've gotten bored of his game and pulled the plug. Or maybe we in the clearing group would have lost our own will to fight on – if there is one thing that I have learned during my time leading it, it is that very few people are able to fight on with no hope at all."

"That's right," Philia agreed, "and Kirito and Kizmel aren't alone. We won't let them be."

"And the same goes for you, too," Lisbeth said, moving to stand behind the shorter tamer as the group clustered around Kuro. "We all went through it together. No one gets left behind, that's the kind of person Kirito is. That's why everyone – Kizmel, Philia, Rain, and everyone else – fights by

his

side,

because he'd do the same for us

."

Leafa extended a hand. "I don't know who you've lost. I can't imagine what you're feeling. But I think that they would be happy for you to be here, now."

"I…" Kuro's words died in her throat, the sight of the five players in front of her suddenly replaced with that of five others as they stood at the entrance of a different dungeon, in a different world. "...thank you."

-------------------------------

"

Man, what's with this crowd? It's like we're at an idol concert, or something."

Asuna turned her attention towards the huge crowd that was spilling out of the Einherjar camp's main plaza at Lisbeth's complaint.

A

s the

ir group

walked through the camp's gate,

i

t was hard not to notice it either, as players were blocking roads and pathways as cheered and screamed for something. There was even a group of female players decked out in white-and-black colour schemes that were vying to push through to the center of the mob – and somehow, looking at the entire scene, Lisbeth's assessment appeared rather accurate, even if Asuna had never been to an idol concert, herself.

The blue-haired Undine frowned. "

Let's avoid them if we can

."

Having been at the center of such a group once or twice before in Aincrad, where the Flash had been the object of fame and popularity much to the fencer's chagrin, Asuna couldn't help but feel relief that they would at best only skirt along the edge of the congregation

since their destination was Lisbeth's smithy up in Alne

. And then there was the shouting...or rather, the

shrieking

. Asuna winced at the shrill sounds – even Yuna's fans hadn't been quite that aggressive with the volume of their adoration in the death game, and the songstress had been the closest thing to an idol there had been.

"Sumeragiiiiii!"

"Sumeragi-samaaaaaa!"

"I love youuuuu, Sumeragi-kuuuun!"

"

Oh. It's them," Philia

said in a deadpan voice. "Shamrock."

"Shamrock?" Asuna asked, looking over at the blonde Imp.

"Yeah, Shamrock. The guy they're yelling about is Sumeragi, their guild leader." Philia brought up her menu and made it visible, displaying a browser window with a popular video-sharing and streaming website loaded. An intro video was playing, ending with a stylized, golden three-leafed clover emblem. "They're a guild that's gotten insanely popular over the last couple of months because they stream a lot of their PvE and PvP stuff, and they're really good. They do a lot of speedruns and time-attack clears for dungeons

and bosses

."

"Oh, right, I heard about them before," Leafa added with a grimace. "They tried poaching some of the top Sylphs a while back. They, um, they tried asking me, too…"

"Nice," the other blonde grinned. "What'd you tell them?"

Ducking her head to hide her blush in a way that entirely resembled her brother, the green-clad Sylph muttered a quiet reply. "I turned them down. I told them I had no interest in joining a guild for now."

Considering what she knew about Leafa's prior experience with guilds, Asuna wasn't surprised,

and she couldn't help but feel that the other girl had made the right choice

. A glance at the way the crowd was behaving easily gave away the fact that not only were the members of that guild basking in the adoration they were being showered with, but they were actively riling up their fans, as well.

Yeah, I wouldn't want to join them, either. We had some in the KoB that were there for the attention, but most of them had more discipline than this.

"They even asked Lady Sakuya!" Leafa continued, indignation lacing her tone. "Imagine that, this Sumeragi

guy

had the gall to tell Lady Sakuya that she should just give up being the leader of the Sylphs and join him, instead! Like he didn't think what she was doing was anything importa

n

t,

and that she'd be better off in his guild

!"

Philia shrugged. "Well, I heard they're recruiting f

rom

everywhere. Factions really do matter less than they used to from what I understand, and they're just taking advantage of the fact that now people can move wherever they like

without having to stick to factions

. And to be fair, Lady Sakuya

is

pretty famous for being a good player and a good leader. It's no surprise that they think it'd be a boost to their prestige if they could boast about having recruited her. Not to mention – doesn't she ever get tired of actually running the faction and just want to...

play

the game?"

"Maybe, but still…" the blonde Sylph shook her head. "I still don't like them. When they talked to me, it was so condescending, like they were doing me a favour by inviting me. It's

like

they think the only thing that's important in the game is showing off how good you are,

and that the only thing that should matter to me is being part of that

."

It was Asuna's turn to cough and chuckle.

That sounds entirely too familiar.

Outwardly, the blue-haired fencer patted her friend's sister on the shoulder in commiseration. "I'm assuming that she had the same answer for them."

"Oh, she told them to stuff it," Leafa said with a wide grin. "I think Recon even got the whole thing on camera. It was beautiful, Lady Sakuya totally told them off."

"

Oh, oh! I think I saw that video! It was

funny

," Philia said with a smirk.

I...should see about finding that video, Asuna grinned. Sakuya's reputation as a formidable woman with a steely will and razor wit was not without merit, it seemed – it was enough for her to almost pity whomever ended up on the wrong side of said wit.

Almost.

"

Speaking of, w

here is the little guy, anyway? I haven't seen him around the last couple of weeks, and you two used to be inseparable," Lisbeth asked. The pink-haired smith put on a teasing smile. "Don't tell me there's trouble brewing in lover's paradise?"

"W-what?" the Sylph spluttered. "W-we're not...we're not having trouble!"

"Aha, so you're not denying being lovers, then?"

Leafa opened her mouth, but only a high-pitched squeal of protest emerged – Asuna took pity on the younger girl, and shook her head. "Don't tease her too much, you guys."

"Can you blame us?" Philia's voice pulled her back to the current argument. "Kirito stopped getting embarrassed after he and Kizmel finally got their act together."

Kirito-kun

is

kind of adorable when he's flustered

, the Undine agreed silently, though that wasn't a sentiment she would ever utter out loud to either her friend or his wife. "Only because that's Kizmel-chan's prerogative," she answered instead.

Still, the Undine's admonishment was half-hearted at best; she'd known the others for long enough to know that they were bantering in good fun – and Asuna was glad to not be around people where she had to keep up appearances.

It took me long enough to feel comfortable dropping that facade around Kirito-kun and Kizmel-chan,

she mused fondly,

but somehow, after that, it was easy to let others in. Even though I barely spent time with them, they have a way of making you feel like one of their own

.

Blue eyes wandered to the newest member of their group that had experienced just this phenomenon. Kuro was walking with Silica, a little bit behind the four girls up front, looking on with an expression of awe and confusion while occasionally answering to something Silica was saying.

It was a feeling Asuna herself was rather familiar with, every time she met up with the group that had somehow gathered around her former partner and his wife.

Dropping back to exchange places with Silica, the Undine fell into step with the girl who'd chosen to style herself after the Black Swordsman.

Reaching out to scratch Pina's chin, who'd found her perch on the Spriggan's shoulder and was vying for Kuro's attention, Asuna looked over with a wry smile.

"

Are you all right?

Sorry, I know it can be a bit much sometimes."

Kuro shook her head. "No, no...it's fine.

I was just remembering something.

I'm just...they all look really close."

"They are," Asuna tilted her head. "

But that doesn't mean they don't take some getting used to."

"I guess, but it's better than the opposite."

"That's true." Asuna didn't miss the brief flash of

pain that flashed across the black-haired girl's eyes for an instant before it disappeared.

K

uro shrugged, an action that seemed very much like the person she was attempting to portray. "It feels a bit strange that they accepted me so quickly. It's...a lot different from back then."

It didn't take a genius to figure out what she was talking about, and the Undine nodded in understanding.

Back then, everyone was out for their own survival. Every man for himself...that was the very first lesson Kirito-kun taught me.

Trust had been a dangerous commodity for them.

It was a lesson many of the Survivors had learned the hard way.

"

Well," she said after a moment, "I don't think it's something you have to worry much about here. Especially not with this group. They're not the kind of people to leave someone behind," Asuna told the other girl with a smile. "

I have a feeling that now that they've adopted you, it'll be very hard to get rid of them."

Kuro laughed, and for the first time, Asuna caught a sign of a smile devoid of all signs of bitterness and pain. "You think so?"

"Yeah," the Undine confirmed. "They wouldn't have stuck with Kirito-kun otherwise. Believe it or not, he can be a handful at times.

But we wouldn't have him any other way.

"

Kuro's answer was drowned out by a new wave of cheers as the crowd parted to make way for a group of twelve players. The cheering masses undulated as people tried to get as close as they could without getting in their way, pushing and shoving in their efforts.

That really

is

a huge crowd. Guess that guild must be really popular, huh?

Asuna shook her head as she realized they were coming straight towards them on their way to the gate. There wasn't enough room to entirely make way; when the two groups squeezed past one another, her eyes momentarily met those of a tall Undine with short blue hair and a katana slung through the leather belt at his waist. It lasted for only a second, before the crowd surged forward and engulfed the group entirely again, hiding them from view.

Asuna wondered if she'd imagined the hungry, challenging glare he'd sent her way.

-------------------------------

October 31st, 2025

Kirito had never really been as eager about Halloween as some of his peers. Sure, he'd participated in the occasional event in a game, but that was about it – he didn't have the temperament to join his classmates in costuming themselves and going to haunted houses or some of the other traditions they observed for the spooky season, but even this limited participation had ended when he'd begun isolating himself in the wake of learning that he'd been adopted.So, really, most of what he knew about Halloween was from games and their respective events. Costumes, ghosts, and haunted houses, he mused, that was the extent of what he was familiar with. Part of him was curious to see what YMIR's take on the seasonal event would be, as he didn't think they would do anything to overshadow the expansion they had launched just weeks ago.Jötunheim, much to his surprise, had been left untouched – as had most of the rest of Alfheim, he'd found out from his friends who'd spent more time in-game over the past week since the Halloween event had started. The sole exceptions to that were Alne and Yggdrasil City, the two places at the very center of the continent; one on the ground at the foot of the World Tree and the other, high up beyond the clouds, in the branches of the same, and he casually admired the decorations as their small group made their way through the streets after coming up from the tunnel that led to Jötunheim.In the spirit of the season, the city's lamps and lanterns had been replaced by floating carved pumpkins whose innards burned with an eerie coloured flame of green or blue, while the sky was cast in a perpetual twilight hour regardless of the time of day. Players wandered around alone or in groups, many in costume or some form of cosmetic armour, and his own party was no exception.When Kirito and Kizmel had logged in, his sister had already been waiting for them in costume and wasted no time in shoving packages into their hands with the instruction to put on whatever was inside.Shifting a little uncomfortably at the heavy, black armour that he'd found when he opened the package in his inventory, the swordsman tried moving in a way that stopped the huge pauldrons from obstructing his view. The armoured collar that came up to just beneath his chin didn't make it any easier, and segmented, overlapping steel plates meant that he couldn't look down easily, either. This looks like something Eugene would wear. Or maybe those anime characters with the huge, overly large swords that hunt goblins.The armour was purely cosmetic at least, which meant that his mobility wasn't impaired, but the swordsman couldn't help but wonder why she'd picked out this particular costume for him.Kizmel, on the other hand...Kirito found that at least the armour allowed him to hide the blush that had rushed up his neck at the sight of his wife once she'd donned her own costume. A white dress – calling it "armour" was far more charitable than he felt comfortable with – fell from her shoulders to just above her hips, but she didn't particularly seem to mind the way it exposed a large amount of her legs and shoulders, not to mention its plunging neckline. A golden, armoured belt wrapped around her waist and covered most of her torso, but the gleaming metal only served to further accentuate her figure.With her hair dyed white and standing in stark contrast to the former dark elf's tanned skin, she struck a captivating figure that turned more than a few heads.Her violet eyes were darting this way and that, taking in the sights of a city decorated for the spooky season, lingering on the multitude of costumes that the players around them put on show. Finally, she turned towards him, after a group in various monster costumes passed by – he spotted a classical waist-coat wearing vampire, a zombie, and a mummy, amongst others."So, this festival is a custom in your world? This Hallo-ween?"Kirito scratched his head. "Yeah.""And it is customary to wear costumes for such an occasion?"He nodded. "Well, it's not necessary, but a lot of people do it. It sounds strange, when you put it like that…"Kizmel chuckled. "I am no stranger to costume balls at court, Kirito – although I have to admit, these kinds of costumes are new to me." She looked down at her garb. "I see many dressed as monsters and creatures from fairy tales, but also warriors and...other sorts."Kirito coughed as she awkwardly finished her thought when one female player in a particularly short white halter-dress and blonde, curly hair passed by them with a wide smile, stopping only to strike a pose and blow a kiss before moving on. "Um...yeah.""Is there a significance to this? I understand that some would want to imitate heroes of old, or enact battles from myth, but some appear almost...mundane.""Huh." The swordsman paused for a moment, before shrugging. "I don't really think that there's rhyme or reason to it. If you want to dress up for Halloween, then you can pretty much choose whatever you want. A lot of people choose monsters because it's scary and spooky, but some people just pick their favourite character from books or movies."Kizmel hummed in thought. "This is done in your world as well?""Yeah," he confirmed, "although it's much easier here.""Cheaper, too," Agil chimed in; they'd run into the burly Gnome on their way up from the frozen lands underneath Alfheim and he'd accompanied them into the city to have a look around. "We used to hold costume contests at the cafe on Halloween nights before...well, you know," the tall, dark-skinned Gnome explained. "Most of the time we'd get the usual low-budget stuff, maybe some people that went to a costume store, or some amateurs that put it together at home with what they had. But once in a while, we'd get this almost professional-grade work, and when I asked one of them what it cost once, well, let's just say that I could've paid a month or two of rent for that amount."The dusky-skinned Imp nodded. "I can understand why you would prefer it here." Then, she looked over at him curiously. "Is there no such event this year? It has been almost a year since your return, has it not?""I guess it has," Agil agreed. "Man, time flies, we really are coming up on our anniversary, aren't we? But to answer your question, we're not having one this year because my wife stopped doing while I was away. It's a lot of work to put together, and we wanted to take it slowly for now, try and get everything running smoothly again before we dive into organizing something like that. Next year, though, I think I'll try and start it back up – you all are invited, of course. Costumes optional, but I promise it's a good time."Kirito found Kizmel's hand in his as she replied. "I would love to be there.""Yeah, me, too," the swordsman added. "By the way, I'm surprised you're not in costume, Agil."With a bark of laughter, the older man scratched his head. "Well, I didn't really have time to pick out pieces that would look like something I'd want. We might not be doing a costume contest, but we still decorate the bar and put on a seasonal menu. It's been busy.""I think Asuna and the others just went to Ashley for theirs," Kirito pointed out with a nod; he wasn't sure, of course, but he'd heard that the player who'd been one of Aincrad's premier clothiers had joined NewALO and brought her avatar over, skills and all. He knew that if Asuna or Lisbeth wanted clothing done right, they would go to her, and the craftsmanship of Kizmel's costume spoke for itself – although the fact that she could now process metal armour was new to him.
Then again, it's just a cosmetic overlay, so I wonder if she even needed new skills for that?

"That makes sense, I guess," the tall Gnome rumbled. "I heard she wasted no time in setting up shop and keeping right on where she'd left off. Argo did some marketing for her I hear, so costumes like this would be right up her alley.
I bet she's making a killing on this.
And you two nailed it, by the way."

"
I don't even know what we're supposed to be," Kirito muttered. "It all just looked like some fantasy characters from a manga or something, but my sister doesn't really read that kind of stories."
And I'm pretty sure Asuna doesn't, either. Which left...Lisbeth or Ashley herself, and if pressed, he was willing to bet that this was the work of the seamstress who had a knack for picking out things even her own customers didn't know they wanted until they saw the finished product.
"
Hah!" Agil chuckled. "Looks pretty obvious to me. You're a Black Knight and a dark elven warrior. Whoever did pick them out for you knows their stuff – and you two. Just don't go making any pacts with evil animal gods now, you hear?"
With an amused snort of laughter, the former merchant turned his head and nodded as Silica came up to them, Lisbeth and Asuna in tow. "Looks like everyone is here. You guys meeting up, right?"Kirito nodded; looking at the trio of girls, he barely managed to hide a laugh of his own behind an awkward fake cough. Whereas his sister had chosen to wear a men's kimono with red haori overcoat, and dyed her hair a matching crimson to portray a samurai he actually did remember from an old manga his mother loved and that had recently been re-made, Lisbeth and Asuna had opted for western-inspired costumes.The usually pink-haired smith was also cross-dressing and had exchanged her dress and forge apron for a fitted waist-coat ensemble, complete with white gloves and slicked-back hair as she presented the image of one of the many hyper-competent butlers that so often appeared in light novels.But Asuna...his former partner was the one that had surprised him the most when he'd first seen her after logging in – and this time, he was certain that Ashley had had a, somewhat mischievous, hand in choosing the outfit for her.A western dress that came down to her thighs was not so unusual, but the embroidered overcoat and frilly collar and sleeves lent it an air of fanciness that would have been fit for a noble lady at a fantasy court were new on his partner who usually preferred simple, if elegant designs. And the one thing that absolutely sealed the deal and had nearly forced him to stuff a fist into his mouth to keep from breaking out into a fit of laughter was the hair.
Asuna's usual blue hair, the mark of the Undine, had been dyed as well.

Dyed
blonde
.

And styled into a pair of curly, gravity-defying pigtails that fell on either side of her head
to resemble a pair of drills
.

Oh please, please don't let her do the laugh…

Kirito's erstwhile partner caught his eyes, burning into him with a look that he knew very well was equal measure embarrassment and amusemen
t, but he was saved from having to answer her wrath by Silica as she
excitedly
bounded up to the pair of former clearers.
"Kirito-san, Kizmel-san! Over here!" she called out, while Pina flew ahead and settled down on his shoulder."Hey you guys." He laughed at her energetic greeting. "What's up, Silica?"She looked up at him with round, pleading eyes. "There's a new dungeon here just for tonight that Argo-nee told me about earlier, it drops the Candy Wand as a reward for clearing it!""Candy Wand?" Kirito blinked.The young Cait Sith nodded vigorously. "Yeah! It makes a random candy when you use it, and each gives a small random buff when you eat them.""Huh. That sounds useful. What do you guys think, you want to go?" he asked the others."I'll peace out for now," Agil answered. "I was just popping in to take a look around, but I can't leave my wife alone with the customers we're getting tonight. You guys have fun though – save me some candy, will you, Silica-chan?""I will!" the youngest girl chirped happily.The Gnome laughed heartily. "Thanks. I'll see you guys later." He patted Pina's head and disappeared, logging out of the game."What about you?" Kirito looked at the rest of them. "Me and Kizmel can run her through it really quick, if you don't want to come along. I heard from Rain and Philia that most of these don't even have combat, so everyone can do them even if they're new, so it shouldn't be a problem."Asuna and his sister looked at each other, and shook their heads. "I don't mind," Leafa answered."Me, either," the temporarily blonde Undine agreed."Oh, I'm coming," Lisbeth noted with a grin. "I heard about this quest, this is gonna be a blast."Kirito didn't really trust the mischievous glint in the Leprechaun's eyes, but there was little he could do about it now. Besides, I'm pretty sure there's not going to be anything too bad in there. Maybe a haunted house, and some puzzles or minigames. I'm sure it'll be all right."Okay then, can you lead the way, Silica?" he said.Nodding, the girl smiled brightly and took his and Kizmel's hands in hers and pulled them along. She led them towards a large, towering mansion that was one of many such buildings that had appeared in Alne for just the last few days, along with temporary ethereal doors that led to event dungeons and instances that would disappear after tonight. This particular one stood taller than many of the other buildings around it, shrouded in an ominous fog and seemingly wavering in and out of existence.There was a large group of players around it by the time they got there, entering and leaving the instance as they appeared from the fog that blanketed the front yard.As they approached the gate, a large, wrought-iron affair with the letters above it declaring it the Mystery Manor in flowing script. It swung open with a drawn-out, eerie creak to admit their group of six. Looking up at the three-story building and the way dark shapes were playing around in the light flickering in its windows, the black-armoured Sylph tilted his head.
Huh, looks like a haunted house, I think. I guess there might be some puzzles, but I wonder if they'll have jumpscares…

A chill wind rustled the grass underneath their feet as they took their first step onto the manor's grounds and the gate swung shut behind them with a decisive, rusty
clank
, seamlessly transporting the party into the instance. Behind, the lights of Alne and the noisy crowd of players faded away, leaving the manor and its grounds surrounded by nothing but blackness.

A quest prompt appeared on his HUD, and he reached out to accept. [

Begin Quest:

Ghostbusting

Y/N?

].

He'd never really scared easily, and as a veteran of many fantasy games, including
SAO
, Kirito had faced the undead, corporeal or otherwise, and many other kinds of scary or spooky creatures before, so he was more curious and excited than worried. A small grin crept onto his face as he took Kizmel's hand in his, before turning around to make sure the others had come with them – only to catch sight of a shimmering, translucent shape rising from the ground behind them,
and suddenly
with a sinking feeling,
Kirito remembered something
.

Uh-oh. Asuna, don't turn around-

"AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!"

Ah. Too late.

-------------------------------

The doors of the Mystery Manor swung open, causing the six of them to hurriedly spill onto the front yard of the haunted mansion as the grand entry hall behind them

exploded

with an ethereal, otherworldly light. It grew steadily until it enveloped the entire building, turning it into a translucent caricature of its original form.

A disembodied scream could be heard as t

he ghostly house wavered and shimmered, before

it finally sunk

into the ground with a rumble, leaving behind only an ornate treasure chest where the front door had been.

Silica rushed towards it with a happy grin whilst her pet dragon trilled happily, and Leafa couldn't help but smile at the little girl. She'd been surprised when she had first met her, wondering how a young girl like her had managed to survive through the death game without her parents or her family, only to quickly learn that after they'd met her, Silica had quickly adopted her brother and Kizmel as her big brother and sister.

Even now, the pair were looking on with fond smiles as she opened the chest to reveal the spoils of their efforts.

Not that it was a lot of work, we didn't even fight anything. Some of those puzzles were a little tricky, though...but Kizmel seems to be really good with them.

And then there was Asuna...who was currently wheezing and on the

edge

of hyperventilating.

Leafa would have been worried, had Lisbeth not been standing there with an amused grin on her face even while she practically held the other girl's hand as she tried to hide behind Kirito and Kizmel throughout parts of the haunted house they'd just completed.

For all her courage and skill and charisma...she was the

last

person the speedy Sylph would have expected to be afraid of

ghosts

, of all things.

Her brother and Kizmel seemed to have known,

going by

their amused, if somewhat worried, expressions; they had offered to take her out of the instance and back to Alne, but Asuna had stubbornly insisted on seeing it through for Silica's sake.

I guess she wanted to keep up appearances in front of Silica-chan

, Leafa mused.

"I got it! Kirito-san, I got it!"

"You sure did, Silica," the black-armoured swordsman answered with a smile. "Was it the item you were looking for?"

"Yeah! Here, try some!" The Cait Sith waved a wand that looked like an orange and black lollipop through the air, creating a handful of colourfully wrapped candies that she handed out. "It's got ten charges a day, so I can make lots of candy!"

Leafa unwrapped her own absently while watching the younger girl feed one of the candies to Pina, before putting it in her own mouth.

Not bad...it's toffee?

A smooth, sweet flavour spread in her mouth, similar to some of the rich desserts she'd tried in Swilvane, and a buff icon appeared on her HUD.

Looks like a five percent gathering

chance

increase. Not too useful, but not bad, either.

"

You okay, Asuna?" Kirito finally asked, coming over to where she was still sitting on the ground.

The Undine waved him off. "I'm...I'm okay, Kirito-kun. I can't believe we made it out of that."

"Oh, come on, it wasn't that scary," he countered. "Remember that time with the ghost pirates-"

"Kirito-kun!"

"Cheer up," he told her, before handing over a small, wrapped package. "Here, it's the quest reward. Good luck on the roll." Turning towards Leafa, Kirito held out a second one. "Here you go."

"Thanks," she answered. Tapping the package with her index finger brought up a menu with a spinning wheel for the available prizes. Crossing the fingers of her other hand, she pushed the button and watched it spin, cycling through the half-dozen items until it began to slow, eventually settling on…

"Oh, nice," her brother said, looking over her shoulder. "That's the

Jack-O-Lantern pet."

Activating it created a small, fist-sized carved pumpkin that floated around her. Leafa held out a hand and it settled on her arm like a trained bird, and upon closer inspection, she found that the flame inside cast quite a bit of light.

"That's gonna be useful in dungeons," Kirito pointed out.

Yeah, I can see that. Usually we have to rely on torches or lanterns. We can hang them from the waist, but this is nice, too.

Looking up at him, she grinned. "What did you get?"

"

A cosmetic cloak," he grumbled.

"Oh? Let me see!"

For a moment, her brother looked like he wanted to protest, but then gave in to her request. With a shimmer, his frost boar cloak turned into

a tattered piece of black fabric embroidered with skeletal bones in dirty white thread, and Leafa tilted her head.

Maybe he's right to be grumpy. That doesn't look all that good. It's not

bad

, but…

H

e activated its cosmetic function, disappearing in a puff of smoke. When his form became visible again, it had turned into that of a skeleton clad in black armour and a black coat, although the most notable feature was the burning skull and the crimson pinpricks of light that flared in the skeletal eye sockets.

That's...something, all right,

the Sylph pondered before shrugging. "It's...all right?"

Kirito disabled the cosmetic armour. "Eh. It's not terrible, I guess, but I don't think I'd ever actually use it."

"Hey, you'd be a hit in a haunted house!"

Her brother chuckled. "

Is your class

doing one for the culture festival?"

Leafa shook her head. "No. This year I'm with the kendo club, we're putting on a few exhibition matches, instead. The rest of my class is doing a themed cafe, though."

"Cool. I'll have to come and see."

That

gave her pause. He'd never come to one of her culture festivals – or

any

of her school events – before. Of course, as they were only a year apart, he'd been usually busy with his own, and they'd never attended the same school together, so there had never been an opportunity.

And then when I started senior high school, Kazu-nii was trapped in

SAO

,

she thought somberly.

"Really?" somehow, her voice had turned into a quiet whisper.

He looked at her, before apparently coming to the same realization. A kind smile, the one she'd been longing to see, slowly crept onto his lips. It was her brother's smile, one of warmth, rather than the cold or arrogant smirk of the swordsman, without the bitterness and sorrow of the Survivor.

"Yeah." Kirito reached out to ruffle her hair.

"Promise?"

"I wouldn't miss it for the world. Kizmel, too." He nodded over towards where the Imp was donning her own prize – a black, medium-sized witch's hat that appeared on her head with a coquettish tilt. It looked incredibly out of place with her white dress and hair, but still...Leafa couldn't help but admire the fact that she somehow pulled it off.

Their small group made its way out of the instance, and Leafa turned to look over her shoulder as they left; the mansion was gone, of course, leaving behind little more than the front yard's decorations and pathways. Then, she stepped through the gate and returned to Alne as the game merged them back onto the main server. The lights of the city and the players around them reappeared as they emerged from the ethereal fog that surrounded the manor, and she let out a sigh when the weight of the bulky metal pack they'd worn as part of the quest faded away.

"Aw...we don't get to keep them," Lisbeth said.

"Guess not." Kirito shrugged his shoulders, now free of the device that they'd needed to use to clear the mansion of its spectral inhabitants. Though in his case, Leafa supposed it was for the best – it had looked comically small on the back of his bulky armour.

"Too bad," the Sylph said with a grin. "I liked it. Those things were fun...blasting ghosts, it felt almost like those old arcade games Mom used to take us to play. You know, the one she really likes, the only one she can convince Dad to play with her?"

-------------------------------

November

3rd

, 2025

Kazuto

looked around himself, feeling more than a little self-conscious as he wandered onto the grounds of his sister's high school. The Survivor's school had no culture festival on account of insufficient staff, not to mention its limited student numbers. But Culture Day was still a national holiday, so he was free to actually attend the culture festival at Sugha's school like he'd promised.

Kizmel, of course, was also present, watching through the lens of the Augma's spectacles as he panned his eyes across the myriad of stalls that had been set up in the front yard. Banners hung everywhere and in between there were outdoor events in progress as students and guests alike moved around.

I thought getting here

before

lunch time would mean there were less people, but I forgot it's a really big school.

"

It's a day where the students show off what they can do," he explained to her quietly, the little screen on the inside of the glasses showing her observing the scene before them intently. "Each class or club can decide on what to do, and they spend months planning and arranging things for today."

The former dark elf nodded. "A display of their achievements and abilities."

"Yeah, something like that," he agreed. "It's open for everyone to come and see. So if there's people that want to see what the school is about and what kind of clubs there are, they can come and look, or if the parents of the students want to come and see what their children have come up with."

"I see." Kizmel swung her head this way and that. "There appears to be a wide variety of activities."

It had been years since he'd attended one, long before

SAO

, so Kazuto was more than a little surprised by the sheer scale of it.

Then again, the last one I participated in was early in junior high, I think.

Everywhere he looked there were food stalls or open-air events – a gallery had been set up in the shade for people to admire what he figured was the work of an arts club of some kind, judging by the sculptures, while a few places had also been set aside for musical performances of some kind as the students tuned their instruments –

everything from a traditional

shamisen

to a modern electric guitar

.

And that wasn't even considering everything that was going on inside the main building in the classrooms.

Man, there's so much going on...

Since he'd come relatively early in the morning and they had deliberately avoided being outside during the lunch rush, he'd expected to still have enough time to look around pretty much everywhere, but even after spending a couple of hours there it felt like the three of them had only barely made a dent.

Still, he wasn't in a rush to see absolutely everything; in fact, he was more than content to spend the time with his sister and watching her happily pull him around as Suguha showed him the different events that had been planned and set up.

"Hey, Sugu...you sure

you're okay to spend all this time with me

? Don't you have your own

club

project to work or get ready for?"

he couldn't help but ask after they'd returned outside to grab a late lunch.

"Nope," she replied, shaking her head and biting down on a

yakitori

skewer while he was picking up his own. "The kendo club has two exhibition matches in the gym today, but I'm only in the last one, so I've still got some time."

"Ah."

She looked up at him, having quickly scarfed down the grilled meat from one of the student-manned stands. "So, what do you think? It was a lot of work to plan everything, but it turned out great, I think."

"Yeah," he agreed, before pausing for a moment as Kizmel whispered something into his ear. "Kizmel said she really liked the theater club's performance. She says she'll read up on Noh theater next. What was that play called again?"

"Um…

" his sister pulled out her programme leaflet and rifled through the pages. "Ah. It was called

Atsumori

."

"Thanks." From the corner of his eye, he could already see the former knight looking over to quietly ask Cardinal to find a copy for her.

Suguha glanced up from the leaflet. "What about you, Kazu-nii? What'd you like best so far?"

"Hmm…" he thought for a moment; it was difficult to choose considering how much they had seen so far.

Let's see, the photography club had some neat pictures. The haunted house wasn't bad, either.

And then there had been his sister's class.

Along with one of its sister classes, the two groups of students had decided to pool their resources and open a pair of themed cafes in classrooms directly opposite one another in one of the school's hallways. Upon visiting them, he'd quickly realized why Suguha had opted to participate in the kendo club's exhibition match, instead.

A butler and a cat-maid cafe. Yeah, seeing Sugu in one of those outfits would've been...weird.

When he took too long to answer, his sister reminded him with a playful elbow to his ribs. "Hey, Kazu-nii!"

"Eh...I don't think I have a favourite yet," he told her honestly. "Pretty sure I know what it's gonna be, but I haven't seen it yet."

"Huh?"

"Your match," he stated calmly. "I'm looking forward to seeing it."

"...oh." She looked down for a moment, and he caught the faintest sign of a blush on her face.

Reaching out to ruffle her hair, he chuckled. "When was it set for again? Three, right?"

"Yeah, three. It's one of the last events of the day."

He nodded decisively. "Well, we'll definitely be watching it."

"Really?"

"Why wouldn't

we

? You're the ace of the team, right?" Kazuto grinned. "Besides, I wanna root for you. And I bet I'm not gonna be the only one.

Shinichi-kun is going to be there, too, right?

"

"

I think so," she answered.

"Actually, that reminds me. Isn't he around today?"

"He's working the kitchen for the cafe," his sister explained, "so he's been busy."

Kazuto frowned; he'd met her friend in the real world a few times before, and while it had taken them a bit of time to warm up to one another, he could see that Nagata

Shinichi

wasn't a bad guy – more importantly, he was honest and loyal when it came to Suguha. It also helped that they had gotten along reasonably well in

ALO

before meeting, and so he was more than a little surprised that his sister had spent all day with him without a sign of her school friend.

"Perhaps now would be a good time to suggest for us to go see him," Kizmel offered.

You know, that's not a bad idea.

Turning towards his sister, Kazuto linked his arm with hers. "Come on, Sugu.

Let's go pick up your boyfriend."

"W-what?" she spluttered, but he didn't really give her time for much more.

"Lunch is over and all the food prep should be winding down, right? Besides, they should be working in shifts so they can go and have fun at the festival, so I'm betting he's working through it because he's letting other people go enjoy themselves. So, let's go and pick him up."

"But-"

Kazuto shook his head firmly.

"Look, Sugu, I'm really glad I got to spend the morning with you, but he's your friend, too. I'd feel bad if you didn't get a chance to go and enjoy the day with him."

When she opened her mouth to protest, he continued. "You two should get to have fun here

together

. It wouldn't be fair if he just worked through the entire day, right?

Don't worry about us,

I'll just take Kizmel around a bit more, until it's time for your match."

"We could all go around together," Suguha retorted.

He chuckled, and leaned in close. "

Look, just listen to me on this one, okay?

" he told her, "and besides, he doesn't know everything about Kizmel, right? It'd be a bit weird

if we went around with you two

, and besides, we don't really want to get in your way."

"

Get i

n the way…?" It took her a moment to realize what he'd meant, and suddenly, Suguha's blush returned full-force. "Kazu-nii!" she all but shrieked.

Kazuto laughed and patted her on the shoulder. "Come on, Sugu. Let's go find your boyfriend so I can leave you in his hands."

It didn't take them long to reach the cafeteria that had been set up as the staging and rest area for the students, and they didn't have to wait long to find his sister's bespectacled, black-haired friend emerging from the kitchen wearing an apron and carrying a covered steam pan. They waited until he'd placed it on a cart to be moved, before calling out to him.

"Nagata-kun!" Suguha called out, catching his attention, and Kirito could see the other boy's face light up as he caught sight of her.

It was almost too easy to imagine his in-game avatar's drooping ears perk up as he hurriedly walked over towards them.

"Sugu-san! And Kazuto-san, too."

"Yo," Kazuto waved at him. "Working hard, I see."

Nagata nodded. "Yeah...there's surprisingly a lot of guests at the cafe. I'm just glad we haven't run out of stock. Did Sugu-san take you around the festival?"

"Yeah," Kazuto answered. "But I was thinking, she's got her match at three, and right now it's past the lunch rush, so I don't think anyone's going to miss you. You should take her around and spend some time with her, you know."

"W-what?" Nagata blinked rapidly.

Suguha's head snapped over at her brother's straightforwardness. "Kazu-nii-"

"What?" He shrugged. "I just figured you two might want to spend some time together. Trust me, take every chance you get."

H

is sister looked as though she was about to say something, but closed her mouth and shook her head in exasperation. "Are you sure, Kazu-nii?"

"Yeah, I'm sure. It's only two hours, so you should hurry."

She turned back to her school friend. "That's how it is, Nagata-kun," she told him. "Well, I don't think my brother is going to get lost, so..."

For a moment, there was no answer,

and he could see the younger boy tensing up as if preparing himself for something

.

Finally, his sister's friend

, who'd recently grown just a little bit taller than her, drew himself up and took off his apron.

There was a look of determination in his eyes that Kazuto knew very well as he gathered up his courage.

"Um...Sugu-san," he began tremulously, "w-would you like...to go see the stalls with me?"

A smile bloomed on her lips. "I'd love to, Nagata-kun."

-------------------------------

November 6th, 2025

With a deafening crash, the last of Utgard Citadel's Praetorians fell and burst into icy shards as General Eugene's demon sword cut through it, causing a cheer to go up among the assembled players and leaving the path to the throne room clear. They took a moment to regroup and resurrect any of their fallen comrades, and Asuna was no exception.

The Undine, her face flushed with an unusual excitement, muttered the incantation to bring a fallen player back from his Remain Light; the Sylph gave her a cheery wave and quick thanks, before hurrying off to rejoin his party. Between Lady Sakuya's Sylphs and Eugene's Salamanders, they had brought six parties' worth of players.

Plus the mercenaries like us,

Asuna mused,

that makes ten parties in total. Sixty-eight players

.

It was larger than any boss fight in

SAO

had ever been,

and s

he didn't envy the two faction leaders for having to keep an eye on the entirety of the action.

Once they were ready, the gates to the inner sanctum swung open ponderously, admitting them into the chamber where the true boss fight would take place. Atop a throne of crystalline ice sat a figure that stood almost

ten meters tall, wreathed in flickering, living flame that stood in contrast to all of the frost that permeated this realm. A life bar appeared, along with a name: [

Surt, the King of Flames

].

He rose slowly from his throne, moving to stare down his would-be challengers, and a great rumbling voice emerged from his throat. "Foolish mortals, knaves of the gods! None shall stand in my way!"

Fire erupted around one of his hands as he clenched his fists, while the other was wreathed in ice –

and then the battle was joined.

Asuna marveled at the way Sakuya and Eugene seemed to have a grasp on the chaotic, swirling battlefield as players took to the air; inside the Citadel, they were finally sheltered from the constant storms and howling winds that pelted the surface of Jötunheim, restoring their ability to fly, and they made full use of their newly restored mobility. Entire parties dove towards the Flame King, supported by barrages of spellfire from the mages as they took position to surround the raid boss, pelting him with wave after wave of attacks.

But this was the toughest battle in the game so far, and even the most powerful attacks barely scratched the boss's HP bar as he conjured up walls of flame and sheets of ice to protect himself, while striking out with the conjoined elements, summoning torrents of ice and burning flame that threatened to engulf the entire chamber, large as it was.

Asuna swerved to the side as one particular blast shot past her close enough that she could feel the heat, but then two familiar players surged past her

through

the line of fire. Kizmel led, shield raised as she pushed her way through the flames licking at them, while Kirito followed close behind the former knight until the attack abated, before darting out and launching himself into a Vertical Square, his glowing blade blazing a quartet of azure trails in the air as he struck at the Flame King.

Caught between the interval of offense and defense, Surt was unable to bring up his barriers in time – and even though it was a relatively low-level skill, wielded by one of the most skilled players in the death game and with the absurd stats of the Black Swordsman, it finally took a noticeable chunk from the boss's life bar.

Her friends' party roared with a cheer, rushing in behind the pair to follow up with their own attacks, and Asuna's lips stretched into a wide grin as she, too, followed suit. The rapier in her hand struck and swayed as though it had a life of its own, gliding from attack to attack with a dancer's grace as she took every opportunity she could spot to leave her own mark on their foe.

Eugene led his lancers into wild, daring charges as they rushed forward in tight formation, using the sheer weight of their armour and the speed of their wings add to the impact of their lances; Lady Sakuya directed her Sylphs from the middle of the field, guiding the arrows and spells of their backline and making sure her own speedy Sylphs were where they needed to be in the fray.

And at the center of it all were the three of them, a whirlwind of black and purple and white, of clashing steel and frenetic movement as Kirito's instinct, Kizmel's experience, and Asuna's strategy melded together into a seamless whole as they took the fight to the Flame King directly, standing their ground in the face of his overwhelming size and monstrous strength.

Asuna lashed out with a Star Splash, its eight thrusts unerringly finding their mark even while to her right, Kirito heaved the large sword he wielded around to smash

through

a flaming bolt that Surt was trying to launch at them. To her left, Kizmel had put up her shield protectively, absorbing a staccato of icy hail that found its way towards the trio as they traded off.

Taking the brief moment that she was locked in her post-skill delay to take stock of their situation, Asuna found Fuurinkazan's red-armoured figures on the far side of the battlefield, advancing in good order as they traded off with one another. To the side, another party looked like they were having the time of their life; a closely knit group of six led by a short-statured Imp were weaving and bobbing around in the vicinity, all the while bombarding the Flame King with spells and attacks of their own as they covered another pass by Eugene's lancers.

Fireballs flew overhead, joined by other elemental attack spells as the casters opened fire once more, hammering

at Surt until his barriers came back up,

though this time something felt different about it, and Asuna's instincts were screaming at her that things were going to change.

With a defiant roar, the boss withdrew to his throne and raised both hands; fire and ice swirled together into a maelstrom that arced randomly into the chamber to create portals from which stepped semi-corporeal figures of ice and flame, dozens in number.

A

near solid wave of fire blasted through the room, forcing the players to its very fringes, before turning their attention to the new wave of reinforcements

even while their supporting spellfire spent itself impotently against the boss's hardened barrier

.

We've got to deal with these adds first, then.

Quickly pivoting to the more pressing matter at hand, the fencer quickly regrouped with the others.

There's too many of them to just ignore.

Asuna's eyes flickered through the room as she searched for a suitable opponent; nearby, she found that Kuro, Lisbeth, and Leafa had already

targeted

one of the ice golems. Kirito's sister wielded a sword of blazing flame as she struck at their target, making full use of her weapon's elemental property while Kuro's twin swords turned aside an attack that would've sent the blonde flying across the room. Lisbeth used the opportunity to circle around and smashed the golem's knee with her mace, toppling it to the ground so it could be set upon by all three with ease.

Elsewhere, a short girl clad in all black plate armour was hefting a shield as tall as she was, standing firm while three separate golems attacked her without so much as yielding a step back

while a blonde Sylph wielding a pair of daggers darted around

; Klein and his group saw the opportunity and pounced, sweeping in from behind with devastating force

to relieve the two girls

.

Assured

that their flank was clear, the fencer's keen eyes caught sight of movement, and her body was in motion before the thought had even fully formed. Dashing forward with all the speed she could muster, Asuna allowed a spear of light to form around the rapier in her hand. "Kirito-kun! Break left!"

Her erstwhile partner reacted without needing to look, trusting Asuna's judgment without question. Extending his wings to full brake, he halted his forward momentum and

turned

it

to the side

, allowing a jet of flame to pass by the space he'd just vacated.

The Undine finally reached striking distance and released the hold she had on the sword skill; with a whistling sound of her blade cutting through the air, she leapt forward and the Shooting Star struck true at the center of the flame elemental's body. The skill discharged with a whine, disrupting the roiling fire that made up its incorporeal shape, but the distraction was enough for the black-haired swordsman to step in with a devastating blow of his own.

A powerful downward cleave bisected the elemental from top to bottom, striking with enough force to nearly blow its two halves apart,

before Kizmel finished it with a cut so fast it was almost invisible to the naked eye, leaving only a silver trail hanging in the air before the fire elemental burst into flames and disappeared.

Looking up, Asuna shared an

exhilarated

smile with her two companions.

Feels just like old times. In the best of ways.

The look in the couple's eyes told her they felt exactly the same.

A thunderous

crack

suddenly shook the room as the last of the Flame King's summoned creatures disappeared and his barriers protecting him from the players' attacks shattered. Surt

reached towards the throne and it shimmered and shifted, warping as it shrank and deformed until what had once been a piece of furniture took on the shape of a cross-hilted sword.

He grasped it in one hand and swung the massive, four-meter blade through the air; the sheer force of the displaced air from the motion sent players tumbling to the icy ground as their wings were disrupted, and the sword pulsed with an unearthly, divine rainbow hue.

"Taste the blade capable of slaying the gods themselves! Let your lives feed the

endless

hunger of the Demon Sword

Levantine

!"

Taking a slow step forward, the Flame King disappeared from view, only to reappear in front of Eugene's group of Salamanders as though he had teleported. With a swipe of the huge sword in his hands, the heavily-armoured, elite lancers were sent flying almost all the way to the edge of the chamber, before Surt disappeared from view once again.

There! I can...just about see him,

she realized, straining her eyes to try and follow the impossibly-fast rush of the boss.

He's only moving in straight lines.

"Guard!" Klein hollered from the other side of the throne room. Even though he didn't possess Kirito's preternatural reflexes, he seemed to have instinctively realized that they were the next target, and it was a credit to Fuurinkazan's discipline that they closed ranks just before the Flame King struck out at them.

Still, they were sent tumbling and skidding across the floor, but most managed to get back to their feet before Surt had disappeared again.

Over and over the Flame King struck at hapless groups in a seemingly random pattern; though she could barely make out the blurry after-image of his movement, Asuna clenched her fists impotently at her inability to actually

strike

at him while the boss rampaged through their ranks.

All they could do was keep moving, in the hopes that whenever Surt began a charge, they would not be there when he finished it.

This can't keep going like this. We need to do something,

Asuna thought grimly; the attacks weren't entirely fatal, and with so many players spread across the room, recovering and resurrecting the Remain Lights wasn't too difficult, but she could see the morale beginning to flag,

and eventually their resources would run out

.

But what? Even if we know he's going in straight lines, we can't attack him, and we can't stop him.

A few groups had tried, but if even Fuurinkazan had been bowled over despite bracing themselves, then there was too much force there for them to absorb and force the Flame King to a standstill.

A flicker of movement, just the slightest shift of colour – and Asuna suddenly realized that she'd slowed down just enough to become the next target. Pushing her wings, she knew that she wasn't going to make it, and braced herself for the attack that was sure to send her flying.

Clang

.

With impossible reflexes Kirito stepped in front of her, hurling the large sword he carried through the air to intersect the path of his opponent's blade.

It was a one in a million shot – and yet, he'd managed to hit, but a part of Asuna's mind knew that even so, it was far from enough.

An attack that had swept away even a full group of clearers.

A swing that had sent seven grown men in full plate armour flying.

What hope did the swing from a single man have to stop it?

Even with his monstrous strength, even with all of his skill, there was no matching up to the brutish force of the game's toughest boss with strength and skill alone.

And then, a second miracle occurred. Impossibly, at the last second, a violent crimson light burst forth around the swordsman's blade as he spun into a second swing in quick succession, lashing out five times in the blink of an eye. With a concussive blast and accompanied by a flare of light, the five-hit Shadow Explosion spent itself against the Flame King's sword, halting it completely and bringing him to a stop.

-------------------------------

November 7th, 2025

Hiyori nervously looked up at the sign that hung above the entrance of the cafe, wondering once again if she really had any business being here. The invitation had come through Lisbeth in

NewALO

a few days ago, and at the time, she had unthinkingly accepted it – only to realize belatedly that this would be the first time she met up with other Survivors in the real world, and the doubts started.

Did she belong here? Did she have any right to be here?

At the same time, she also realized that there would be a good chance that

they

would be here; after all, Lisbeth had said that everyone was coming, which included Leafa and her brother. And where Kirito was, Kizmel was sure to be, as well.

In the end, the urge to actually meet the people behind Aincrad's most notorious duo had won out, but now that she stood on the proverbial threshold, Hiyori hesitated.

They'll be here...right?

Taking a deep breath and pushing her doubts aside, she slowly reached out and opened the door, before stepping inside.

Immediately, the sound of conversation and laughter assaulted her, alongside the warm air that was a pleasant change from the chill of November. Looking around, she found dozens of unfamiliar faces, although every now and then there was one she recognized as one of the death game's more famous players.

That's Lind from the Divine Dragon Alliance, and there's Thinker, who runs MMO Today.

There were others, of course, but she'd never had the opportunity to meet or even speak with them, knowing them only from what she'd been told or read in Thinker's in-game newsletter.

As her eyes roamed across the gathering of dozens of people, Hiyori's gaze ultimately fell onto one group in particular, even though they were tucked away in the far corner of the cafe, almost as if to isolate themselves from the rest of the party. Sitting at the same table as possibly the most well-known female player of

SAO

was a figure that Hiyori would never forget. His avatar was slightly different in

NewALO

, but since

SAO

had used their real-life appearances, he was still recognizable to her.

That's him. That's-

She shook her head. Walking up to the table and simply introducing herself wasn't something she felt comfortable doing, especially since Lisbeth was nowhere to be found, but at the same time she didn't know what to do with herself, either.

And even though they know me in-game, I completely changed my avatar, so they wouldn't recognize me…

Someone bumped into her from behind, reminding Hiyori that she was still pretty much standing in the doorway and obstructing others from entering. Flustered, she turned around to apologize and found a brunette girl with shoulder-length hair standing there.

"I'm so sorry!"

"It's fine, it's fine," the other girl, who stood a little shorter than Hiyori herself, answered with a smile, before extending a hand. "I don't think I've seen you around before. I'm Suguha."

"...Hiyori," she answered awkwardly, unable to recall the other girl's face from her time in the death game. "Um...I'm Hiyori Kashiwazaka. It's my first time here, I was invited by, uh, Lisbeth."

"Oh, you know Rika?" The brunette brightened up. "Come on, then, she's probably with Asuna and my brother!"

Hiyori quickly found her arm in the other girl's surprisingly strong grasp as she was pulled along, before something clicked

after hearing the other girl's voice

. "Your...brother?" she asked, blinking. "You're...Leafa?"

"Yup, that's me!" the player behind the statuesque blonde Sylph replied brightly as they rapidly approached the table in the corner that was occupied by the Black Swordsman and his friends, much to Hiyori's horror.

"W-wait!"

"Hey, Kazu-nii!" Suguha called out cheerfully, ignoring her protest as she found herself practically pushed into a chair. "Huh, where'd Rika go?"

Onyx eyes looked back in amusement at his sister's antics. "She went back to the bathroom. Looking for her?"

"She is," Suguha pointed out, tilting her head towards Hiyori. "Rika invited her."

At the incomplete introduction, three pairs of eyes turned towards her, and Hiyori belatedly realized that one of the people at the table was a blonde woman whose features were notorious in Aincrad as the one person not to cross.

That's the Rat...oh no…

"Um...h-hi," she muttered quietly, eyes turned down to avoid the Black Swordsman's gaze. "My name is Hiyori Kashiwazaka...I play Kuro in

NewALO

. I'm sorry for barging in like this, but Lisbeth invited me, and-"

His eyes lit up in recognition. "Oh, that's right, I remember seeing you in the big raid. Asuna and Sugu told me about you a bit. I'm Sugu's brother. Feel free to call me Kazuto."

"They did?"

He shrugged. "Yeah. Sorry, I guess from what they told me, I guess I was kind of expecting…" Kazuto let out a chuckle. "Nah, nevermind. It was a stupid thought, but since you were a Survivor, I kind of thought-"

"Ya were expecting a Black Swordsman lookalike ta walk through the door, weren'tcha, Kii-bou?" Argo cackled merrily.

"Something like that." The boy who'd introduced himself as Kazuto shook his head with a wry smile. "Anyway, looks like everyone else has met you and I'm the last one, but it's nice to meet you, Kashiwazaka-san."

"Just Hiyori is fine…" she muttered, desperately trying to hide behind her curtain of long black hair. "I'm sorry, it's just…"

He smiled gently. "I'm the one who's sorry if I bring up any kind of bad memories for you. Kizmel told me a bit about when she met you a while back."

"It's not that!" she denied immediately. "No, I just...um, how much did she tell you?"

He paused for a moment, head tilted to the side. "Just that you deliberately styled your avatar and fighting style after me

because you think we saved you."

"I don't just think that you did," she whispered quietly, "I know it. For certain."

Kazuto's eyes clouded over. "How can you?" He shook his head. "There's so many times we were too late-"

"Because I was

there

," Hiyori answered honestly. "I was…" a shiver ran down her spine as the memories returned, but this time the utter, sickening dread that had always accompanied them was little more than an uncomfortable tingle in this warm environment, surrounded by people she'd fought with and befriended. "I was...I

was

captured by Laughing Coffin. They forced me to help them."

Perhaps it was the atmosphere, of the keen eyes of the four people at the table that were devoid of judgment, but the words simply kept spilling from her lips unbidden. "They...they treated me like an

animal

, like a toy, branded me like I was some kind of

thing

they possessed and could throw away at any time. I was made to join their guild and-"

"You were one of their green players," Argo summarized, her eyes narrowed. "The ones they were using ta spy and get supplies."

"...yes." Hiyori sucked in a deep breath. "I hated it. I hated myself for helping them, for being so weak that I couldn't save myself, or escape...no matter how. I hated myself for being a coward."

"Yer the one that sent me that anonymous tip about the location of their hideout, weren't ya?" the blonde commented with a sharp look.

Hiyori nodded silently. "I just...I couldn't take it anymore. I knew they would come after me if they found out, but I didn't care anymore. I wanted out. I wanted them stopped. Even if it meant dying."

"...that doesn't sound like a coward

to me

at all," Kazuto finally said, causing her to look up

in shock

. "

That sounds to me like you just wanted to survive. Nothing more, nothing less."

A bitter smile crossed his lips. "I'm glad. I'm glad that you made it out. But just because we fought them, doesn't mean we did something that deserves admiration. We didn't stop them until it was way too late, after all."

Even though the face was the same, in SAO the Black Swordsman had always been a figure larger than life, menacing and intimidating despite his relatively short stature. He's always worn a mantle of arrogant competence, and those that took offense at his arrogance quickly learned that he had the skill to back it up. But here, among his friends and family, his features lost the hard edge they'd held in Aincrad, making him look much younger, much less mature in the way that the life-and-death nature of death game had forced them all to grow up sooner rather than later.

Even so, the one thing that hadn't changed was the haunted, sorrowful look in his eyes.

The look of a person who'd seen too much, who'd

given

more than most could imagine, and if nothing else, it was much worse to see those eyes on his youthful face rather than the steely, battle-hardened Black Swordsman.

But in those eyes, Hiyori also saw something else: understanding.

It was the last thing she'd expected to find, but as if that was the

straw that broke the camel's back, the dam that had been holding back the memories of those haunting, cruel days, finally broke.

-------------------------------

November 9th, 2025

"

I'm telling you, the theory that AGI is the One True Stat is total nonsense," a high-pitched male voice spoke, distorted by the tinny quality of the speakers that only added to the grungy atmosphere of

Chalmun's Cantina

. "Sure, Agility is an important stat. Having an extremely high mobility and minimizing your weapon sway were enough to make you one of the best – until now."

The owner of the voice was displayed in one of the four segments of the holo-panel, floating high in the middle of the dimly lit bar that was currently playing the popular program

This Week's Winners

on the Net channel MMO Stream. It was available for viewing at home on computers and mobile devices as well, but it also streamed into the countless MMO worlds that populated the Seed Nexus, making it available to players in-game.

"But that's all in the past now. I've got one simple message for all my friends who wasted their lives raising AGI for the past eight months: rest in peace."

His taunt was met with boos and jeers from the

patrons of the bar, especially as he was from

their

world, and having spent the last few months propounding the exact game theory he'd just publicly rejected. Bottles and mugs flew across the room, smashing against the wall into little polygonal shards in protest of the man who'd

recently

won the second Bullet of Bullets tournament as a result of his deliberate deception.

O

ne person didn't join the raucous shouting as she watched the program with a sigh.

I'm sorry, Spiegel. I knew it sounded too good to be true, and I tried to warn you that you shouldn't just be chasing fads from other players. There's no shortcut, no win-all meta in this game.

Still, it didn't make her feel much better – especially since her friend hadn't logged into the game in a few days when he used to play religiously ever since coaxing her to start

Gun Gale Online

a few months ago.

He could re-roll, but that would take time...and waste the subscription fee Kyouji-kun paid until now.

"So," the stream's host, a girl dressed in neon-pink technopop fashion, bubbled, "are you going to be competing in the next Bullet of Bullets, then?"

"Of course," the player declared proudly, staring directly into the camera. "And I'm in it to win it."

"The thing is, XeXeed," the player on the other panel interrupted his preening, "isn't the BoB all about solo encounters? There's no guarantee that you'll have the same results a second time – plus, if you're unlucky, you might just run into an ambush. It's rather silly to act like this victory was guaranteed by your build, if you ask me."

"No way, Yamikaze," the player called XeXeed responded flatly. "This result was a manifestation of a general trend in

GGO

. I realize that you don't want to admit this, since you're playing an agility build yourself.

It's true that until now, pumping up your AGI so you could scoot-n-shoot

low-caliber,

live-ammo weapons with minimum gun sway was the prevailing style, and you'd make up for your lack of durability by being faster to dodge things. But unlike a single-player game, the balance of an MMO changes over time.

Power creep exists, and new items are being added all the time

. When you're dealing with level-based systems, you can't rearrange your stats freely,

and since they're finite

you have to allocate those points with an eye towards the future."

H

e continued over the repeated attempts from the other player to interrupt. "

The best style in one level zone might not be the best in the next. You understand that, right? The guns we'll see next will have higher and higher strength and dexterity requirements to equip and use effectively. This idea that you can just dodge out of harm's way in every encounter is going the way of the dodo. The battle between me and Yamikaze at the last BoB was that process in a microcosm. Most of your gun's power was neutralized by my heavy armour, and yet seventy percent of my shots landed.

Things might have been different if you'd been able to equip a higher-caliber gun, but you don't have the STR for that, do you?

I'll say it right now: we're entering the age of the STR-VIT build."

"

Ah," Yamikaze finally managed to get a word in edgewise, "but isn't that because you got a rare gun with super-high strength requirement that you barely managed to equip right before the tournament? How much did you even spend on that?"

"Hah! That was a drop, fair and square. But if you want to put it that way, I guess real-life luck is the greatest stat of all! Hahaha!"

S

inon sighed and tuned them out.

I guess I accidentally lucked into the new meta?

Thinking back to the heavy rifle she'd found in a dungeon just under two months ago and the sheer amount of time it had taken her to grind up enough levels to be able to allocate the STR necessary to even heft it, the green-haired sniper shook her head.

She was about to log out when someone stood up amidst the jeering, a large, intimidating form shrouded in a cloak

rose

from a table in a darkened corner of the pub

and moved until he was in the middle of the bar. Sinon found her eyes glued to the eerie shape that seemed to glide noiselessly across the floor and watched, almost mesmerized, as one hand reached under the coat.

It emerged clutching a black, metallic shape that glinted with an obsidian sheen. Her breath quickened as the player pulled the slide back, chambering a fresh round as the patrons fell silent now that they caught sight on him standing there. A few uneasy murmurs broke out as people wondered what he was doing – there was no PvP in town, the only exception to the otherwise free combat zone of

GGO

, so

any bullet

he fired at wouldn't even effect the environment, much less another player.

As he raised

the weapon

into the light cast from the monitors, Sinon's heart leapt into her throat. A feeling of dread rose at the sight of the familiar shape when he brandished it fully, pointed towards the screens that were still displaying the argument between the game's two top players.

For a moment, he remained perfectly motionless, holding the gun in a flawless bladed stance despite the ridicule and giggles that began to rise at his seemingly pointless posturing.

"Xexeed!" he finally spoke, his tone gravelly and hoarse, sounding like the incarnation of death itself. "False victor! Taste the judgment of true power!"

With the shocked stares of the entire room upon him, he raised his left arm and traced a cross with his fingertips from forehead to chest, and across his shoulders. The moment he'd completed the symbol, the index finger of his right squeezed the trigger.

Inside the confines of the bar, the report from the handgun was impossibly loud as it discharged with a plume of orange flame; the slide shot back, ejecting a spent cartridge.

The bullet flew true, hitting the holo-panel showing XeXeed's avatar directly in the center, shattering into pixels the moment it touched just like the bottles the patrons had thrown earlier.

For a moment, nothing happened as the entire bar waited with bated breath – but XeXeed kept chattering on.

Actual laughter began to break out, and even though she'd broken into a cold sweat at the sight, Sinon was beginning to heave a sigh of relief. People began to mutter about how embarrassing and pointless the whole display had been while XeXeed's voice was audible above the ridicule.

"-don't you see, even if you include stats and skill selection, the ultimate factor is the player's ski-"

He stopped mid-sentence. All attention focused back onto the holo-panel.

XeXeed was frozen in place, his eyes wide and mouth open as one hand slowly rose to clutch at his chest...where the bullet had struck the screen.

The next moment, he disappeared, leaving only a 3-D modeled chair behind. The hostess was quick to cover for him, regaining her wits without having been witness to the bizarre scene inside a random bar in SBC Glocken. "Oh dear, looks like he lost connection. Don't go anywhere folks, we'll get him right back, I'm sure…"

No one in

Chalmun's Cantina

heard her. In the dead silence that followed, all eyes were staring at the cloaked man.

He

held out his weapon and spun in a lazy circle, before raising his voice again. "This is true power, true strength! Carve this name and the terror it commands into your hearts!" Sucking in a harsh, mechanical-sounding breath, the man spoke again. "My name, and the name of my weapon...is

Death Gun

!"

Sinon almost didn't hear him; her eyes had lost focus the moment he'd openly brandished the obsidian weapon and she'd spotted the star embossed upon its grip. She didn't see him as he logged out, disappearing from this world as quickly as he'd made another disappear from it, curled up into herself to quiet the tremors that wracked her avatar.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

November 14th, 2025
"What do you think?"Rain spun around in front of the mirror for a moment, inspecting the way the clothes flowed with her movement. She'd seen it on the mannequins that Ashley was using to display her creations, but actually wearing it felt different, and she couldn't help but worry whether the dress actually looked good on her. She'd always admired the fancy idol costumes that her favourite performers wore on stage during their concerts, but the redhead had found that it took a whole heap of courage to actually put one on, herself."I...like it?" the redheaded Spriggan said cautiously, looking down at her dangerously short, poofy skirt. "But don't you think it's a little bit, um, much?""That's the idea, you're supposed to make an impression...Guess I still have some work to do, then," Ashley replied cheerfully, looking over her with a critical eye. "All right – give me a moment to make some changes. I think I can make it a little more comfortable for you."She took the garment back from Rain before heading back to her work bench and opened up the menu that allowed a player to make alterations to everything from the detailed lengths of every part of the pattern to the fabric material's sheen and lustre. This was one of the benefits of doing this in VR, the Spriggan mused silently; not only could things be changed very quickly and easily if the necessary materials were on hand, but there also was no work required for sizing it to her body once it was done, as the game automatically sized the costume to her avatar.A rustling of fabric drew her attention back to her partner as Yuna tinkered with her own outfit. Rain briefly admired her boldness in making adjustments on her own; while everyone could use the system to some effect, only those who'd leveled their tailoring skill up had access to more precise varied options – not something she felt comfortable doing on her own given her lack of skill, both literally and figuratively. The brunette Pooka was industriously labouring over even the smallest detail of her outfit, making sure it was exactly to her liking, with the same focus that she approached her singing.The back rooms of Ashley's studio in Yggdrasil City were the perfect place for the two of them to work on these costumes under the seamstress's watchful eye – and the tailor famous for doing top-quality work for some of the death game's most notoriously well-dressed clearers was quick to prove that she hadn't lost her touch, returning the navy blue and black-trimmed number to Rain within a few minutes.The redhead took the garment and equipped it, and much to her relief she found that the skirt had lengthened to just above her knees while maintaining its profile with a pettycoat added underneath. She breathed out a sigh and looked in the mirror at the girl that was staring back at her. It wasn't the utilitarian clearer she'd been in SAO, nor was she the aggressive hunter that Rain liked to portray in Alfheim.It's too late to be getting cold feet now, Nijika, she reminded herself. Kirito, Kizmel, and Yuna and Nautilus and the Professor all have worked so hard to set up the stage for us by building that entire VR environment from scratch, you can't back out now just because you're getting nervous.Looking away from the mirror, she found that Yuna had finished her work and had donned her own idol outfit – a sleeveless white number with gold and black trim and matching bows that flowed from mid-back to trail behind. With the short-cropped bolero-style jacket covering the upper part of her dress and her hair pulled back into a long braid, the Pooka looked every inch the idol she aspired to be, leaving the Spriggan to wonder if she looked anywhere near as good in her own outfit.Yuna's eyes met her own and lit up with a wide, beaming smile. "That looks fantastic on you, Rain! The colours are so deep and vibrant, it fits you perfectly!""R-really?""Yeah!" Yuna nodded eagerly, turning over to Ashley. "What do you think?"The seamstress made a show of thinking for a moment, placing one finger on her lips as she tilted her head to the side, before letting out a deep, throaty chuckle. "I think it's perfect. It suits you. Yeah, you don't pull off white and gold like Yuna does, but strong colours do suit you. You're going with red hair?""No," the Spriggan shook her head. "I've got a new avatar for it. It's a dark platinum."Ashley nodded. "That'll look even better with the dark colours on your costume. Trust me, you look great."Rain looked down at her outfit and the accompanying jacket. It was a shorter version of the coat she'd worn in Aincrad, a stylized double-breasted garment that came down to the same length as her skirt, but was left open to allow the dress underneath to show through. For a moment, she closed her eyes and imagined herself up on stage, and a matching smile spread on her own lips."Yeah," she agreed softly. "Thank you, Ashley."The older woman waved her off. "Just doing my usual work. You're the ones who came up with the design. I just made sure it turned out to be something wearable. I'm actually quite honoured you two picked me to design your outfits for your big stage event.""Still…" Rain shook her head. "I don't think I could've imagined it to turn out this well, not on my own. You sure you don't want anything in return?""It's all right. I enjoy making things, and besides, these aren't for in-game use anyway, right?""No," Rain answered honestly. I'd probably be too embarrassed to wear this in the game, anyway, the redhead thought to herself.Ashley grinned. "Well, then, just make sure to save me a front-row seat when you get to do your first live concert, all right?""Absolutely," Yuna chimed in, as though the fact that the seamstress expected them to go far enough to actually have a live concert was a matter of course. "Thank you so much for your help!""Yeah, yeah, no problem. If you're happy with the way the outfits look, I can export the files so you can recreate them anywhere. Let me know if you need me to make any last-minute changes." Tapping through her menus, the seamstress made good on her word. "So when are you guys planning to stream your big debut?""Next Saturday," Rain answered, removing the cosmetic layer over her armour and stashing the costume in her inventory. "It'll be on Yuna's channel.""I'll have to make sure to tune in, then.""Please do!" the Pooka nodded. "Actually, I think Kirito-kun mentioned that they were planning to do a watch party at Fuurinkazan's place that night. I don't think they'd mind if you joined them.""A watch party, huh?" Ashely chuckled. "Sounds like fun. I'll keep it in mind."The three of them finished up their business before returning to the public part of Ashley's store, where Nautilus was leaning against the wall as he waited for them.
"Everything set?" Yuna's boyfriend asked."Yep!" she responded brightly. "The outfits are fantastic, and we have the files to take back."Rain waved as they left the store. "Thanks again, Ashley!"The proprietress waved back from behind the counter as the door closed behind them, leaving the trio back in the bustling streets of Yggdrasil City's busiest shopping district. A couple of players passed by, looking at the shop they'd just left curiously, but the four paid them no mind."So, what are your plans now, Rain?" Yuna asked curiously.The redhead blinked and shrugged. "Um...I didn't have anything in mind exactly," she told them. "I don't have work today, so I was thinking of maybe logging into the concert hall and practicing a bit more.""Really?""Yeah," she said, "It's different there than just singing by myself at home. Nautilus and Kirito really did a great job with the acoustics, and I wanted to go over the dance routine again using the recordings from the choreography, just in case."Yuna giggled. "Those ghosts are really handy, aren't they?"Rain nodded. "Yeah. And I know the songs, but next to you I still feel like an amateur…"Yuna paused her steps and turned towards her. "I've done this for longer, that's true, but don't sell yourself short, Rain. Your singing is beautiful – isn't that right, Ei-kun?""It is," Nautilus agreed easily. "You've just got a different style than Yuna, that's all. Not everyone can pull off the preppy, happy idol, but there's nothing saying that's the only way to be, right?""I guess so," Rain admitted, looking up at the pair that had been helping her move towards her dreams with a grateful smile. "Thanks."He shook his head. "Don't thank me – you're the one putting in all the hard work. You and Yuna are both going to kill it, I'm sure."-------------------------------
November 15th, 2025
Until now, Underworld had been an untouched land with only a handful of exceptions – the Spire, which was their home in this world, and the little cabin by the lake where Kizmel and Kirito had gone fishing and spent the nights that they were here together. So to find a pair of cabins in varying stages of construction nearby was quite a surprise to the former knight, particularly as they resembled the buildings she was used to seeing from Aincrad and the outskirts of Lyusula, rather than what she'd seen from Kirito's world."We're lucky that a couple of our team members are handy with tools and more traditional means of construction," Rinko explained as they passed by them, pointing to the one that was further ahead, with large timbers erected upright and beams spanning across. "So Higa-kun and Cardinal have been working with them to see how detailed we can make the fabrication and construction process.""Isn't that kind of overkill?" Kirito asked as he looked at the way the wood had been worked to fit together without nails, something that fascinated Kizmel as well.The craftsmanship is impeccable to fit together so neatly, she mused, running a curious finger across the seam where two timbers met, only to find the most minuscule of gaps in between."Maybe," Rinko shrugged, "but we're trying to see how far we can push the simulation. In the end, we want this place to evolve and grow, and its inhabitants to do the same. Building things is an integral part of that, because it requires an understanding of physics and structures – if we just snapped our fingers and had Cardinal place an entire town or village down, what would there be to learn and create? Plus, we can use this to test how durable these are going to be, since we're not making any of the structures here immortal objects like they were in SAO.""It sounds like you're getting a bit ahead of yourself there," the former swordsman pointed out. "You haven't even gotten anyone who'd live here yet aside from us."The older woman laughed. "True, we might be putting the cart before the horse a bit here, but isn't this exciting? We're making something entirely new, and seeing how far we can go. The possibilities are almost endless, even if our original research doesn't pan out. Even now, VR is full of training programs for craftsmen and specialists like welders and electricians and engineers, we're just taking it even further."Kizmel wondered if such an approach truly merited the lengths to which they seemed to be going – but then again, they were looking to create an entire world, so who was to say what was and was not necessary?"I guess," Kirito said, before glancing over to where the tools of the craftsmen and builders who were doing the construction lay.
Following his eyes, Kizmel was filled with an odd sense of deja vu at the sight. Gently touching the hilt of an axe as it sat buried in a stump, she was certain that, as a knight, she was no stranger to physical labour, and she had almost certainly held a tool like this in her hands before while gathering firewood or building fortifications during her time as a squire and with the Pagoda Knights.
Yet when she tried to recall those times, there was...nothing.No, nothing was not entirely the right thing. There was something, a fuzzy, indistinct memory of having done this kind of labour before, but like a fleeting dream after waking, she couldn't grasp any details of it. The phenomenon both intrigued and worried Kizmel in equal parts, especially as she could otherwise recall with almost crystal clarity other events in her life.Her thoughts must have shown on her face, as she found her husband calling her name worriedly. "Kizmel? You okay?"The former dark elf blinked away her internal thoughts and attempts at grasping at wisps of memories, turning violet eyes onto Kirito. "I am fine, my love. It just felt...strange, for a moment, to be holding this tool.""Strange? Strange how?" he asked worriedly. "Are you feeling okay?""I am fine," she repeated with a gentle smile. "It is just…" she shook her head, before trying to convey the odd, almost incorporeal, sensation of her hazy memory to him.Rinko nodded slowly. "I see," the researched said after listening to her explanation. "It sounds like a discontinuity in your memory engrams. You remember the act of doing something, but not the details, right?""That is correct." Kizmel looked down at her hands. "I am certain that more than once, I must have felled trees or dug a moat for the camp, but whenever I try and recall those times, it becomes...unclear. Is this because of what Mother explained to me about the history of Aincrad and how she created it?"As far as Kizmel understood it, the steel castle's history had existed, but only in the roughest of strokes like a fleeting dream, leaving the world to fill in the details as it became necessary. Her mother had likened it to the process of creating a painting: starting with a rough sketch and then filling it in with broad strokes from which little more than outlines could be discerned, before eventually moving on to finer and finer details as the image slowly took shape.But when painting a vista as grand as the steel castle and the world that preceeded it, with every tower and spire and floor, every living thing within, the life and death of each of its inhabitants and their forebears, it was easy for a single blade of grass to be omitted for being too small to be visible on the canvas.I have done these things, but when I try to recall them, there are no details, because it was never necessary for me to know how I went about doing them. It was a strange feeling to be so disconnected from her own memory only when she tried focusing on the details. If they had still been in Aincrad, so Cardinal had told her, those recollections of the past would have been filled in as the world itself bent to her mother's will to grant her those detailed memories – but they were in that world no longer."I'm pretty sure that's the case," the researched confirmed, looking between Kizmel and Kirito. "If you were to have all of the memories of every little detail of your past, it'd take up an impossibly huge amount of data storage. So I think what happened was that you remember the broad strokes and major events, but everything else...kind of gets filled in as necessary."Kizmel pondered that for a moment, before realizing that it was just as it had been in Aincrad, only now she was aware of what was happening; it was just one more reminder that, for all of her memory of growing up, she'd been made rather than born, just like the steel castle had been created out of thin air the day the machines were turned on, regardless of its legends and past."Actually," Rinko continued, placing her hands into the pockets of the lab coat she was wearing, "it's not that different from something we humans experience rather regularly.""Really?" Kizmel blinked, and even Kirito turned towards her with interest.The older woman turned to address the black-haired boy at his question. "Think about it, Kazuto-kun. The human mind is a wonderful, mysterious thing – but it doesn't have infinite storage, either...well, unless you have an eidetic memory. For example, can you remember what you were doing down to the last detail, say, last Tuesday?""Umm…" Kirito frowned in thought, before shaking his head. "I mean, I had school, and after I went home…" he trailed off."But you can't recall exactly what you were doing, right?""...no," he admitted. "Not everything. Not even...not even most of it, now that I think about it."Rinko nodded. "It's the same phenomenon. Sometimes, our brains just...shunt out what they consider unnecessary information. Such as...what I had for breakfast this morning. I could swear I had coffee and cereal because that is what I eat every morning, but I'm willing to bet you that that's wrong, because I know for sure that I don't have any cereal at my house since it's on my shopping list for tonight. Our brains also don't necessarily recall every little detail of what we did, either because it hasn't really registered into long-term memory, or it wasn't important at the time, or because it's just an old memory. When our minds are pressed to do so, most of the time it'll make something up. It'll try and fill in the gap with something familiar, something it knows, whether that's right or not. It just happens that the process that would fill in the gaps for Kizmel is undeveloped, because it was done by the system back in SAO.""I...I see." Kizmel let out a breath she hadn't known she'd been holding, feeling a slight measure of relief that she couldn't entirely explain."It's a rather human thing, actually," the older woman noted with a smile. "Being imperfect. It's got to be a weird feeling, huh? Realizing that sometimes, you just can't remember things right, when I'm sure you're used to remembering everything exactly as it happened, down to the last detail, but that's just how we are.""...it is," the former dark elf admitted, before turning her attention to the task that had brought them to the forest that was growing near the Spire. "What is it that we are doing today?"If Rinko noticed the totality of Kizmel's motives in changing subjects, she didn't let it show; rather, the researcher pivoted smoothly and retrieved a notebook from the folds of her coat.
"Higa-kun and Cardinal have been doing a lot of work in making Underworld habitable, but we want to see how far we can actually push the simulation in terms of complexity. Considering that we're running what's essentially a real-time simulation of a full, albeit simplified, ecosystem here that is over a thousand square kilometers, one that is actively evolving and growing and changing as we speak, it's been remarkably stable thanks to the Cardinal System and its automated maintenance and optimization functions," she explained. "But we're starting to run into the limits of what our hardware is capable of. Higa-kun is even speculating that this might be the very limit of conventional computing power, even with the supercomputing cluster that Kikuoka-san put together.""You're starting to see lag," Kirito realized.
Rinko nodded. "It may be imperceptible to you and me, but I'm sure Kizmel can tell. Cardinal for sure as well. The physics interactions are the greatest hurdle to that, because while it's something we can...fake, if you will, in the way a lot of games do, we don't want to. Think of water, which is arguably one of the harder things to simulate perfectly. It's a wave, but also acts like a group of particles once it gets broken up into small enough pieces, and each time one moves, it changes how the others around it move, so it's usually simplified as a pre-made animation. What we need is a much, much better capability for parallel processing rather than brute-forcing it with sheer amount of operations if we want to have any hope of actually running everything down to the smallest detail.""So why are we here today?" Kizmel asked curiously."We're looking at options when it comes to moving the server to a more advanced computing system, but before we do, we wanted to get your impressions on how things are right now. Out of everyone on the team, you two have the most experience with long-term full-dive exposure – Kizmel is a given, of course, but we'd also like to get Kazuto-kun's impressions," Rinko told them. "Right now our best option is to have Cardinal adjust the internal simulation speed when the load becomes too high. In theory, you and I shouldn't notice anything different about it, since our perception of time is directly tied to the simulation speed, but we want to find out how Kizmel perceives those time dilations.""Because however I experience these changes will likely be how others like me will experience them," the lilac-haired woman concluded. "And if so, they may appear unnatural to them in a way that would disturb their perception of Underworld.""Exactly." Rinko grimaced. "The alternative is to dynamically adjust the resolution of the simulation as the load becomes too high, but that has...other issues."Kirito tilted his head thoughtfully. "So what exactly are you expecting?""For you and me?" the older woman shrugged. "Nothing. At least, that's what everyone else we've run this test with has told us. Which makes sense – we're directly tied to the simulation through our brains, so if the simulation slows down, the impulses our brains receive from the interface will slow down, too. But right now, Kizmel is operating from outside of the server, and while she's logged in, we're curious to see what happens when the simulation slows down.""Very well," the former knight stated, straightening her back. "I suppose we are ready."Rinko looked at her for a moment, before chuckling. "Higa-kun, are you there?" she called into the air."I hear you," the young engineer's voice came from thin air; for once, he was not in the Spire, but in the human world, and his words carried across the empty air in much the same way that Cardinal's were.
"We're ready to begin here. Turn up the resolution.""Got it, doctor. Cranking it up."For a moment, the world flickered around her; it was so fleeting it was almost imperceptible, and had Kizmel not known to look out for something, she would have missed it. What she couldn't miss, however, was the sudden pressure on her chest – it wasn't painful or uncomfortable, far from it, but it was unusual.
A shiver ran through her, the sudden chill traveling down the skin of her forearms as the entire world around her suddenly became...more.The world suddenly snapped into focus with a clarity that she'd never imagined possible as little specks of dust began dancing in the sunlight, while the leaves shifted and crumbled underneath her feet. Sounds reached her ears, of the wind, of the leaves rustling in the breeze, even of the twigs and branches shifting as they moved. Her braid moved with the breeze, a few stray hairs escaping to cling to her face.My hands...they're...warm...she realized suddenly, touching the warm palms with cold fingertips.Turning towards her husband, Kizmel was curious to see if he was experiencing the same things she was, only to find him standing still, as though frozen in time. No, not frozen, she realized suddenly, but moving incredibly slowly. Is this what Dame Rinko meant when she said that time would flow differently for us based on our perception of the world?-------------------------------Kazuto hadn't been quite sure what to expect when the proverbial switch was flipped; the only thing he was sure of was that it was reasonably safe, since both Higa and Doctor Kojirou had tested it beforehand. Maybe it'll be like that high-intensity sim they had us run in the beginning?Recalling the way the Rath team had set up a small testing world – practically just an island not even as large as Kizmel's Haven – to test the maximum output of their interface equipment at its safe limits, he couldn't help but shiver in anticipation. Agent Kikuoka had likened it to the blind getting to see at the time, which Kazuto had always considered somewhat dramatic, but it also was a sentiment he couldn't entirely disagree with.The difference between the NerveGear and whatever high-power equipment they were using at Rath had been night and day, even more so when compared to the lower-powered AmuSphere that was in common use. It was like going from old-school headset VR to full-dive in one go.For a moment, a tingle ran through his avatar, not dissimilar from the cautioning intuition he'd learned to heed during the battles in Aincrad, and Kazuto unconsciously braced himself as the world around him sharpened as though someone had turned the focus on a lens.Then, suddenly, he realized that the air had a smell. It was clean and fresh, with a slight hint of burnt wood that seemed to accompany the autumn breeze.He could feel the wind on his arms as more than just the sensation of being pushed against, feel the difference in temperature on the half of his body that was facing the sun as its warmth prickled at his skin. There was a weight on his chest as he breathed, even though in full-dive it was a reflexive action and he had no physical body that needed oxygen. The shadows and light moved ever so slightly differently as well, losing the uncanny appearance of being too perfect inside a virtual world.It was almost enough to let him forget that he was in VR, and Kazuto experimentally crouched down to the pile of sawdust at his feet. Running a finger through it he could feel its individual grains. He grabbed a fistful of sawdust and dirt, watching as it dropped from the palm of his hand to slowly drift back to the ground as he drew with it, scattering with the wind in a way he knew no other game had managed so far, before turning his attention to other things.The stump that had been left as a makeshift workstation, too, was now replicated under his fingers in exacting detail, every crease and bump of the bark present where before he would have found a generically rough surface texture before. Kazuto looked at the axe Kizmel had pondered earlier and reached for its smooth handle, pulling it free with a hefty yank that sent him stumbling back a step as he unconsciously applied the same amount of force he was used to in-game. That came loose a lot easier than I thought. It's a lot different than the static-stick system a lot of games use.Its weight felt solid in his hands, different from the swords he was used to. He'd tried out a number of different weapons in SAO's beta test before settling on a sword, and there had been other games before that had tried to simulate arena combat in VR. Axes, swords, and polearms – they'd all felt a little different, and the games had tried to make an approximation of how they'd balance, but in the end, a high enough STR stat meant he could simply muscle anything he wanted around with little issue. Now, though, he could feel the difference in heft and weight, as the axe's blade threatened to tip itself out of his grip if he loosened it just so, and it was very distinctly different from the swords he was used to wielding.Turning around, he was curious to see how Kizmel was taking to this version of Underworld, only to find her flickering from place to place as though she was having trouble staying connected to the server.At first, he was worried that there was some kind of glitch or bug with the system, reaching for her as he called out, but his sharp eyes quickly made out the fact that it wasn't Kizmel herself that he was seeing, but the after-image of her as the former knight moved at a speed even the Black Swordsman had problems tracking. Whenever she stood still long enough the image solidified, but as soon as the former dark elf took even a single step, she was gone as though she'd teleported.
I guess they weren't kidding when they said they had to dial the sim speed way down, he mused after futilely trying to call out to his wife. Even if she heard him, he could only imagine how unintelligible it would sound like to her. Probably just like when you play a video at quarter speed, only worse.He had maybe a minute and a half to explore his surroundings before the same tingle ran through him just as he was getting used to this kind of fidelity in the virtual world around him, and then it snapped back. The world lost some of its vibrancy, and while it was hard to tell, there was something just a little bit off about the way the handle of the axe felt in his hand now as he stuck it back into the stump with a thud.Looking up, he found that Kizmel had returned to normal speed – or maybe it was him who'd stopped moving in slow-motion to her."That was...weird," he muttered. "How much did you slow down the simulation?""Simulation speed was reduced to 10 percent," Cardinal supplied helpfully as she appeared from thin air next to them, summoned by his question. The diminutive sage adjusted her glasses. "Actual time would be one-tenth of perceived time for users.""That's...a lot." Kazuto frowned. "Is the load really that bad?"Cardinal shook her head. "Ten percent simulation speed was deemed an adequate safety margin as there are multiple users that need to be processed for this trial. The actual minimum necessary simulation speed reduction is forty-two percent of real-time.""Still…" Forty-two percent, almost half-speed...I didn't think it was that bad already, but Underworld is huge – it's bigger than Aincrad ever was, and it's still bigger than Alfheim with all of the expansion zones, and more complex to boot. And it's only going to get worse the more users are logged in and the more they can interact with Underworld, he mused. But Kizmel doesn't seem affected, since she's running on external hardware."How was it, Kizmel?" Rinko asked, notepad already out and at the ready.His lilac-haired wife looked down at her hands; Kirito wondered if she was feeling the same kind of loss of sensation and fidelity that he did. "It felt...strange," she admitted after a moment. "I am accustomed to the sensation of what you call a higher resolution, and this time was no different. However, it was incredibly odd to see the world around me slow down so much.""It's just as we expected, then," the doctor nodded while taking notes. "All right. But you didn't experience any problems or issues?"Kizmel shook her head. "No, none beyond the disorientation.""Good, good." Closing her notebook with a snap, the older woman looked up. "Well, that's...unfortunate, but also expected. Guess we have our work cut out for ourselves if we want to keep going down this route.""About that," Kazuto said hesitantly, turning the attention of all three people there towards him. "Is that really necessary?""What do you mean, Kazuto-kun?"He gestured towards the world around him. "All of this, I mean. I get that you're trying to make things as real as possible, but...why? Kizmel came from SAO, and that wasn't nearly as complex as Underworld is.""That…" Rinko's head tilted for a moment. "I see what you mean, but this is also completely new ground to us. We've failed in all attempts to recreate the circumstances of Kizmel's awakening, so we're having to start from the ground up. When she became sentient, she had a framework, a history, knowledge, all of that imparted from the start, not to mention the Cardinal System backing her up to fill in any gaps. Anything we start with would be from zero, ground up, so we want to make the environment as interactive and accurate as possible. It's not so different from teaching a baby, I suppose – you don't want it to grow up misunderstanding something or having a false impression of something it saw when it grew up.""But isn't going this far a bit extreme?" Kazuto asked, gesturing towards the environment around them. "I get that you want to get basic things right, like gravity and such. But every little detail? It's not like you have to simulate every drop of water and every bit of dust and sand and dirt, right?"The doctor chuckled. "If this was a game, that'd be true, but it isn't. A game means that there are rules everyone agrees on – it has players that understand that the rules may be arbitrary or even contrary to reality as they know it, but they accept them as part of the game. On the other hand, if we don't do everything right in Underworld, we'll end up with the kinds of conflicts and contradictions that require us to make those kinds of rules. Take gathering materials for example," she said, bending down to grab a stone off the forest floor."You can pick up a pebble. You can even pick up a larger stone than this and carry it in your hands. But if you were in a game, it would go into your inventory. The wood we used to make these cabins would go into your inventory to magically be carried around without taking up space on your person. What about the cubic meters of dirt we need to move for the foundations? Why one thing and not the other?""That's-" because of game mechanics, he was about to say, only to realize that was exactly what she'd meant. Game mechanics. If we start with an inventory, why bother carrying anything by hand? Where do we set the limits on what we do and don't allow to be carried?Seeing the understanding dawn on him, Rinko continued. "And that's just one thing. The example Kizmel mentioned a lot when we talked to her about her experience in Aincrad was her confusion about why bows did not exist. Or rather, she knew of one that existed, but no others. Why can some weapons be thrown and not others? Because it's a rule of the game. Why can I throw a sword at you and do damage, but when I throw an iron ingot that's arguably much heavier, it just bounces off? Because it's classified as an item, and not a weapon. It's a rule," she pointed out.Turning to the former dark elf, the researcher addressed her directly. "Underworld isn't just a game where we can take shortcuts and simplify everything like we would in a game. It won't just be populated by people that know it's a simulation and understand it as such, that acknowledge the arbitrary rules we put in place, because there are no such rules in reality. How many times in Aincrad have you encountered something that made no sense to you, Kizmel? That went against everything you understood about how the world worked?""...many times," his wife answered after a moment, letting out a slow breath. "Perhaps even from the very moment I was wrested from the destiny that had been laid out for me.""And that's the exact thing we're trying to avoid," Rinko said, placing her hands in the pockets of her coat. "You've had the framework to work through these contradictions. Someone younger, less mature, less...advanced than you might suffer more than just a headache as they try and figure out why you can or cannot do certain things despite understanding that it should be possible. In the worst case, we'd look at a catastrophic implosion of an ego or personality, and I'm not saying this because you're an AI. Something similar can happen to humans, too, and when their psyche implodes, it's often catastrophic...and irreversible."The doctor's eyes softened. "I remember what you told me about your sisters. From what I understand, their case was a little different, because they were made to suffer trauma by proxy, being forced to watch without being able to help which was their core directive, but think of it this way: to me, that's proof that they're just as human as I am, in a way, because in the end, we're not perfect. We're fragile creatures when it comes down to it. And I'd hate to put anything into this world only to see it suffer the same kind of fate, that'd just be cruel."She's got a point, Kazuto was forced to acknowledge, thinking of the trauma that Yui and Strea had endured and caused them to eventually terminally break out of their programmed roles as mental health counseling programs and the unbearable grief that had ultimately caused their programming to destabilize.
Even if the sisters' case was somewhat different, there had been a lot of times during their journey through Aincrad together when the game's seemingly arbitrary rules had caused Kizmel to question them, and he'd always been afraid on some level of her finding out that the entire world she'd lived in was little more than a game and what that revelation would do to her worldview and sense of self. I can't exactly fault them for being afraid of the same thing when I was terrified what would happen to Kizmel if she found out."Even before I became a swordmaster...a player," Kizmel suddenly began, emphasizing the word that had once held an almost mystical meaning to her, "I knew that there were things beyond my understanding – but that has never curtailed my attempts to learn. In fact, it was just such questions that drove me in part to rejoin Kirito and the others once my duty was done. It is true that there were times when I could not reconcile what I knew of the world with what was before my very eyes. It is true that such times caused me to question whether my understanding of the world was complete, or if it was the world itself that was flawed."She turned towards Rinko. "But is that not at the very core of what you are trying to achieve? Is that not the very measure of intelligence you seek – one that thinks and grows and evolves on its own, one that makes its own choices and seeks to understand the things it does not yet know? Do you have so little faith in the life you wish to bring to this world that you do not believe it can do the same without guiding it along every step of its journey? That it is incapable of observing and learning on its own accord? If such a simple hurdle is insurmountable, then perhaps what you have created is not truly alive and capable of thinking for itself.""Huh…" Rinko paused for a long moment, unable to refute her words."You said you wished to create another like me. An artificial intelligence – but can such a being, if it cannot even conduct such basic reasoning, be truly called intelligent?" Kizmel hummed. "Would it not feel...hollow, if you were to create a being that could seem intelligent only by virtue of having memorized its boundaries, rather than trying to discover what lies beyond them?""It would," the older woman admitted, a bitter smile on her lips. "But this is life we're talking about. We can't just toy around with it hoping for the best."Kizmel shook her head. "Even though I only knew my sisters for a short amount of time, I am certain of this: they would rather have lived, and experienced all the grief and joy that came before their deaths, than have spent eternity as unfeeling automatons. Perhaps it is a vain, selfish hope, but is not wishing to be something more than you are an integral part of being alive?"Kazuto's eyes wandered over to where his wife was passionately making her argument, wondering if perhaps, they weren't giving the Cardinal System too little credit after all. Strea, Yui, Cardinal herself...and Kizmel. All of their intelligence, their morals, their behaviour, all of it was emergent, in response to what was happening around them and to them. None of it was ever programmed, that was the whole point, though. Just because we don't understand how it happened, doesn't mean it can't happen.As ground-breaking as Underworld was technologically in terms of scale and realism, he couldn't help but wonder if perhaps Kizmel was right, and that all of this work would amount to little more than a technological exercise. For all this place was lightyears beyond any other full-dive environment, he'd always had the impression that it was missing something, but it wasn't until now that he realized what that was.For all of its advancement and ability to grow, Underworld's entire development was still driven solely by the handful of users that logged in, for the simple fact that there was no one else. There was no one to tame the wilderness of this world, or build houses and villages, to create civilization or induce a change that wasn't solely caused by the carefully curated and cultivated nature around them.Which was fine as long as they were testing things, but he figured if Kikuoka really wanted to somehow raise infant AIs here and have them grow up, it would need some kind of life, some kind of transience. Something to create a reason to do more than just survive and do the bare minimum. Kizmel was right – simply creating a place wasn't enough.
It needed something more.It needed a purpose.-------------------------------
November 17th, 2025
"What a mess…"
Looking over the case files that had been sent his way, Agent Kikuoka couldn't help but rub a hand across his forehead in vexation. He hadn't expected his part in the SAO case victims response task force to billow to the point where every cyber-crime in the Tokyo Metro area that even tangentially involved VR somehow ultimately found its way to his desk.
I didn't think I'd end up being the catch-all for anything VR-related that Metro Police can get away with pushing off their desks, but I really shouldn't have been surprised.
The file had landed on his desk as a result of the police station not really wanting to deal with it, having stamped it off as a "death by natural causes" based on the conclusions of the autopsy report, and at first glance, it seemed to be an open and shut case.
Heart attack, though? At that age?
Kikuoka could only shake his head at the thought. There was something about it, however, that gave him a frisson of unease when he looked it over – and likewise seemed to have given the attending officers a similar uncanny feeling, leaving them to send it over rather than discarding it entirely. Maybe if he'd been found surrounded by energy drinks and been known for staying up days at a time, but by all rights, he should've been in relatively good health according to the examiner. And then there's…
That.
That being a recording which had gone viral and hadn't even taken all that much work to dig up. It – along with copious amounts of online speculation and conspiracy theories – were the only reason the case hadn't been closed and landed in the archive instead of his desk, and why any sort of foul play was even being considered.Still, even after watching it for the third time and even slowing the recording down, he couldn't make heads or tails out of what he was seeing. It's obvious enough what's happening, but an assassination in-game? That should be impossible.Yet, everything he was seeing pointed at the fact that it was, indeed, possible.A shiver went down his back as he considered the character who'd called himself Death Gun, and the almost ritualistic way the masked, cloaked figure had gone about committing its alleged murder, despite the impossibility of shooting someone through a TV screen inside of a game. The video, shared and re-posted across most major websites, had garnered a lot of attention from the victim's fans and spurred on plenty of speculation about the mysterious timing of his death and whether such a mystical murder was even possible.At least people seem to be mostly laughing about it, rather than taking it as a serious threat, the former soldier counted his blessings. I'd rather not have my hands full dealing with a surging panic about a magical online "phantom bullet" of sorts that can kill anyone in a video game.It was a small consolation, however, because at the end of the day he still had a dead body and suspicious timing on his hands. Plus, it's clear that that kind of fear and panic is exactly what this Death Gun is trying to evoke. Everything about his ritual, the timing, the words...it's all calculated to make it seem like he's some sort of online grim reaper.Rubbing his forehead, Kikuoka looked over at the second monitor where the image of a short brunette in scholarly robes was displayed. "What do you make of this? Do you think there's any validity to the speculation?"Cardinal cocked her head to the side. "I do not think the incident in the game and his death are related.""So you don't think the guy shooting him in-game had anything to do with his death?" Kikuoka asked skeptically.The woman presenting itself as the avatar of the Cardinal System shook her head. "It is impossible to commit such an act. In the first place, he did not even attack the avatar of the deceased, but a televised on-screen image of him. There is no manner in which Death Gun's actions affected another player's avatar in the same manner that shooting a gun at a TV screen in the real world would not kill your target.""It's a hell of a coincidence, though," the ministry official murmured, wondering if he'd imagined the brief, uncomfortable pause in her tone at the mention of the name. "Autopsy places his time of death around that day – and I'm pretty sure he didn't keel over dead before that stream.""Is there a possibility of narrowing it down further?"He shook his head. "Maybe if they'd gotten to it sooner. They only really found him when the landlord noticed the smell. He lived alone, with only sporadic contact with family and friends. If anything, his online fans raised more of a ruckus about his disappearance than anything else, considering how prolific he seemed to be. Then the medical exam concluded it was a death by heart attack with no indication of foul play, they ruled it natural causes, and that was the end of that. You think it's possible that there was a hardware malfunction? That maybe his disconnect wasn't tied to him dying? Or maybe the AmuSphere malfunctioned and killed him?"
Or maybe Death Gun triggered some kind of catastrophic fault in it that caused his death?
"Without access to the server's logs, or the deceased's ISP log, I cannot tell. But it is impossible for someone to die from the hardware that is in current circulation," Cardinal pointed out. "The AmuSphere is specifically designed to not emit the same kind of high-powered EMF radiation that the NerveGear was capable of, even in the extent of catastrophic hardware failure. His death cannot be related to the hardware short of an electrocution via short-circuit.""That's what I'd like to think, too," Kikuoka agreed, "but I think once the police got wind of the rumours online, they kicked it over to me. What do you think about the video?""It is impossible for someone to die from the hardware," the diminutive woman reiterated almost mechanically. "Regardless of what actions were taken in-game by the user or other players, there is a zero possibility of the death directly occurring as a result of using the AmuSphere.""And even if he died because of the game, it sure wouldn't be a heart attack," he conceded, thinking back to the numerous autopsy reports he'd looked over as the SAO case had dragged on. No, if the hardware did anything, it definitely wouldn't be looking like a heart attack to the coroner.Cardinal nodded. "Agreed.""That leaves us with death as a result of overuse?" he offered, grasping at threads.His suggestion was met with a very human-like shrug. "That is certainly a possibility. I have no expertise nor data to support or refute such a hypothesis." She paused. "However, I agree that the timing of the shooting and the apparent loss of connection is indeed suspicious. If, as you say, his state of health was good, then it is unlikely, but possible."Back to square one, then. Kikuoka let out a long sigh, wondering briefly if he'd imagined her fidgeting. "We can't even pull the server logs, since it's an American game, and we don't have jurisdiction in the USA. We could send a request to their publisher Zaskar, but I somehow doubt that'll get us anywhere, especially since we can't even back it with a warrant or subpoena. So this is pretty much all I've got to go on."
A dead body, a video from inside the game, and a whole bunch of conspiracy theories. Joy.
He thought for a moment, before making a note. "I'll send a request to his ISP to see if they'll provide us with the usage logs for his unit from the estimated time of death and the live stream. Same with the power company, maybe he just had an outage or something."The possibility sounded thin even to him. After all, the body was reportedly found in bed, with the AmuSphere still on his head and running, as though he'd never even disconnected or gotten up, himself. Looking up, Cardinal merely stared back at him placidly, without much more to say on the matter – not that he faulted her.There was a knock on the door, causing him to quickly shuffle the files together. He closed them up before calling out. "Come in."A short-statured blonde entered the office with a casual gait, though her usually mischievous expression was nowhere to be found. "Kikucchi, I think we need ta talk.""Now's really not a good time, Hosaka-san," he began, only for her to wave him off."It's about what ya had me look into. The XeXeed murder."That got his attention. "Murder? I didn't say anything about a murder," Kikuoka started."Ya didn't, but when ya ask me ta dig into something, I can read between the lines of what I find. Big-shot e-sports guy, disappears right in the middle of a live-stream after exploiting his way through one of the biggest VR e-sports tournaments in the world? Yeah, the moment I found that video, ya should've figured I'd be digging deeper."He couldn't help but shake his head in exasperated amusement, wondering why he hadn't expected that kind of response from her by now. "Careful not to dig too greedily and deeply, Hosaka-san."The corner of her mouth twitched up in a sign of amusement, before she shook her head. "Look, the guy had his share of enemies, but when the game journals got wind of his death? It blew up big." She handed him her phone, browser window opened to the website of a magazine he'd frequently advertised. The title MMO Today was emblazoned boldly across the top, with the headline article covering the untimely death of the player known to the gaming world as XeXeed, even if the file on his desk read "Tamotsu Shigemura," instead.Taking a moment to compose himself, he looked back at her. "You know I can't discuss an ongoing investigation with any unrelated personnel, Hosaka-san. I'd be breaking laws six ways from Sundays.""Ah, so you do admit there's an investigation," she replied with a grin. "And yer not the type ta look into nothing. Ya wouldn't have asked me to look up this guy if ya thought it was nothing.""Hosaka-san-""Just listen, why don'tcha?" she replied calmly, settling down in the chair across from him and pulling a flash drive from her pocket. "XeXeed wasn't just a notorious GGO player, that was just his latest gig. The guy had plenty of enemies, because in every tournament he took part in, he would exploit the game's mechanics for everything it was worth. Just gotta look at the attitude he had in his last interview ta figure that one out – the guy didn't tend ta make a lot of friends doing that, but he kept comin' out on top by consistently screwin' not just his immediate opponents, but a lot of others over, too. Don't know if it's worth killin' over, but I know people who've killed fer less."Her eyes darkened, and he believed it – after all, he'd listened to the first-hand accounts of the Survivors who'd gone to confront the game's murder guild Laughing Coffin, and about everything they'd done."Putting aside motive for the moment," he answered, leaning forward and eyeing the small memory stick, "how are you so certain it's a murder when even this article simply says he passed away?"Hooded eyes looked back up at him. "Call it a woman's intuition. The guy croaking mid-sentence in a live stream? I don't buy it. Add ta that the way this nutjob Death Gun played things up so melodramatically, about how he has true power? I heard people talk like that before. People talking about wielding true power in a game.""You're not suggesting-"Carina stood up. "I ain't suggestin' anything, Kikucchi. Remember? I'm a civilian, I know nothing about no murder case. I just happen to like scrap-booking things I find interesting and sharing it with friends and co-workers. Call it a bad habit of mine."-------------------------------
November 18th, 2025
The sound of raindrops gently tapping against the glass was oddly soothing, but Nijika didn't realize just how lost in thought she had been until the sound of the chair in front of her desk scraping across the floor drew her attention. Looking up, she found Kazuto looking back at her from under a wild fringe of black hair with a curious expression that did little to mask his worry."Everything all right, Nijika?"She shook herself out of her thoughts and put down the phone she'd been staring at. "Yeah. Um...did I miss something?""Only the end of school. Class ended twenty minutes ago."The brunette blinked, barely remembering hearing the closing bell and packing up her books, only to take a look at her phone and spot the notification for the day. "Oh. Sorry, I guess I spaced out for a bit."He followed her gaze down to the screen of her phone; it was locked, but the calendar was showing the day's events, along with the Line stamp of a birthday cake. "It's not your birthday, is it?" he asked worriedly.It was the same kind of panic he'd always shown in Aincrad whenever he'd realized he had forgotten something important, but this time, there had been no way for him to know. Nijika shook her head with a fond chuckle. "No, it's not, dummy. We celebrated mine back in July, remember?""Oh, right." Kazuto scratched his head in a manner that she couldn't help but find endearing, far different from the indomitable and relentlessly driven Black Swordsman she'd first met. "Um...so, whose birthday is it? And why does it make you sad?"Blunt and tactless as ever, she thought with amusement as he almost immediately restored part of the resemblance. Never change, Kirito.
"It's my sister's," she answered simply.Onyx eyes widened, and lips formed into a silent O. "The one you mentioned back then?""Yeah," she said. "I'm surprised you remember."Kazuto shrugged. "It kind of stuck with me. I guess it's fresh in my memory because I was surprised when Yuuki turned out to be the girl Philia mentioned back when we were on the fifty-first floor. I mean, what are the odds of that? It was back when I told you guys about Suguha, wasn't it? And you mentioned you had a younger sister.""That really was a surprise, huh? And it turns out Kizmel knew her, too...and all three of them are Imps. It's a small world." Nijika couldn't help but giggle. "You're surprisingly attentive, Kazuto.""You said back then that you didn't live together anymore. Did you...did you ever find her? After, I mean."She shook her head sadly. "No. I mean, I've started looking for stuff about her once we got out, and I did find some. She's recently been in magazines as the youngest ever to graduate from CalTech in America, and she's apparently going to be a faculty researcher there." Turning on her phone, she pulled up the article she'd found a few days prior, and showed him.Back then, reading it had filled her with immeasurable pride at her sister's achievement. She'd always known that her sister was a genius, but this just further drove it home – and left her wondering if perhaps their father hadn't been right to take her to nurture that genius. Maybe, just maybe all of their family's heartache would be worth it. After all, they called her the kind of genius that only comes along once every few generations. Maybe Nana will actually change the world."...she looks really young."Nijika nodded. "She's five years younger than me.""That makes her...twelve?" Kazuto's eyebrows shot up, and a low whistle escaped him. "That's...wow. She's got to be crazy smart, then.""Yeah. She's a certified genius," she told him proudly. "When our parents split and left Russia, my dad moved to America with her so she could have the best education he could afford. My mother thought that she should grow up like a normal child, without all of the pressure and attention until she got older, but looking at this, it's hard to argue with the results."He looked up at her. "I didn't know you were Russian.""My father is. My mother is Japanese," Nijika answered. "We left there when I was nine. Nana would've been four...I don't think she'd even remember me, she was so young." A bitter laugh escaped her. "I don't think she even knows I exist, and I'm not sure Dad would've told her about me or even Mom. She'd have come looking for us otherwise, and I'm pretty sure he'd consider that a distraction.""I wouldn't be so sure."His firm answer caused her to tilt her head in askance. "What do you mean?""About her not remembering you, I mean," Kazuto elaborated. "When my parents died in a car accident, I was younger than that. Yeah, I don't remember their faces, but I remember hearing my mother's voice. I remember being held and being warm…" his tone wavered for a moment.
"I somehow even remember the colour of my mother's favourite scarf. Mom – I mean, my adoptive mother – she didn't believe me when I told her, but apparently I was right, and she did wear that blue scarf everywhere." The black-haired boy took a deep, shuddering breath for a moment, before looking back up with a comforting smile. "What I mean is that I wouldn't give up. Sure, she might not recognize what you look like when you meet and she might be confused if she never heard anything about a sister while growing up, but she'll recognize your voice, or your eyes, or something else when you do meet. You're her sister, after all.""That's…" For a moment, Nijika's voice caught in her throat, and her hands trembled. That's so unfair, Kirito. How do you know just what to say when you're the self-admitted shut-in with zero social experience?
"Hey," he said, changing the topic suddenly, "why don't you email her?""...what?" Nijika blinked."Yeah. Here, look," Kazuto turned the phone back towards her. "This is her, right? Nanairo Arshavin?"She nodded slowly, trying to make sense of the English website he'd pulled up on her phone screen, before remembering that he was relatively fluent. It looked like a roster of people, and she only quickly glanced over the text there, unable to make out everything, but it was a picture in the center that her eyes zeroed in on. It was a picture of a young, cheerful girl with wide, excited eyes and a beaming smile, with a pink beret coquettishly perked atop her head.
"Yeah," Nijika croaked, her throat suddenly dry as she realized it was a recent picture judging by the age of the girl. "That's her.""You said she was going to be faculty, so I checked the university's website. She's actually listed there, along with her university email address," Kazuto explained. "I mean, it's not her personal email, but it's worth a shot, right?"Nijika froze, and a tremor ran through her spine as she realized that he was right. So long...for so long I could only watch from afar and collect whatever scraps of info I could find. I read whatever articles I could find about her, but I could never figure out a way to reach out. Mom might have known, but…But that would have required going through the siblings' father.Their parents had loved each other, but it was also that same love that she remembered all too well as the one thing that had ultimately torn them apart. Both parents wanted what was best for their daughters, but they had never been able to agree on what that was, and to this day, her mother was somewhat bitter about the path that her former husband had taken for Nijika's sister even as she was proud and sad at the same time.Looking down at the phone screen, it was here. It was within her grasp – the ability to reach out and reconnect with the little sister she thought she might never see again. But...what should I say? Nijika pondered nervously. I can't just send an email and go "Hi Nana, it's me, Nijika, your older sister! Hope you're doing well!" Would she even remember me, or Mom?"It'll be fine." Kazuto's voice cut through the whirlwind of thoughts in her mind, and Nijika latched onto it for stability."I...I don't even know what I would say," she whispered. "What do I start with?"He shrugged. "I don't know. How about just hello?"Nijika just stared at him, before reaching out to playfully slap the black-haired boy's shoulder. "You!""What?" Kazuto asked innocently. "Hey, maybe send her an invitation to your debut concert, how about that?""I can't do that!" She grumbled good-naturedly at his answer, knowing that he wasn't even being facetious about it. He'd meant what he said, and she couldn't help but marvel at how straightforward he seemed to be when it wasn't related to him. Guess what they say about not being able to see the forest for the trees is true, and all."You can start with happy birthday, and go from there." He grinned, before getting up and extending a hand. "Come on, you can figure out the rest on the way home. The others have gone home already, but I can give you a ride back."-------------------------------
November 19th, 2025
Even though it was far smaller than Aincrad, Alfheim, or even Kizmel's own Haven, she couldn't help but marvel at the world that they had built together. Despite the fact that its sole purpose was to house a stage for Yuna and Rain to perform on, the place that Kirito, Nautilus, and the two singers had made and asked for Kizmel's help in creating was a sight to behold. It would have been so easy to ask Cardinal, and have her mother complete the work they had painstakingly done over weeks in mere moments, but they had chosen not to.Instead, they had asked for Kizmel's help, and together, they had shaped the stage for the first public performance of Rain and Yuna; the last time she'd been here had been for a rehearsal when they had run through the entire performance's lighting and background, and the former dark elf had been amazed at spectacle they were capable of producing. Even in the dark, with the stage unlit and only a few lights turned on in the wake of her passing through, she could spot little changes that they had made since then, minute alterations to the wooden, hand-painted backgrounds and the way the lights had been set up.Working together with the others to make this place come truly alive had been an inspiring experience for Kizmel, and she had even taking an interest in tasks that she had picked up as a result of their time working on this stage. Asking her mother to help her create the necessary tools in Haven had helped her appreciate the efforts others who laboriously slaved over seemingly small details so lovingly, and she'd begun filling one of the rooms in her cottage in Haven with trinkets and implements as Kizmel experimented with various small projects of her own.
There was nothing natural about this little island in a sea of nothing, and yet it felt like this small world of theirs had a history and character shaped by their efforts, their dreams, and aspirations. It had a character that, for all their grandeur and scale – or perhaps, because of their scale – worlds like Alfheim and Underworld could not match, at least not yet.There was simply something...human about it.A tingle in the back of her mind alerted Kizmel to the presence of another as they connected to this private world, and she turned around, recognizing her fellow visitor with a smile. "Yuna.""Kizmel!" The songstress of Aincrad broke out into a matching grin when she caught sight of her. "I didn't expect to see you here.""I apologize for the intrusion," Kizmel said, "I just-" she cut off momentarily, unable to quite fully articulate why she'd come here. It had been on a whim, a momentary urge to visit the place where she'd spent a good part of her free time in the past few weeks helping them create this magical place.Yuna waved her off, unconcerned. "I didn't mean it like that, and you're not intruding at all! You're always welcome, I was just surprised because we didn't have anything scheduled, and there was no one else here. Um...there isn't anyone else here, right? I'm not interrupting anything?""I am alone," the lilac-haired woman assured her as the songstress looked around in agitation. "I came here to...think, I suppose.""Think?" Yuna tilted her head. "Is everything okay?""It is." Kizmel paused, looking down at her hands. "Thank you for asking me to help with this, Yuna. And Rain and Nautilus as well. It means...very much to me that you would go out of your way to ask me when you could have simply done it on your own."The other girl shook her head. "Of course we'd ask you to help!" she declared as though it was self-explanatory. "I mean, aside from the fact that you're pretty much the expert when it comes to tinkering with the Seed and trying to make a place like this, why wouldn't we ask you for help? Especially since we were already asking Kazuto-kun. You've been a huge help, and we really couldn't have done this without you.""I'm glad I was able to be of help," she said, before turning to look up at Yuna. "It is...the first time I was asked to actually build something," she confided the other girl. "Something not related to war, at any rate.""...oh!" Yuna blinked, and realization dawned on her. "Yeah, I guess hobbies are a little hard to come by, um, wherever you're living now." An awkward chuckle escaped her throat. "It's just...it's so easy to forget you're not with us out there in the real world.""I shall take that as a compliment." Kizmel shook her head, the words spilling from her lips, perhaps as a result of her recent contemplation as to her own place in these worlds. "For so long I have spent my life preparing for war and battle. My hands have ended the lives of many an opponent, and yet...it is...reassuring to know that battle is not all that these hands can do."The brunette smiled broadly. "You've never had the chance to do anything else, huh? Even back in Aincrad I never really saw you doing anything other than training or practicing and reading. I guess fighting is all you've known for, well, your entire life, if you wanted to be technical.""I suppose that could be one way of looking at things," Kizmel admitted, unwilling to correct the other girl about the details of her own memory. It was, after all, as far as most swordmasters were concerned, the way things were. "Thank you for giving me the opportunity to try and learn new things, to create and build, rather than destroy."Yuna reached out and clasped one of her hands in between her own. "Of course! I'm glad you had fun. It's been...a process for all of us adjusting to being back, but I guess it's been the worst of all for you, huh?""I would not say that," the lilac-haired woman shrugged. "It has been...enlightening, but also daunting. But working on this, with all of you, has given me some measure of reassurance that I will eventually find something I would like to do for myself. Perhaps not today, nor tomorrow, but one day."A giggle came from the shorter girl, causing Kizmel to look down in confusion, to find her staring back bemusedly. "Oh, I didn't mean to laugh at you, Kizmel," Yuna said hurriedly, "it's just...you're not the only one who's stuck in that particular rut, believe it or not. A lot of us go through the same thing once we're done with school. What do we do after? Do we go to university? And if we do, what do we study? What kinds of interests do we have? What do we want to do in the future? It's just such a...human thing, I couldn't help but laugh."Is it? Kizmel thought back to the times she'd sat in with Kirito during his lessons at the Survivor's School. That's right. Yuna, Nautilus, Asuna and Sachi are all preparing to go to university. The others…They would eventually face the same choice."Usually if you're unsure, a school has a guidance or career counselor," Yuna continued, "and the students talk to them about the things they like doing and that interest them, so that they can make some recommendations. But I'm guessing that's not something you can do, huh?"Kizmel hummed in thought. A counselor to guide me in my plans for the future? "Perhaps there might be a way," she finally conceded. "There are some whom I can ask, at any rate.""Oh?" Yuna's eyes lit up. "Well, I'm glad to hear that! And remember, we're there, too. We're not professionals, and we're still figuring things out on our own, but if you ever want to talk or ask about things, we're here for you."A smile slowly curled at the edges of Kizmel's lips. "Thank you, Yuna. And thank you for allowing me to be part of fulfilling your dreams. I'm happy that you consider me a friend and called upon me to help.""You're more than just a friend, Kizmel," the other girl replied, pulling her into a loose hug, "you're family."-------------------------------
November 21st, 2025
Nijika looked at the stage with no small measure of apprehension, anxiously playing with the long, silvery tresses she had chosen for this particular look of her avatar. Hair colour aside, it was the same as the one she used in NewALO, barring the pointed ears and fairy wings, and the face was still undeniably her own – it was a habit that had been hard to break from SAO, and Yuna clearly felt the same way, having not been shy about using her real-life appearance for the concert model.
The last few days leading up to the day's live debut had been a whirlwind of rehearsals, practice, and preparation, leaving her exhausted and with little time or energy to spare to feel anxious. But now that everything was done, and there wasn't time for anything else, paradoxically she had nothing but time to worry, and the stage, which had become so familiar to her over the past weeks, was feeling unusually intimidating.There was a timer on her HUD that counted down the minutes until they went live as the platinum-blonde girl paced back and forth, unwilling to bother the only two other people there with her sudden bout of nervousness. Eiji had agreed to be the cameraman and handle the technical aspects of switching around the lighting and backgrounds as they transitioned from song to song, so he had his hands full. Yuna, on the other hand, seemed unnaturally calm right before their debut; the blonde wasn't sure if she really was that confident, or if she was just internalizing her own jitters. The older girl was gliding around the stage, her mouth moving silently as Nijika imagined she was singing their repertoire to herself, following the steps they had practiced.It was difficult not to admire the grace and fluidity with which the songstress moved, as though she'd been born to perform – and Nijika knew first hand that her voice matched that talent. Even back in Aincrad her singing had drawn entire crowds with little effort, so it was no surprise that she was a somewhat popular singer online already.But my tone and style are entirely different, the blonde couldn't help but worry.
She'd always loved singing, but never really seriously attempted anything related to it simply because of her preference in music and the fact that her voice absolutely refused to pitch into the high registers that many idols lived in without cracking. As a result, singing had been a dream she'd almost given up on before they had all ended up trapped in Akihiko Kayaba's death game. It was only by chance that she'd gone to karaoke with Yuna and the others and taken hold of the microphone, after which the older girl had all but dragged her into singing together, claiming that she had a knack for the kind of deep, modern pop-rock that was popular overseas.Yuna said there shouldn't be a problem with my voice, and we picked songs that complement it, plus we'll be backup for each other, but still...it was hard to shake years of feeling insecure about her own voice."Five minutes," Eiji called out from the darkness beyond the stage.Glancing at the clock on her HUD at the reminder, she realized that he was right. Nijika moved to stand and head towards the stage, only to find her limbs trembling and weak. There's no way I can dance like this. Gritting her teeth, she tried to force her way through, laboriously placing one foot in front of the other, but the closer she got the more leaden her steps became.There was a soft chime at the edge of her awareness, momentarily distracting the blonde from her plight. A small icon was lit up and pulsing gently on the edge of her HUD. Someone's calling me? She'd set her phone up to not be disturbed, and everyone else knew that she was about to go live, leaving her to wonder who could be on the other end.Taking a deep breath and somewhat glad for the respite, Nijika stopped and swiped her hand through the air to answer the call. A window appeared in front of her, with a familiar face."Kizmel?" Nijika whispered incredulously. "Um...what's wrong?"The lilac-haired woman was clearly in NewALO, judging by the background and the low noise of background conversation that filtered through the connection. "Nothing is wrong, Rain," Kizmel said with a gentle smile. "I just called to wish you luck. Everyone else is here, too. See?"She panned the lens around, capturing the inside of what Nijika recognized as the lounge of Fuurinkazan's guild home in Yggdrasil City. All of their friends were there and then some, as the group had decided to advertise and invite anyone they could get a hold of for the girls' big event. They even got a hold of General Eugene, Lady Sakuya, and Alicia Rue, Nijika realized, spotting three of the game's faction's leaders in the background.
But that wasn't all. Everyone is there...really, everyone.Kirito was, of course, right next to Kizmel, giving her a broad grin and a thumbs-up as the camera passed by him, Agil was engaged in a good-natured, animated argument with Klein and Dale as the three looked up and waved. Sachi and Lisbeth were chatting and smiling, seated next to Silica and even Asuna was there; Yuuki and her friends were talking to Philia and the other members of Fuurinkazan on Kizmel's other side, the three Imps had long since gotten over the surprise that they all had independently met one another and were now trading stories.Even Kuro was there, the black-clad Spriggan still dressed in a fashion reminiscent of the Black Swordsman, much to what she imagined was Kirito's chagrin and everybody else's amusement. Recon and Leafa were hanging out with the three faction leaders...but each and everyone one of them stopped what they were doing and looked at her encouragingly."We are all here for you, Rain," Kizmel said as she panned the screen around. "No matter what happens, we know how hard you have worked for this, and we all wish you the best in fulfilling this dream of yours. Wherever you are, whatever task you set yourself to, know that you are not alone. You have family here to lift you to your feet if your own legs should falter.""She's right," Kirito agreed as he leaned in. "You'll do great, Nijika.""If you sing just the way you did at karaoke nights, you've got nothing to worry about.""Yeah! Don't worry so much, your voice is great!""Hey, can you do the theme from-" Harry One's comment was cut off abruptly when Issin rapped his knuckles on his fellow guild member's head."Oi, don't ask the girls anything that'll get them copyrighted on their first day!"Nijika couldn't help but laugh at the absurd display of affection and camaraderie. "I'll sing it next time we do karaoke, how about that?""Sure! Thanks!""Rain, is it?" The call finally passed to Lady Sakuya, and the older woman's gaze bored into her own even across the connection that spanned entire virtual worlds. "I wish you good fortune in your endeavour. I once considered singing, myself, but like you, my voice was considered unsuited for the popular songs at the time. I'm happy to see that you found the courage to do what I never could."She'd only spoken to the leader of the Sylphs once or twice in passing, but Nijika remembered clearly that her voice was deep and soothing, a refined tone suitable for a mature woman or a Yamato Nadeshiko rather than the preppy tones of an idol. The blonde girl blushed at the praise, but the camera moved on before she could respond."Go knock 'em dead!" Eugene was as boisterous as ever, but the grinning confidence from the burly Salamander was infectious.Nijika swallowed tightly as they continued around the room, seemingly never stopping, until Eiji's voice finally brought her back to reality."Thirty seconds! Get to the stage, please!"Nijika nodded slowly, and sucked in a deep breath. "I've got...I've gotta go. We're about to go live." Her voice was still trembling, but her limbs were not.
A chorus of encouragements sent her off as the connection finally cut out, and the silver-haired girl turned her eyes towards where Yuna was waving her up with a big smile.
All right, it's let's go. Everyone's watching, so let's give them a show!
-------------------------------Kizmel looked up at the huge screen on the wall as the lights around them dimmed. A clock was running down, counting down the last ten seconds before the performance would begin, shown not just here, but all across Alfheim and even the human world for all those who wanted to see. She'd been present when the two girls had practiced their performance, listened to them sing and watched them dance, but it was entirely different to see everything come together now.There was something magical about sitting in a darkened space and watching the dazzling lights and elegant steps while their voices harmonized, even if the rhythms and beats were unfamiliar to her sensitivities.Next to her, Kirito was smiling, seated between her and his sister, but his attention was not entirely on the show that was being put on in front of them. Leaning over, she quietly whispered a question into his ear, and in response, he made his menus visible to her, revealing that he was looking at a mystic page on what Kizmel had learned the humans called the internet, the way that most people would be watching the girls' concert from their homes. Her husband pointed to a number that was steadily growing.
"Looks like the viewer count is going up," he murmured back just as quietly. "We're already passing ten thousand."It was difficult for her to imagine ten thousand people whose eyes were drawn towards the two girls on stage. It was as numerous as the swordmasters that had been trapped in Aincrad, far more than she'd ever seen in one place, and Kizmel marveled at the ease with which the humans of her husband's world could reach out to such masses without needing them to be present in person. I could not imagine ten thousand being assembled even in the streets of Lyusula, much less in a single hall.And yet there were places that could hold not just that, but many times that number in Kirito's world. She recalled images she had seen and places she had read about that had been built thousands of years ago there – the human world simply had a sense of scale that dwarfed everything she knew.With one last look at the state of the concert's attendance, her husband smiled and closed the menu completely, before reaching over to wrap an arm around her waist. Kizmel sighed contentedly and leaned into his shoulder as both of their eyes returned to the show. Letting the music wash over her, she closed her eyes, listening to Rain and Yuna sing from what seemed like the very bottom of their souls.Even though these songs were not their own, the former knight felt as though they were capable of making them such, as Yuna's sharp, bright voice gave way to Rain's melancholy, deeper tones in turn. It was not the kind of music she was used to, nor was it any kind of music that she had known from the steel castle, Yuna's performances there aside. But just as there was an entirely new world for her to explore, so too did it have its own myths, legends, people, stories, and music. Not every song was to her taste, but she could feel the very heart and soul the pair was pouring into them, so there were none she disliked entirely, and many that Kizmel had grown quite fond of.When the concert finally came to a close and Rain and Yuna, their faces flushed with exertion but wearing happy, fulfilled smiles, took their final bows, the lilac-haired Imp had completely lost track of the time. The screen lit up only for the concert stage to fade to blackness among thunderous applause that she was sure was echoed by everyone who'd watched, and Klein turned back up the lights in the guild hall.Chatter rose among the assembled players slowly as the magic of the performance faded, and her ears picked up little else but praise for the two aspiring songstresses among those present."Man, I knew they were good, but that's pretty freaking great," Kunimittz said, letting out a low whistle. He turned towards Kirito. "You guys helped set that up, right? Nice job, man. That was pretty close to a professional production.""Thanks." The black-haired Sylph by her side chuckled. "But we just made what Rain and Yuna asked us to. Everything you saw is what they came up with. They picked the songs and choreographed the whole thing, too.""Time and effort well spent," she muttered once the older man had taken his leave, eliciting a nod of agreement from him."Yeah." He sighed. "Looks like it was a success, too – I'm not surprised, considering how popular those two were getting just from solo cover videos. But it's still a big jump to a full production like this."She tilted her head curiously. "Do you believe they will hold another concert like this?""Maybe," Kirito shrugged. "Probably. It's a lot cheaper than renting out an actual stage or stadium, but it'll still cost money. They'll need some professional help next time. We can do okay, but...""Could we not continue as we have?"Her husband looked back with a mischievous grin. "I take it you had fun helping them out?""I did," Kizmel had no problem admitting. "Watching them, I feel...hopeful.""Hopeful?"She nodded. "Despite everything that you they have suffered, despite every horror and trauma that you have faced in Aincrad, they look forward with bright, hopeful eyes and continue to reach for their dreams.""Well, yeah," Agil chimed in, leaning over the back of the couch they were sitting on. "We've got a lot to be grateful for. Surviving the death game first among them, but I think that it really put things into perspective for a lot of people. I can't speak for everyone, but I think a lot of us feel that we've been given a second chance, and we want to make the most of it."He looked across the happy crowd. "I know that I came out of that mess with a new appreciation for every day that I can wake up and be with my wife. Others...well, it looks like they might not want to put off their dreams any more. Maybe they feel like it's not worth the wait, and they'd rather take the chance and fail, than miss their opportunity to try at all."Kizmel looked down at her hands where they were joined with Kirito's. Dreams…What were my own dreams? It was a question that she had begun to ponder only recently, and it occupied much of her thoughts whenever she was not immediately busy with something. She had listened to their friends prepare for the next step in their lives, speaking with those like Asuna, Yuna, Sachi, or Nautilus that were making ready to embark on the first step to fulfill their dreams. Watching them work hard and knowing that Kirito was close to having to make a similar decision had planted a seed of that question within her mind.Now that she no longer needed to fight, now that she had an entirely new world at her fingertips, what did she wish to do?
Tilnel always wished to be a healer, to help those in need. Father lived to serve, a knight and soldier all his life, and mother was a scholar, always in pursuit of knowledge.
But Kizmel herself? For as far back as she could remember, she'd had no such ambitions of her own. Try as she might, the Imp couldn't think of a time when she had dreamt of a profession she wished to take, nor a goal she wished to achieve, at least until the war with the Forest Elves had broken out in earnest.

Then I became a knight to follow in my father's footsteps, I fought battles, and yet even then…even so, my only goal back then was to see the fighting end.
It wasn't until she had met Kirito and Asuna that Kizmel had begun to question what she wished to do in life, but even then, it had been an arduous, danger-filled task that had left them all with little opportunity to do more than take it one day at a time and hope they survived to see the sun rise one more time. As much as it vexed her to think herself so shallow, she had never even considered what to do after the fighting was done.What is it that I wish to do? Kizmel didn't have an answer.
"I...envy them," she finally said quietly. "For their dreams. Their aspirations. I...have no such things.""Nah, I think you do," Agil countered immediately. "You just haven't had a chance to find out what it is.""Is that so?""It is," the older man confirmed unhesitatingly. "Everything you've done up to now is fight. But that's not your fault – it's quite literally what you were originally made for in the game."Next to her, Kirito winced at his bluntness, but didn't interrupt – Agil was not known for mincing words, after all.The dark-skinned Gnome continued. "And even when you became more, all you did after joining us was fight, because that was the only way out for us all. I'd be willing to bet that you never had the chance to do anything else, because I don't think there was any need for you to, in the first place. You were never given the choice or opportunity to."She thought back to the hazy memories of her past. "I suppose you may be right," Kizmel admitted. "It is...daunting, but I suppose I should take heart that it is a challenge everyone must overcome.""Well, it's never too late to start." The older man shrugged. "To be fair, you're hardly unique in that. All I can say is maybe start trying different things until you find something that catches your interest."She chuckled. "I believe Yuna said something to that effect, as well.""Did she, now?" Agil's booming laughter echoed across the guild hall.-------------------------------
November 23rd, 2025
"...what's this about, Doc?"Rinko Kojirou gestured towards where Kizmel was hammering away at a piece of glowing white-hot metal on an anvil, before inspecting it and putting it back into the forge that had joined the two cabins under construction near the Spire. "Oh, you're here," the doctor replied, not even looking up from where she was taking notes."Okay…" Kikuoka shook his head; he had his hands full already, having planned on delegating anything related to Rath and Underworld's operation to his second-in-command while he dealt with the case that had been sent over from Tokyo Metro Police, but the message from Doctor Kojirou had sounded urgent enough for him to pay a visit to Underworld, himself. "...and what is she doing, exactly?"Rinko finally looked up. "Blacksmithing, obviously.""I can see that, Doctor. I meant, what is going on that's urgent enough for you to call me here?" he clarified.
She adjusted her glasses. "Ah. Right. I suppose it would be more apt to say that she's crafting, or trying her hand at it, at any rate. At least that's what she said when I asked," she added, pointing towards the workbenches that showed recent signs of being used. "She's trying to make things. The old-fashioned way, without just willing them into existence.""...crafting?" Kikuoka blinked, nonplussed. That was something he hadn't expected. Then, a second thought caught up to him. "Wait...we haven't even gotten to geology yet – where'd she get the ore from? And I know wood fires don't burn hot enough without using coal or charcoal. Don't tell me she went mining, too.""No, those she made, just like the forge and tools. I suppose it's more about the actual act of making something for her, than building up to something in particular," Rinko answered. "I wouldn't have been too surprised or concerned, but the logs show that she's been here since around eleven last night, without pause. Now, she doesn't need sleep or food, but still…"I see why Doctor Kojirou is concerned. Letting out a quiet sigh, Kikuoka rubbed his temples; for a moment, he considered just letting things play out, but just because the doctor seemed content to simply observe and ask the occasional question while providing the odd word of advice or encouragement, he knew the kind of intense focus and concentration that was written all over the AI girl's face as she tried to tune out the world in order to make sense of...something."You didn't ask her about it?"Rinko shrugged. "Of course I did. She just told me that she wanted to try things out, because while she technically has the memory of doing some things, she doesn't actually have those memories or experiences, at least not in detail. Plus, I suppose she got inspired by seeing the progress on the cabins. Higa-kun agreed that it would be a good test of the fine detail resolution of the simulation, so we saw no reason not to proceed.""But it was still anomalous enough for you to let me know," he pointed out."Well...yes, of course. Kizmel hasn't ever really shown any interest in this kind of work, especially not when it comes to hand-making things the old-fashioned way," Rinko told him dryly. "She seems to be fine and even, I daresay, enjoying some of it. But as to why...well, I have no idea."The government agent observed her for a moment, watching Kizmel rhythmically swing the hammer up and down as she struck the glowing piece of steel. Up and down the heavy sledge went, striking iron with a shower of sparks – though apparently the simulation hadn't been yet set fine enough for those to be a threat of injury or fire. Even if they were, the woman swinging the hammer could simply will the flames or the injuries out of existence.It wasn't easy to fault the doctor for being fascinated by the process; he'd watched traditional Japanese smiths work on swords before, but what Kizmel was employing was a western approach as she gradually turned the lump of raw ore into a bar, and from there proceeded to hammer it into a long, gently curved shape.She's making a sword, he realized. It had the rough proportions of a katana, but until she finished he couldn't be sure. For a moment, Kikuoka wondered if she was even aware of what it was that she was making, especially as there was no need for a weapon in Underworld – but one look at her face told him that she was running on autopilot. Her body was going through the motions, her eyes keenly watching the steel for any imperfections as she worked it into the shape she desired, but somehow he could tell that her mind was occupied with something else.
Of course she is, otherwise she wouldn't have been here going on...almost fourteen hours straight.
"How long have you been observing her, Doctor?"Rinko blinked, before tilting her head in thought. "Not that long. Higa-kun informed me that she was here when I came in, so I logged on to take a look. When he checked the access logs and told me how long she'd been here, I sent you that message."Kikuoka sighed; he'd indeed gotten her message earlier, but hadn't managed to find the time to come by the lab until now. Looks like Kizmel isn't the only one lost in her work. Can't anyone around here take care of themselves?"It's almost one in the afternoon, Doctor," he said. "Unlike her, you do need food and water. It's just about lunch time – why don't you take a break for a bit. Don't worry, I'll keep an eye on her. Maybe find out what's going on with her, since I'm pretty sure this is unusual for her.""...oh. I suppose I did lose track of time." The doctor shook her head. "It's just fascinating watching her.""I'm sure it is. But you of all people should know the importance of taking care of yourself."She nodded. "I do, of course." With one last glance at the knight-turned-blacksmith, she pursed her lips. "I'll go take care of a few things while I'm at it, and check over the logs with Higa-kun. Even if she's doing this for her own reasons, we're getting quite a lot of good data from it. She's actually saving us a lot of time and effort in having our own people do similar experiments."She finished jotting down a few more lines in her notebook, before logging off and disappearing from Underworld, leaving just Kikuoka to watch by himself as Kizmel tried her hands at moving steel.
Considering that the person swinging the hammer was someone who didn't tire and had near-limitless strength if she so wished it, the steel moved faster than even under a mechanical power hammer, and it didn't take much longer for Kizmel to leave the finished product to rest on the anvil to cool off. With her hands stilling and her task complete, she finally seemed to come back to her senses, wordlessly staring down at the sword-shaped bar of steel with a bitter
frown. Figuring that now was as good a time as any, before she started on something else, Kikuoka stepped towards her and cleared his throat."Kizmel?"
Her eyes wandered up to him. "Oh? Ser Kikuoka. I apologize, I was so caught up in my task that I did not notice you there.""I'd say so," he replied genially, gesturing towards the tools strewn about. "It certainly looks like you've been busy."Kizmel looked around the area around herself as though only noticing for the first time. "I...apologize?" she muttered, ducking her head in embarrassment."Nothing to apologize for. As it is, I think you've just accelerated whatever experiments Doctor Kojirou and Higa-kun had planned by a fair bit," he answered with a chuckle, before walking up to the anvil to examine her handiwork, carefully stepping over the discarded pieces of burnt iron and malformed lumps of half-consolidated ore. "Looks like you've got a knack for working with your hands. Though I'm sure your stamina and strength don't hurt in being able to just keep on going. But I'm curious, why the sudden interest in blacksmithing? I didn't really take you for an artisan."She followed his gaze, and the sad look returned. "I must have watched smiths forge things dozens of times in Aincrad, both NPCs and players alike. I have watched them place ingots into a furnace and strike them with a hammer, only to instantly yield the desired shape and form. At the time, I thought nothing of it, for that was the way the world worked, but only now do I see how absurd such a thing really is. Iron and steel are not so fragile that they move with a single touch of the hammer, nor do they magically take the shape you desire simply because you will it so."
"Well, a case could be made for you and Cardinal being able to do just that," Kikuoka pointed out, "but I'm sure that's not the point you're trying to make."Kizmel chuckled at his forced bit of levity. "I suppose that I have spent a lot of time thinking about my place in this world, and what I could do to contribute to it.""I'd say you're doing plenty," the ministry official countered. "You're providing invaluable insight by helping us test and develop these systems.""For now, that is the case," she agreed, "but as I was watching my friends prepare to move on from school to pick their paths in life, I could not help but think of what came after for myself. It might be years from now, but I hope that there will come a time when this secrecy will no longer be necessary, when I can live my life in your world as any other. When that time comes, I wish to be able to do something, but I have come to realize that all I know is how to fight.""So you decided to pick up crafting?" Kikuoka raised an eyebrow.The AI girl nodded. "It was the most immediate thing I could think of," she told him. "Something that I could try my hand at without too much inconvenience to others. Besides, I felt like I overstepped my bounds when I spoke to Dame Rinko last week. I spoke grandly of knowing and understanding, of grasping the ways of the world without the need to truly, fully experience it...and I realized that, perhaps, it was simply my own conceit that made me speak in such a way about growth and knowledge, of what makes something intelligent, when truly, I have no basis for my words."
Ah, that's right. Doctor Kojirou mentioned that Kizmel suggested her own theory when they did the resolution test last week, he recalled. The doctor seemed intrigued by her idea, but it looks like the person in question is having second thoughts.
"So you decided to try and put your money where your mouth it?" he prodded."Yes," Kizmel admitted. "I chose something I have observed again and again, but that still seemed attainable with what is possible and available to me here in Underworld, under the constraints of your world's rules." She looked down at the anvil. "I know that steel is strong and firm, yet somehow, I still expected it to yield under just a single blow, like I had seen it do for Lisbeth so many times. It took...time, to learn how to strike it so it would move without breaking, and how to form the shape I desired."The ministry official let out a low whistle. If what she's saying is true and she's only ever watched smiths make things in SAO, and this is the first time she's ever picked up a hammer and forge, that means she taught herself how to make something like this in a day. That's…He looked at the blade she'd produced carefully, noticing that it was smooth and homogenous; he didn't know she had forge-welded layers together like a traditional katana, or if it had been made from one solid piece of steel, but the surface was smooth and even. A fuller had been hammered into the bottom three-quarters of its length, but more impressive was the delicate taper that thinned it from base to tip, something he knew took a lot of skill and practice to do cleanly. Even without holding the blade in his hand, it was plain to see that this was no amateur's work and he could easily imagine it being light, fast, and well-balanced.
Guess that explains all the failed products on the ground. Honestly, the speed at which she picks things up is frightening...I wonder if it's because this is her native environment, or because she's just that capable.
"I'd say that's pretty impressive," he pointed out. "In our world, craftsmen practice for many years, sometimes even decades, before they can produce something like this. But you're looking rather dissatisfied with the final product."Kizmel's lips quirked into a wry grin. "I attempted to make many things, but somehow, this was the only one that would come out right, even after dozens of attempts. When I helped my friends make things these past few months, I felt that perhaps, I was capable of more than just war, that there was something I could take pride in doing, not to destroy, but to create. And yet, it seems when I am put to the test to create something on my own, the only thing I can make with any competence is a weapon of war."Ah, Kikuoka thought to himself. I think I'm beginning to see where the problem lies."I had hoped that perhaps in creating things, I could find my own path forward in your world," she continued quietly, looking down at her hands. "One that would not require bloodshed and violence."This world isn't as peaceful as you think it is, Kizmel, Kikuoka couldn't help but think to himself, careful not to let those thoughts show. Sure, the scales of battlefields and the way wars are being fought might have changed, but soldiers like you and me aren't as obsolete as you might believe."You know, I think you're selling yourself short there," he told her out loud, instead. "It sounds like you've had a lot on your mind – not that I can blame you. I bet that you were working away at all of this to keep your hands occupied just as much as it was to actually give it a try, right?"Violet eyes looked back at him. "...I suppose I had much to think about," she agreed.He shrugged. "So you made a sword. So what? And it's a pretty good one, too, from the looks of it. If you want my opinion on it, you ended up making this one right because it's the thing you know best. Just because you know theoretically how you do something, doesn't mean you'll immediately be good at it. Now, I have no idea how you learn and process experience, but for us humans, it's a lengthy, drawn-out process. It takes us many tries and sometimes years of doing something to become really good at it."Kikuoka reached out to carefully pick up the blade that lay on the anvil. The steel still felt warm in his palm as he curled fingers around the bare tang. Just as I thought. It's lighter than a katana, and it's balanced to be used one-handed.Giving it an experimental flourish and testing its balance confirmed his suspicions. "You've wielded a sword for as long as you can remember. You're intimately familiar with how it should feel, how much it should weigh, and how it should move. For a craftsman, it's just as important to understand what they're making as much as how to make it. Any old blacksmith can hammer a bar of steel into the shape of a sword, but only a swordsmith can make a blade worthy of being wielded," he explained.Handing the blade back to her he urged her to hold it in her hands. "What do you feel when you hold it? Is it too heavy? Too unwieldy?""It feels…" Kizmel gave it an experimental swing. "It feels just right," she finally said."There you go." Kikuoka nodded. "The reason this is the one thing out of everything you tried to make that came out perfect? It's because you actually understand what a sword is. What it needs, the shape you want it to have. This sword is something you have a perfect mental image of. It's not the sword that's most familiar to me, and I'd bet if you asked that boyfriend of yours, he'd have a different idea of what his ideal sword is, too. But this one is yours. It's born from the image you have, and the experience that has formed that image. It's the thing you're most familiar with, the thing you understand the most out of everything that you've tried to make, and when trying something new, sometimes having something familiar to latch on to is important.""Is that so…" she murmured."It's a start. A good one, too, but that's all it is. So what if you can only make this one sword right now? That doesn't mean you can't keep practicing until you can make other things. Failure is only the end if you allow it to be – take it as a learning experience, figure out what went wrong, and move on." He chuckled. "Actually, I've gotten messages from Higa-kun asking if you'd be willing to make felling axes and other tools for the building process while you've been here."
Kizmel smiled softly. "Perhaps, once my skills have improved.""Take it as practice to make something new." Kikuoka cleared his throat. "Anyway, you said before that you thought it was presumptuous to believe that you could hit the ore just once and have it turn into whatever you wanted it to. But isn't it equally presumptuous to think that you could pick up any kind of craft or trade that takes people decades to master and instantly be good at it, if you've never done it before? That experience and understanding you talked to Doctor Kojirou about – isn't that the exact thing you're proving right now? We didn't give you the parameters on how to exactly make something, you're having to learn it from the ground up."Violet eyes looked at him with a glimmer of amusement as she stuck the bladed into the ground point-first and reached for the hammer again. "You have quite the silver tongue, Seijirou Kikuoka. Are you sure you are not a merchant or a politician?"A slight grin tugged at his own lips. "No way. I've been a soldier all my life, but I have enough friends that left military life behind and found themselves looking at the same problem you're facing now. When you're suddenly leaving behind the only thing you've known most of your life, it tends to leave you feeling lost, especially in a society that's as rigid as ours. Many of them are just like you, looking for their place in the world and are realizing that what they've spent the last years or decades learning and doing is...well, unnecessary at best, and socially unacceptable at worst. But I'd say the fact that you're trying out new things and expanding your horizons is a pretty good start.""That is what my friends told me, as well." Kizmel looked back up at him, the corners of her lips quirking up in amusement."It sounds like they've got the right idea, then." He shrugged. "Look, as daunting as it looks and despite your rather unique circumstances, that's something all of us go through, believe it or not. Some even more than once. Now, I can't really give you any advice on what to do, because, well...this entire thing is still new to all of us, but the one thing I will say is that I'd recommend that you try and experience as much as you can. Literature, music, arts, history, hobbies...just try and experience as much as you can, and see if anything catches your fancy.""I see."-------------------------------
November 25th, 2025
Kazuto looked over to where Kizmel was standing next to him in the whitespace that was the Seed Nexus's lobby. Instead of the logo for NewAlfheim Online, however, they were staring at an entirely different icon in the game selection screen, waiting for the files to finish downloading so they could log in for the first time."So...not that I mind at all, but why'd you decide you wanted to try out a different game, all of a sudden? And why this one in particular?" he couldn't help but ask."It caught my eye because it was the most different, I suppose," she answered. "I realized that while I have been learning about your world and we have worked on shaping Underworld, I have never looked beyond Alfheim in the Nexus to see what others have done with the tools Mother gave them to build their own worlds. When I looked, I found that there are many worlds that are similar to Aincrad and Alfheim, worlds of swords and magic, of knights and dragons, but this one was so different that it stood out to me. Besides, the tournament we watched looked interesting."With a quiet ping, the download completed, and proudly displayed the rotating logo for the game she'd chosen: Gun Gale Online."Well, Klein did mention that it looked interesting enough that his guys wanted to give it a try. From what I heard, Dale, Harry One, and Issin gave it a try, and they said it was decent, but they found it hard to play since it's an international game and most players speak in English," Kazuto shrugged.
"Will this be a problem for you?"He looked back at his wife. "I should be asking you that. I'm okay with it written, and I can get along with some spoken English, but you're still learning it, right?""If I need, I can use what Mother taught me to...learn the language," she answered, "although I would be loathe to take such a shortcut.""Well, I can probably deal with most of it, and there is a Japanese language setting for the menus, plus a HUD translation option for everything else. If anyone talks to us, I guess I can try and translate, but I doubt that's going to happen much if all we're doing is looking around," he said. "So, how do you want to do this? We've got a couple of options here."Kizmel blinked. "How so?"He paused, realizing that she'd never done any exploration of other Seed Nexus games before. Not that I did a lot, either, but I've poked around with other programs enough. Plus, I'm pretty sure her account and character are tied together a lot more than a regular account. I know that she's been moving between here, Haven, and Underworld using what's her own body, connecting directly to the server from her own machine, but I never really asked her how she's logging into NewALO."There's two ways we can do this," he started, "one is that we transfer our characters over from NewALO. Just like when we imported our accounts from the SAO servers, we keep our levels, skills, and stats, but they're adjusted for whatever the maximum is of the new game and it deactivates the ones that aren't applicable. It also wipes all of our items and currency, because those definitely aren't compatible."It was the more permanent option of account migration, much in the same way that their SAO characters had been ported over into ALO when YMIR had taken over. Thanks to the World Seed being the core system of all of the games in the Nexus, just like back then, all of the base accounts were compatible, and the system automated a lot of the adjustments that needed to be made, such as finding analog skills that corresponded to the ones they had acquired in their old games, and adjusting the levels and stats to the same relative values based on the new game's maximum values.However, it also required a complete deletion of all items and currency, since those were unique to each game and even if there was overlap, it was a measure to prevent errors and corrupted item codes from appearing much like what had happened to him when he'd first logged into ALO. It also served as a measure to prevent players from farming for items or money in personal, easy-mode worlds that they or other had set up and then simply bringing that into other games and other similar attempts at cheating."We'd have to leave behind all of our stuff with one of our friends," Kazuto explained. "Because if we migrate the account, it'll also remove any claims we have, or any housing we've bought, storage, and banking space.""That sounds like a permanent solution, one which I would prefer not to take." Kizmel tilted her head. "Is there not some other means?"He nodded. "Yeah. We make new characters on our accounts. They're valid across the entirety of the Seed Nexus, so we can use a single account for multiple characters spread across multiple games, or even just a single game, but those characters are going to be tied to their respective games. You know how my sister has that other character? It's the same thing, but we start at level one, with no skills and base attributes.""I would prefer that solution," she told him. "I do not mind starting over fresh, and as much as I would like to explore, I do not see us taking up residence in such a world.""Yeah, GGO isn't exactly known for being a fun place to live in," Kazuto agreed, "although I think they were mentioning on the forums something about implementing player housing and stuff like that in the future. Still, it doesn't look like a very nice place."Kizmel giggled. "I agree – a barren wasteland is not my preferred home. I remember the desolation surrounding Castle Galey, and it was not a pleasant place."Kazuto nodded. "All right, new characters it is. Um...that means it could take a bit," he added, thinking of something else, "because we'll have to go through character creation. And, uh, it's kind of...extensive.""Character creation?"Oh, right, I'll have to walk her through that, too, he realized. After all, Kizmel had never had to create a character or avatar for herself. She had tinkered with her appearance once in NewALO and made subtle changes using the character customization features available through the World Seed to make changes to her avatar, but it was in essence the same one she'd used in Aincrad. I wonder how this is going to work for her, then, since her account is basically "her." Is she actually able to make another character, or is she just bringing herself from game to game?After so long in these avatars that had been forced into the appearances of their real-life selves, he couldn't help but wonder how strange it would be to suddenly see her in what was effectively a different body – and the same was true for himself, as well. It was part of the reason why he hadn't done much other than adjust his hair style when he'd started playing NewALO in earnest. These avatars have been us for so long, it's going to be weird, almost like I'm wearing someone else's skin.He thought about that for a moment. "Hey, Kizmel, um...do me a favour really quick?""Of course.""Okay, so let's pick the game, and start it up. I'm, uh, I'm not sure what's going to happen with you once we're in the game, so I want to try and figure out if you actually can make a different character or how that whole thing works with you."She nodded and reached out. "What is it you wish for me to do?""Okay, so...when you start the game, there should be a prompt asking you if you want to make a new character, or import one from a different Nexus game. If that choice is there, try and make a new character, okay? If there's any problems or something feels strange, log back out and come back here, all right?"Kizmel pursed her lips. "I understand. I shall return momentarily."Reaching out towards the podium, she disappeared from the whitespace after logging into the game, and true to her word, returned not even a minute later. It was so quick that Kazuto startled at her sudden reappearance, leaving him to wonder if something had gone wrong, because even with her talents and abilities, he figured character creation wouldn't go that quickly."Kizmel? Did something happen?"She shook her head, a confused look written across her face. "There was no prompt, I simply appeared in an empty space inside of a building. There were other players there, as well, but I returned as soon as I was able."Kazuto blinked. "R-really? What did your avatar look like?""I did not have a mirror nearby, but from what I could tell, I looked the same as I do now."
That's odd. He tilted his head. "Um...can you check if you still have everything in your inventory from ALO?"She disappeared again, before returning a second later. "I do.""Huh. Weird." Kazuto shrugged. "Well, it doesn't seem to have hurt anything, so I guess we can just go ahead. Um...since you don't have to go through character creation, I'm just gonna hit randomize and hop in, okay? I'm probably going to look different, and the game doesn't have cursors or nametags, but from what you said, we should end up in the tutorial area, so I think we should be able to find each other fairly easily."Kizmel smiled. "I shall wait for you there, then."She was gone before he could reply, and Kazuto could only chuckle at her enthusiasm and excitement, one that he shared, himself, at the thought of going somewhere new. Sure, the world of Gun Gale Online was a post-apocalyptic science-fiction wasteland, but it was still a whole new world for them to set foot in. With a deep breath, he reached out and pressed the log-in button, himself. A familiar, multi-coloured tunnel appeared in front of him, transporting his consciousness from the local whitespace hub to the Gun Gale Online server, where he found himself faced with the prompt that he'd seen before when trying out other creations on the Nexus.[Create New Character or Import Existing Character?]Choosing the former option moved him into another whitespace with a blank humanoid form in front of him, along with a myriad of sliders, options, menus, and tools for him to craft the perfect avatar. That brings back memories, he mused with a grin. I spent so long making what I thought was the perfect-looking swordsman avatar for me in SAO, only for that to be taken away only a few hours later.He was tempted to do at least the basics of customization, but knowing that Kizmel was already in the game and waiting for him, he decided to simply cycle the random options a few times to see if anything caught his eye. Man, what's with that huge body...yeah, no. Ugh, that one reminds me of a character that Klein or Hafner would make. What's with the scars? This one's...why is every option some kind of scarred, burly action-hero type? he couldn't help but wonder after a few minutes of fruitlessly randomizing the options.Oh, right, it's an American game, I guess they like those kinds of looks over there for shooters, he remembered, thinking back to some of the western games he'd played in the past. There was that one Mom kept talking about, the one with the blonde guy that looked like a body builder from the eighties with the weird flat-top hair and the sunglasses.With a frustrated sigh, he glanced at the controls for making a new avatar, before giving in. Well, it's not like it's gonna hurt any, Kazuto thought to himself, before pushing a button labeled [Import Existing Appearance].The paper doll in front of him took on his own face as the rest of the body morphed into the one he was familiar with from NewALO, and he quickly hit the commands to accept the changes. Entering his usual character name, he confirmed his character selection and another portal finally transported him into the game.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

November 25th, 2025
The first thing Kizmel had noticed during her first, albeit brief, foray into the world of Gun Gale Online was the smell . It was unlike anything she'd ever experienced before, with a sharp, acrid tang of smoke and sulfur suffusing the air, with an almost bitter undertone that she couldn't quite identify, and while it wasn't overpowering, it certainly was potent enough to be impossible to ignore. Kirito mentioned that Alfheim and Aincrad had little to no smell because of their limitations as worlds, or because it would be too overpowering. It is hard to imagine that people actually enjoy this scent, she mused, twitching her nose at the slight irritation, much like the smoke coming off the oil lamps that the former knight was used to using in temporary camps when she had served with the Pagoda Knights. It wasn't debilitating, not by a long shot, but it was enough to be noticed and certainly deliberate on the part of this world's creators.The second thing she noticed, now that she was here for more than a few seconds, was the multitude of voices all around her. They spoke in a variety of languages, many of which she had never even heard before, and some which she had; Kizmel was slowly becoming familiar with English as Alfheim had a small but growing population of non-Japanese players ever since the world – the server, she remembered it being called – had been opened to the rest of the world. Unlike the world of fairies, however, here it seemed to be by far the predominant tongue, although there was a smattering of many other languages coming from the crowd she found herself in, indicating that, while it was the dominant language, it was by far not the only one – which made sense, since this particular game had been open to the entire world from its very inception. Even for all of its impressive size and scale compared to Aincrad, Japan is but a small part of Kirito's world , she mused, thinking back to the map of Earth she had seen. And this was where that truly showed – there wasn't a single word of Japanese spoken that she could imminently hear.Part of her felt apprehensive; not merely because she was stepping into a new world – though Kizmel no longer felt skittish about that particular aspect of her life – but rather, because unlike Aincrad and Alfheim, this was the first time she would be stepping into a world where even the language was foreign to her. Would she find someone who could speak Japanese, or could she make herself understood with the bare minimum of English that she did know? Even with Kirito there to translate and explain, she envied and admired him for his fluency in another language, something that had never even crossed her mind in the small world of the steel castle.Glancing down at her body, she found that gone were her trusty shield and saber, and her chest felt surprisingly light without the weight of the metal cuirass bearing down on her shoulders. In its place were a simple white shirt covered with a brown padded vest, and her legs were clad in a simple pair of pants made from a coarse, durable-looking green fabric, ending in a pair of calf-height black boots. A leather belt, not unlike her usual sword belt, was slung across her hips, riding low on the right.She reached up to feel around her face in the absence of a mirror, and found that she also no longer had the long, delicately pointed elfin ears, just like she couldn't feel the wings that had become so familiar to her in Alfheim. After all, this world is populated solely by humans, rather than fairies, dwarves, or other creatures. Catching her reflection in the polished surface beneath her feet, she found that otherwise, she didn't look too different, even if this was the first time she had taken on a human avatar.Looking up, Kizmel found herself standing on a raised dais, with four angular, metal arms rising around it like some kind of artificial claw. Beneath her feet, the rim of the platform glowed with a soft blue light, and more and more players appeared around her; she quickly moved off of it to make room, and stood at the base of the dais to finally take in her surroundings for good this time.A circular room extended thirty meters or more in every direction, its walls and floors made out of metal that had clearly seen better times, if the surfaces marred by scuffs, scars, and blotches of rusty patina were anything to go by. Colourful, glowing lights and letters hung over various doors at the edges of the chamber, with one huge set of transparent, curved wings leading to what she presumed was the outside, and an ever-present, deep thrum reverberated throughout it all. At first, Kizmel failed to make out anything from the signs other than the letters until she realized that they were written in English. Remembering something her husband and mother had taught her about the menus while in the Nexus, she summoned her own and carefully navigated until she found the entry she was looking for.With a single touch, the text all around her shimmered and rearranged itself, the glowing letters morphing into the script that she could read and had learned was the language of her husband's homeland. Kizmel looked around curiously at the various doors and signs, wondering at the unfamiliar labels.Turning to look around while she waited, Kizmel wondered what kind of appearance Kirito would choose for this place and if she would recognize him; she saw many players whose avatars were built like rugged mountain men, crag-faced and stern, while others were tall and slender, but still well-built with exceedingly handsome faces that she imagined maidens would swoon over if they could. He had once told her that he had spent a lot of time in creating just the right appearance when he had first begun to play Sword Art Online , and even though he didn't strike her as a vain man, she could recognize the appeal in being able to perfect one's appearance, to truly become somebody else to escape his own world. And if I needed any other proof that there is a thread of fate that binds us together, it is that I remember him still, seeing in my dreams the face that he was born with, rather than the appearance he had chosen for the beta test. Why that was, neither Kizmel, nor Cardinal, Kirito, or even Kikuoka and his team had been able to figure out thus far, as it should have been an impossibility on par with her retaining any memory of the beta test to begin with. In the end, it was left to either be a result of a complex malfunction in the ways that had led to her awakening coupled with her psyche reaching out for the first person to find her, or a stroke of destiny itself...and Kizmel found herself inclined to believe in the latter.She needn't have worried about recognizing Kirito, as it turned out – a familiar figure materialized nearby, onyx eyes covered by a black fringe as he looked around curiously until his gaze landed on her."Kizmel!""Kirito," she welcomed him with a smile. "That was far sooner than I had anticipated."He shrugged. "I...didn't feel like tinkering with the character creator too much. Plus, if anything, I can always make another character or see if they have some kind of appearance-altering shop in the game.""This is true," she hummed in agreement. "Then, shall we go and see what this world has in store for us?""Sure," Kirito said, looking around. "Where do you want to start?"Looking down at her bare hands, she frowned. As loathe as I am to make our first stop a place for weapons, this world is very much not a peaceful one, the former knight pondered, looking around the various signs and the words she couldn't fully make sense of even if she could now read them . But where to find one? Seemingly noticing her hesitation, Kirito scratched his cheek and spoke up again. "How about we start with the tutorial quest? We're both new to this game, and I've only ever seen guns on TV and in games. Considering how they're everywhere in this game, I think we should figure out how to use them, first." He poked at his menu. "There's an introduction quest to the game, right over there."Kizmel looked over to where he was pointing. It was a door off to their left, with a sign rather fetchingly proclaiming it the [Gun Range] in glowing pink letters on the sign hanging above it. "I believe that would be a good start," she agreed.Taking a moment to sift through her menus and accept the quest, she sent her husband a party request which he accepted with a smile, before the pair headed towards the door. Other players disappeared through it while some returned, but each time it opened, there was only a black shadow behind that left Kizmel wondering where it would lead.It was only when they got closer that she noticed the tell-tale warble of a barrier behind the door. An instance, she recognized as it slid open to admit them . Glancing over at Kirito, she stepped through; he followed behind her a moment later, and the sounds of the lobby fell away behind them as the door closed on its own with a quiet whoosh .Ahead of them lay a long, straight hallway about twenty-five meters in length, and no less than ten meters wide. A counter rose up to waist-height a few meters into the room, with a barrier dividing it into two booths. A glowing screen lined the wall on either side of the room next to the counter, and a coarse female voice spoke up the moment they entered."Welcome to the interactive gun range. Here, you are able to try out any weapon and accessory modification found in Gun Gale Online . Interactive instructions on firearms handling and operation are available upon request." The screens lit up with a menu, before the voice continued. " Gun Gale Online gun tutorial active. Select a tutorial to begin."Leaning towards the screens, Kizmel found a list of topics provided. Exchanging a glance with Kirito, she shrugged and selected the topmost one. This world is completely unfamiliar to me, I suppose there is no harm in starting from the very beginning. "Section one: weapon types and ammunition," the voice spoke as the screen changed to display a sleek white item. " Gun Gale Online features two kinds of guns: optical and projectile weapons. Optical weapons are recommended for players who have no prior experience with a firearm before. Optical weapons deal laser damage, and have effectively infinite ammunition, though continuous fire will increase the heat gauge visible on the gun. Prolonged fire will lead to overheating, upon which the weapon will enter a long cooldown cycle. Some optical weapons may offer the option of bypassing the cooldown cycle by ejecting the heat sink and inserting a new one, similar to replacing the magazine of a projectile weapon."As she listened, Kizmel peered at the screen as the image cycled to highlight its baffling array of buttons and levers, before an exact replica of it appeared on the counter next to them."Provided is the Betelgeuse Mark One Optical Handgun . Please pick it up to proceed."Kizmel and Kirito did as they were told. The sleek device felt smooth and cool in her palm, but it didn't have the heft of metal, and it weighed far less than the sword she was used to wielding. It feels almost fragile, as though I could crush it if I was not careful .A featureless white dummy appeared on the screen wielding a facsimile of the gun in Kizmel's hands, and the scene showed it firing at a distant target until its front end glowed red-hot. The image switched to one of its hands pressing a stud protruding from the side of the gun, and part of it flew out and to the side, before the dummy inserted a new one."Pistol range active. Please proceed to the shooting gallery. Land five consecutive shots on target to proceed."Kizmel did as she was instructed, looking down the hall to see that a board had sprung up with a vaguely human shape outlined in white."Huh," Kirito said from next to her, "I didn't know the game had laser guns."" Re-za...guns ?" she repeated slowly." Laser ," Kirito repeated more clearly. "Um...okay, so a gun is technically any kind of firearm like this. Something like the guns they used in the tournament we watched a couple months back, or the flintlock that we got back on the fifty-first floor."The former knight nodded. "What about the cannons aboard our ships at the time? Do those not work on the same principle?""Kind of?" Her husband scratched his cheek. "Think of it as a matter of scale. Um...like your saber is a sword. But the one-handed sword I use, or Sugu's katana, those are swords, too. Just like sword is the general category, gun is a category, too. I'm not too sure on what exactly makes a difference between a cannon and a gun other than size, though…"He shook his head. "Anyway, a laser is a kind of light beam. Like a...like a flashlight.""Those devices that you use instead of lanterns? That focus the light in one direction."Kirito nodded. "That's right. Just way, way stronger. Like when you focus light through a magnifying glass."Kizmel eyed the device in her hand skeptically, unsure of what to do. "And this uses such focused light...as a weapon?""I guess so? There are actual lasers being used in labs and factories for cutting steel and stuff, but I think guns like these are strictly science-fiction in the real world right now," he answered with a shrug, pointing the weapon towards the target. She watched closely as he curled his index finger around the hinged tab underneath. A high-pitched whine emerged from it, accompanying a beam of crimson light that instantaneously speared across the distance, passing by the target board a half a meter to the left.Kirito grimaced. "Okay, that was terrible." She watched him take a breath and place a second hand on the gun's handle, steadying himself. The weapon spat out a second bolt, and this time it felt true, striking the board and leaving a small scorch mark behind."Well, the good thing is, there's no recoil," he said, turning back. "And they're hit-scan. Um...that means that the shot lands the moment you press the trigger, with no flight time. Okay, so here's what you do. Hold it like this. This one you can aim by lining up those nubs on the top with each other and the target. The safety needs to be turned off and the trigger here is how you fire it…"She listened intently to his explanation, occasionally glancing back at the screens that had reverted to an image of the weapon and its constituent parts, before nodding slowly. Grasping the gun she'd been provided in one hand, the former knight did as he'd shown her, finding the trio of posts atop the gun and lining them up until they matched, before pointed them straight at the board at the end of the hall. Line the..."sights" up with the target. Curl my finger around the "trigger" and... press down slowly. Letting out a slow breath, she slowly squeezed the trigger, and the gun spat out a beam of crimson light, striking just at the feet of her target, ten meters away from where she stood. Adjusting her aim so that the front post fully obscured the center of the board, she fired again; this time the bolt flew true and landed dead center in her target's chest, scorching it and blackening metal. A third and fourth shot followed, both hitting close by, and Kizmel released her breath. This...is not as difficult as I had anticipated, she noted silently, taking note of the lit strip of light that had begun filling up as she fired. Two more shots rang out, and with a chime, the board folded back down, indicating her successful completion of the task. Next to her, Kirito had likewise finished, and the two looked towards the screens for the next set of instructions.The weapons they had been using disappeared, leaving them bare-handed, but before they could ask, the voice from the ceiling continued. "Optical weapons have a high rate of fire and zero recoil or bullet drop over distance and will reach the target almost instantly. However, this is compensated for by relatively low damage per shot, and ineffectiveness against ablative armour, ceramic inserts, and cover."Kizmel nodded slowly; remembering how the cannons they had used to combat other ships on Aincrad's fifty-first floor had slid back after being set off, she had expected to feel a similar force acting upon the weapon she had just wielded, only to find it absent. I suppose if it truly is using light as a weapon, then it would not have any mass to propel forward, nor any force to recoil. "Projectile weapons come in various calibers, with damage dependent on caliber, muzzle velocity, and projectile weight and type, such as hollow-point, full metal jacket, armour-piercing, sabot, or incendiary," the voice continued as the screen changed to show a different kind of weapon, this one with many more moving parts. "On average, projectile weapons will deal more damage per shot than an optical weapon. They have finite ammunition stored in their magazines. Once expended, the ammunition must be replaced. Additionally, projectile weapons will impart a recoil impulse commensurate with the power of the projectile upon firing and suffer drop-off over distance."New weapons appeared on the counter; Kizmel tilted her head at the blocky, rectangular lines as the black weapons looked much more crude and hefty than the sleek white guns they had just wielded. A small rectangular box was laid next to each gun."Provided is a FN Browning Hi-Power projectile handgun. Please pick up the bullets."Looking over, she found Kirito reaching out for the dozen or so small brass cylinders that were laid next to the gun. Mimicking him, Kizmel did the same, bringing one of the odd items to her face to take a closer look. The bottom three-quarters shone in golden-polished brass and had a small groove in the back, while the top portion was made from some other metal that had a steel-grey hue. It was weighty for its size, and she counted thirteen of them in all. So these are the ammunition that a gun fires? It is even smaller than some arrow heads! Inspecting the little thing, Kizmel couldn't help but wonder how something so small could do the kinds of devastating damage she had read about. Taking a closer look brought up an item description for her that read [ 9x19mm Parabellum Full Metal Jacket]."Collecting bullets and storing them in your inventory will place them in your ammunition storage tab," the voice explained. "Ammunition and other items stored within the inventory will take up weight capacity, which can be increased via the strength stat. Please pick up the magazine and store it in your inventory, as well."Following the instructions they had been given, she stored the ammunition, before picking up the small box on the table. An inspection window appeared on her prompting, and Kizmel looked it over curiously: [FN Browning Hi-Power magazine, 9x19 Parabellum. Capacity: 13]."Empty magazines can be crafted into full magazines from the inventory, provided sufficient ammunition is available," the voice intoned, accompanied by the screen showing a mimicry of the process. "Craft a fully-loaded magazine for the Hi-Power to proceed."Finding the right menu proved a little challenging, but ultimately Kizmel managed the task, waiting until the ten-second timer ran its course and the magazine materialized in her hand fully loaded. Listening to the explanation on the new weapon they had been given, she inserted it, before watching the screen intently as it pointed out the various parts and detailed the weapon's operation as she made it ready to fire by pulling back on the top part of the weapon and watching it snap forward with a clack . The safety and trigger, the slide, the magazine release button, the slide release lever...I did not imagine these were such complex machines , the former knight mused. It is a far different thing from wielding a sword or a bow, although I suppose the knowledge and training to master each require similar forms of dedication .Firing the projectile gun in her hands felt much different from the previous one; whereas the optical gun had been sleek and light and delicate, the Hi-Power felt like a brick in her hand, with enough weight to almost be a bludgeon in its own right. It barked like thunder, flames spitting out the muzzle, and she almost lost her grip the first time she felt the recoil impulse jumping back towards her, pulling her aim far off-target.It took a few attempts for Kizmel to get used to the sudden jerking motion each time the weapon fired, but eventually she managed to put five consecutive holes into the board at the end of the hallway by carefully re-setting her aim after every shot. Wincing at the near-deafening noise the weapon was making, she looked over to where Kirito's gun was still spitting fire, her husband's face etched into a frown as he put the first shot on the target, before the second inevitably missed. With one last bark, the weapon in his hand fell silent, and the top part slid back and remained locked in place."...this is harder than I thought," he muttered just loud enough for her to hear, reaching for the bullets that appeared on the counter, before ejecting the magazine and likewise storing it in his inventory. Retrieving the refilled ammunition, he slid the magazine back into the gun.Kizmel watched him fire a couple more shots, before placing a hand on his shoulder. "Take your time to aim, my love," she whispered into his ear. "Unlike in battle, there is no time limit on this, so you do not need to rush. Perfection is not obtained within a day, after all.""Yeah, you're right," he begrudgingly admitted, looking down at the weapon in his hand. "I've played shooters before, even in VR, but never one that felt this...real. I thought I could just pull down on it to fight the recoil like in other games, but it's not really the same."Her husband looked back at her over his shoulder with a wry grin. "Sorry, Kizmel. I guess I'm not looking particularly cool right now, huh?"She laughed gently, before leaning in to place a chaste kiss on his cheek. "Perhaps not, but being cool is also not why I fell in love with you, my husband."-------------------------------They exited the gun range a short while later, having cut the tutorial short after the basic introduction to the game and guns so that they could continue their trip around this game world. Nice to know we can always come back to any gun range in the game and actually do the rest of the tutorial, he thought to himself, surprised by how elaborate the new player experience had been. Then again, it's not like handling a gun is as easy as swinging around a sword, and every bit of how you use them and how they work is important in a fight, so I guess they wanted to make sure people can practice. Gun Gale Online , they had discovered during the tutorial, was far different in concept for someone used to fantasy games where magic weapons, spells, and enchants existed, and where there was always a rush for the next best weapon as the players leveled up, and the player's level was a direct indicator of their progression in terms of power. But here, the guns aren't supposed to be strictly better than the other. Sure, there's some rare ones that have easier stat requirements to equip, or are a little bit easier to use, but for the most part they all do similar damage as long as they fire the same caliber bullets. It was, of course, more complicated than that – GGO came with a full ballistics suite, befitting a game that advertised itself as the most realistic shooting game on the market – and there were factors like barrel length and bolt weight and ammunition type that all factored in to the gun's damage and recoil impulse. He'd heard that claim boasted before in the game's advertisements, of course, but Kirito hadn't quite expected that level of detail. Even after spending over an hour in the gun range exploring different kinds of weapons and learning how the starter weapons worked, he got the feeling that they'd only scratched the surface. Guess it all comes down to attachments, huh? He glanced around at the huge variety of guns the players around them carried as they passed through the lobby. So modern ones can have way more things we can stick on them that make them easier to use like scopes and laser sights and flashlights and handles and all that. It was an interesting way to balance the game that he'd not really seen before. I guess that's how they can get away with RMT without it being too pay to win. The guns aren't strictly better than the others for the most part, and the developer gets a cut of the sales profit. The other thing that had surprised him was that it seemed that despite the game's setting in a future dystopian wasteland, every single gun in the game – aside from the optical weapons like the Betelgeuse laser gun hanging from his hip – were modeled after real guns, rather than futuristic ones that he'd expected from the setting. I guess there's a reason for those rumours that the US military is using this game engine for training their soldiers , Kirito remembered what Agil had told him. He stretched a little as they passed through the large pair of sliding doors that led outside, and the noisy chatter of the lobby fell away behind them, replaced with a deep, industrial rumble that seemed to permeate every cubic meter of this game's main city.SBC Glocken was named as such for the space battlecruiser Glocken that, as part of the game's backstory, had returned to Earth to find it a barren wasteland. Carrying its cargo of desperate refugees and out of fuel and options, it had landed vertically and now formed the central spire at the city's centre – and was home to the lobby they had just exited, with its reactors buried deep underground beneath their feet that powered the entire city. That central spire held all of the game's main amenities like the cryochambers that served as the respawn point, player housing, gun range, and starter shops, although others were spread throughout the city.Turning around to finally take a look at the former spaceship, he heard Kizmel's quiet gasp, and it was easy to see what had caught her attention. The lobby had been large and industrial, even somewhat futuristic if not for all the rust and signs of age and wear. But now that they were outside, standing in the streets of the city itself that had sprung up from cannibalized cargo containers, other wrecks, and whatever else could be hauled towards the Glocken , the sheer scale of the building was on full display.Aincrad had been big – a revolution in game world design when it came to VR games in terms of open world accessibility. Alfheim followed in its footsteps as well, but even the largest buildings in both of these games paled in comparison to the massive, towering skyscraper that now rose behind them, taller than even the Skytree and far more massive in bulk. Armour plates and inactive, tank-sized turrets on the outside gave it a heavy, durable appearance like a fortress, but not one that was invincible if the scarred plating and gouged armour was anything to go by. Its shadow alone absolutely eclipsed the buildings closest to them, and bridges and walkways spanned the sky above them as they connected the center hulk of the old battlecruiser to the other buildings nearby."Whoa...that's big," Kirito muttered under his breath.They just stood there for a while, looking around with wide-eyed excitement as other players passed around them, the smattering of English and other voices going unnoticed as they took in the game world the American company had built. I heard from Agil that Zaskar was planning on opening a new SEA-regional server after the first Bullet of Bullet tournaments, but it looks like they haven't gotten around to it yet. Wonder how that's gonna go for them. NewALO had recently opened its servers to the rest of the world, and with that had come a desperately-needed influx of new players that had the YMIR team working overtime, but even so, that move had been made because the game and its servers and world needed more players, rather than less. Kirito couldn't help but wonder if perhaps the Americans had come to the same conclusion and opted to postpone their plans, instead. With a place this big, I wouldn't be surprised. It'd feel empty without enough players, he mused with a look around the immediate vicinity around them. Not to mention, it's gonna be rough in a PvP-centric game if there aren't enough players to do PvP. A look at the map showed him that the city was quite large, despite the lack of accessible buildings or player amenities that could be found in other games such as restaurants or player-run shops. There were some of those, but not nearly enough to justify a city of this size, though from what he had heard, they were planned additions yet to come. And from the looks of the many players around them, some clad in full tactical gear or costumed outfits, while many others wore the same basic starting clothes that he and Kizmel had spawned with, there was a ton of interest in the game for now whether those amenities were in the game yet or not.The one thing there was plenty of, if the markers on the map were to be believed, however, were gun stores. It had taken him a moment to realize that, for the players of this particular game, those were the equivalent of a fantasy game's general stores – guns and ammunition were, to them, essential supplies, after all.He glanced down at the leather gun belt and holster that he'd chosen after the end of the tutorial, and the sleek white laser gun he'd opted for as a reward for completing it. At least ammo isn't going to be something we need to worry about, for now. Kizmel was already pouring over her own map, scrolling across as she curiously explored the city's layout. He leaned over her shoulder while ignoring the occasional looks they were getting from the other players as they conversed in Japanese. "So, where do you want to go next? Want to just wander around and take a look, or try and hit up a dungeon or the fields outside the city?"She turned her head towards him at the question, causing a strand of her lilac hair to tickle at his nose. "There appear to be a number of dungeons located in the underground of this city," Kizmel said quietly. "But I would like to see what lies outside the city first.""Curious about what this world looks like, huh?" Kirito grinned at his wife's nod. "Got to admit, I'm kinda curious, too. All I heard was that this was a wasteland, but there's a lot of areas here to go around. Looking at this, it doesn't seem like we'd get far without a vehicle, though."Kizmel shook her head. "I do not mind if we do not go far – but I would like to see this world while we are here." Well, out there is going to be completely open PvP, he remembered. Klein's guys said that even the new player zones aren't completely safe, but I guess we don't really have anything to lose. And if someone tries their luck...well, we'll cross that bridge when we get there. "Sure, let's go and see," he said, before pausing. "Um...which way do we go to get out of here, anyway?"Kizmel laughed and took his hand, pulling him towards one of the ramps that took them from the Glocken 's main surface-level bay to the streets of SBC Glocken proper. The large space around the grounded spaceship gave way to crowded streets lit by bright neon signs, though the grungy, dirty walls gave them a darker, almost cyberpunk-esque aesthetic. The further they got from the center of town, the thinner the buildings got as the dunes and sand reclaimed what little bit of civilization had been eked out for the players, with streets and roads gradually turning into paths and tracks in the sand.The skeletons of overturned and wrecked vehicles littered the outskirts, along with half-buried or partially destroyed buildings and even bunkers – some of which, he noted with interest, were dungeons inside of the city limits and thus the safe zone. Might have to check them out later, he pondered, wondering if those had been specifically placed there for newer players to cut their teeth before venturing into the hazardous wasteland that lay beyond SBC Glocken's boundaries.Terminals occasionally dotted the edge of the marked out pathways – he quickly discovered that they were mission terminals for the game's simplistic quest system of randomly-generated objectives and turn-in locations, but what caught his eye as they passed through a large arch that seemed to mark the edge of town was the one set of terminals that were attached to platforms...and on those platforms sat a number of vehicles.Approaching it, they found a number of players crowded around and lined up in front of the various screens. That's a rental place, he realized with a start. Guess we might be able to get around, after all. Waving to Kizmel, he gestured towards the crowd. "I think we can find a ride. Want to check it out?"They didn't have a lot of money to begin with, just what the game had started them with and the meagre reward for completing the tutorial, but he figured at the very least it would get them a set of wheels to go sightseeing. Getting in line, they didn't have to wait long until a terminal was free, and the pair huddled over it to check out their options. Hmm. An ATV, a bike, a 4x4, and a jeep. A couple of one- and two-seaters and some cars for groups, huh? His eyes skimmed over the stats for each vehicle, landing on the cost. Kirito let out a low whistle, comparing it to their available funds, which were fairly meagre – unsurprisingly, considering they were meant to get the players settled in with some basic essentials and consumables for their first excursion, rather than be spent on a grand tour. Okay, so it looks like they're time-based rentals. The price obviously goes up with the size of the vehicle, but we should be good with the bike for a couple of hours or so. "How about this one?" he asked, pointing towards one of the two-seater bikes. "It's probably not the most comfortable, but it should get us around for a bit. We can go exploring at least for an hour or two."Kizmel nodded eagerly, and he quickly paid the fee, distinctly aware of the growing line behind him as other players leaving SBC Glocken queued up for the rental station. Grabbing the token that slid out from the terminal, they headed towards the platform associated with it and Kirito took a moment to look over their vehicle of choice as it materialized, appearing as a glowing digital framework before it filled itself in like it was being rendered in real-time. I suggested the motorbike because I thought I could drive one since I have one in the real world, but this is… Rather than resembling the motorcycle he was used to driving, one made for the paved streets of a city, this one resembled a futuristic version of a chopper. Its front and rear ends had been stretched out, the struts lengthened until the entire bike was just over two meters long. It rode low, on hefty suspension springs with huge off-road tyres that had grooves bigger than some trowels – a necessity when traversing the sand dunes surrounding SBC Glocken, he supposed. Well, guess we'll find out if I can drive it right now. Swinging his leg over the seat, he waited until Kizmel had settled in behind him. A touch started up the engine and it came to life with a deep rumble that could be felt through the entire frame. The bike nearly got away from him as he eased onto the throttle, its wheels squealing as they shot off the platform and onto the sands faster than he'd expected, but Kirito resisted the urge to slam the brakes. With tyres digging for grip, he felt a moment of lag as the bike fought for purchase before, with an almighty roar, it kicked up a veritable fountain of sand behind them and went ."H-hold on!" Kirito barely had time to shout as the vehicle shot off into the dunes and he let off the throttle until they had slowed to a somewhat more manageable speed. Glancing over his shoulder, he found that they'd left SBC Glocken behind them, but more importantly, Kizmel had wrapped her arms tightly around his waist upon their breakneck launch, and the black-haired boy flushed as he suddenly became very aware of her figure pressed against his back.It took him a moment to gather his wits and realize that the sound he was hearing over the bike's engine was her delighted laughter.-------------------------------Kizmel knew that the humans of Kirito's world had built machines that far exceeded the travel speed of a horse, had seen the machine that her husband frequently used to move around his hometown and even ridden along with him on a "train" – a carriage on large steel tracks that propelled them in between cities. But those journeys had always been made through the looking glass into his world, and she'd never ridden on them herself, never felt the wind in her hair and the sun on her face as they sped across the ground at speeds any Aincrad native could only ever dream of achieving.Until now.The feeling of the sand falling away underneath every time the two-wheeled machine they were seated on leapt off a dune, the bone-rattling thump of its landing, and the roar of the engine that propelled them forward at speeds that turned their surroundings into a blur. It should have been terrifying, as though they were fighting with a bucking beast, and yet, instead, it felt... exhilarating .The closest thing to this that she could think of was the flight in NewALO , but even her fairy wings had never managed to push her to the kinds of speed that this vehicle was capable of – or so she thought at first, until Kizmel came to realize that while flight gave her the ultimate freedom of movement, there was something else about their movement across the ground. Something viscerally satisfying, a connection with the ground that gave her a sense of speed that was easy to lose track of in the air as the landscape blurred by.They moved in conjunction with the rise and fall of the ground underneath them, bouncing and shifting with every dip and crest. She could feel the wind blowing in her face, could feel every movement and change in direction while the wheels kicked up sand and dirt behind them, and as she clung on to her husband's back, the former knight couldn't help but grin broadly at the experience, a blissful laugh escaping her throat.Across the dunes they went, past a city whose broken and shattered buildings spoke of a great calamity in the past – and that, if the sounds coming from within were anything to go by, was the host to a fierce battle being waged even now. It was here that Kizmel first caught sight of what she had learned earlier were the main antagonists of this world: hulking, towering machine-beasts of a war long in the past, corrupted by time and the elements until their intelligence had devolved into an almost feral state that was fiercely territorial and would attack anyone setting foot into what they had claimed as theirs.She spotted one of them faintly in the distance, in between the ruined buildings of the city; a ten-meter goliath standing upon two legs like a mechanical giant, its weapons raining death and destruction down onto the ground beneath, while flashes and explosions roared all around it from the players that were seeking to bring it down. The pair halted on a sandy overlook for a moment, observing the battle as Kizmel got her first look at the way battles were waged in this world before moving on after the towering war machine finally succumbed to the onslaught.In other places across the desert they came across a half-buried landscape of containers and wrecked ships as the land rose up steeply – Kizmel reckoned that this had once been a port at the edge of a grand sea, the skeleton of ships far greater than anything she'd seen in Aincrad laying in the sand like the bones of ancient creatures, stripped bare of anything useful just like vultures did to carrion. They gave the former harbour a wide berth as the sounds of gunfire echoed from within, leaving the scene behind them as Kirito coaxed their bike away and further towards the sandy horizon.Out of the dune sea rose a craggy rock face, isolated mesas eventually growing together into a towering, monolithic cliff face that stood before them. Kirito slowed down as they moved parallel to it until they came across a ravine that had been carved into the stone and rock likely by some ancient river that had long since run dry. Passing through it felt like passing into another world entirely; they emerged on the far side of the crevasse into a massive caldera that was lush and filled with greenery, as though the desert behind them was a mere phantasm of their minds.Kizmel found herself surprised; they had come across a handful of oases in the desert wasteland that seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see, but she hadn't expected such an island of vegetation and life in a world that was nowhere as inhospitable as she had imagined it to be.Following the path on the ground, well-trodden by others before them, Kirito took them through the woods and across a shallow river, their speed carrying them past the mechanical monsters and other players before they could turn to do battle with the sightseeing pair. Occasionally, Kizmel spotted the ruins of ancient cities, overgrown with plantlife as nature slowly moved to reclaim that which humanity had long since abandoned, but the most impressive sight was the remains of a large wrecked ship in the distance, at the far end of the caldera, barely visible through the canopy of its trees.They grazed the very edge of its crash site, only to find the area embroiled in a fierce battle between players as they moved from the cover of the treeline and across the wreckage on the ground, trading fire all the way for the right to be the first to claim its spoils. Kirito steered them clear of the fighting, and though Kizmel would have loved to take a closer look at the innards of the ruined colossus, she agreed that it was probably wiser to avoid battle for now.A warning suddenly blared across Kizmel's vision, the strand of red lettering flashing across the top of her swordmasters' sight: [WARNING: BEHEMOTH APPROACHING ]. She barely had time to wonder what a behemoth was , before they discovered the answer – and violently so.Trees came crashing down around them as the battle between players was interrupted by a large, four-legged mechanical creature, its long neck rising high as it broke free of the trees, rearing back to charge towards the two groups that had been fighting. A glowing eye on its disk-shaped head took aim before releasing a beam of brilliant light and heat, while other monsters followed in its wake, a flood of steel creatures that ploughed towards the embattled players and crossing right in front of their path.Kirito weaved around the stampede as best as he could, but there was no avoiding the creatures of the air. Mechanical flying beasts soared overhead, accompanying their larger brethren in its attack, circling above them and skimming the tops of the canopy overhead. With a warbling cry, one turned its head towards the pair and chose to dive towards them as though it had spotted easy prey."Hold on!"Kirito waited until she'd tightened her hold around his waist before the engine roared with an answering fury. Kizmel felt herself nearly yanked backwards and pushed into the seat of the motorcycle as it accelerated until they were darting across the uneven, barely-trodden paths at breakneck speeds that were only possible because of her husband's exceptional eyesight and reflexes.The ground rose up on her left as Kirito leaned them precariously to tighten his turn, their knees almost brushing the ground as he took them into a sweeping arc to try and lose their relentless pursuer as the mechanical bird leveled off behind them and took aim. Swerving left and right to avoid its shots, he barely kept them ahead of being struck, but as fast as their vehicle was going, it was hampered by being bound to the surface while their opponent had no such limitations.Reaching for the weapon that hung from her right hip, Kizmel drew the slim white pistol and twisted her upper body around to face behind them. Loosing a rapid volley of shots behind them, she found it hard to aim while on top of the erratically-moving motorcycle, and the few shots that did strike home did little to deter their pursuer, its armoured head too tough for the haphazard shots to penetrate. We cannot fight it like this, she realized grimly, and we cannot outrun it .Kirito, too, seemed to have realized their predicament, but as usual, the boy who'd worn the mantle of Aincrad's most notorious swordsman refused to let panic guide his actions. He continued their weaving path through the trees, long since having abandoned anything resembling a road in his attempts to shake their pursuer as thin red lines of light flashed into being all around them. Bullet lines , Kizmel had learned they were called, a visual aid to help the players estimate where their opponents were aiming moments before the shots were released. They are not always accurate, but in this number, they do not need to be, she noted grimly as a cage of red wove around them, heralding the spray of mud and superheated flashes of earth that resulted from their foe's weapon boiling off the water in the ground in an instant, kicking up sprays of dirt and debris.So far, Kirito's erratic pattern had kept them from being struck directly, even though the pair ducked their heads against the clods of soil and silt and shrapnel that burst up all around, but their luck wouldn't hold out forever.She felt, rather than saw, the motorcycle cross over a half-buried broken log the moment before they were struck. Her husband's back tensed as he wrested for control of the vehicle, but with its front wheel lifted above the ground it found no purchase, and the split-second they were airborne was enough for a singular shot to land in front of them. They came back down with a thud , careening out of control for a second as the wheels dug into the crater left behind by the near miss as the rear of the bike slid out of control.Kizmel saw red lines spearing through Kirito's body and leapt from the sliding vehicle, her arms still wrapped around his waist as she wrenched him with her. Grunting as her shoulder hit the dirt, the former knight rolled over and kept rolling until they were far enough away, coming to rest just in time to watch as the bullet lines disappeared and the motorcycle was struck by a half-dozen flashes in quick succession, causing it to burst into flames.Hastily, the pair clambered to their feet as their mechanical assailant flew past overhead, banking around in a lazy turn to come around and finish the job it had started.Sharing a quick glance, Kizmel gave her partner a minute nod, and the two sprinted in opposite directions, weapons drawn. A look over her shoulder revealed to her that the automaton had chosen to chase after Kirito, and she took the opportunity to line up a retaliatory shot of her own. Letting out a slow breath, her index finger tightened around the trigger of the Betelgeuse in her hand, sending a beam of crimson light towards the sky. A single dot appearing on its carapace for a split-second was all the warning the beast had before Kizmel's shot struck the base of its tail, causing the appendage to stiffen in an almost lifelike fashion as it let out a screeching, mechanical wail.Its lizard-like head spun towards her, abandoning its intended target, and the weapons mounted on its underbelly began to glow with malicious light.Slipping behind a tree, Kizmel watched as bullet lines formed all around her, right before the sturdy trunk was struck by a staccato of impacts. Just like in Aincrad and Alfheim, I suppose this world is immutable, she noted with a sigh of relief as their opponent flew past her. And it serves this purpose just fine. Raising her weapon, the former dark elf let fly a volley of shots that pierced the air around the creature, a few striking home but doing little more than anger it further. It can fly, but it cannot stop and hover, she came to realize. While we were moving, it could keep us within its sights to attack, but now that we are stopped, it has to keep making passes. Good, that will give us time, especially if we have cover. She hastily rounded to the other side of the tree as the beast came about and swung down for another run towards her while Kirito pelted it with shots from his position a little ways away, though his attacks were just as ineffectual as hers. The fact that they were no longer subject to a constant barrage was little comfort in light of the more sobering knowledge that their weapons appeared wholly inadequate to deal with the threat the creature posed, at least from this distance. We are too far away to make out any weak spots, and our weapons simply lack the power to bring it down. If only we could get closer, or ground it... The next time the mechanical monstrosity came around, Kizmel deliberately stepped out into the open, violet eyes narrowed as she tracked the bullet lines that sprang up all around her the moment she left cover.Sliding to the side from her dead sprint, the former knight managed to avoid the worst of it as dirt sprayed up around her, the heat from the beast's optical weapons coming uncomfortably close to scorching her skin. Kizmel hissed in annoyance as one shot grazed her arm, ignoring the damage as she rushed back into cover behind another tree with a grim stare at their passing assailant. So it won't come down below the treeline? She shook her head. No, there wouldn't be enough room for it, even if it wanted to. Kirito came running towards her. "I don't think our guns are any good against that thing," he pointed out breathlessly."It would appear so," she agreed, glancing up where their foe was circling, having momentarily lost track of them. "But I do not believe that escape is an option, either.""Not without the bike, no," Kirito nodded, eyes flickering over to where the vehicle's remains smoldered among the grass. "Heck, even with the bike, I think that thing could catch us easy."Kizmel pursed her lips. We stand no chance of fighting it, and we cannot escape from it. I suppose our only option is to die. It was a grim thought that would've never occurred to her in the steel castle – after all, Kizmel was a warrior, and she would battle to her last breath no matter the odds. But here, inside of a game, death was of little consequence; even in Alfheim she had perished a few times before, only to experience the odd sensation of respawning or being resurrected.But above all, perhaps because it was a game and she had no need to genuinely fear for her life, did the idea of simply accepting her fate here never cross the former knight's mind. After all, this simply meant that she could exert herself to the fullest, to try and expend any and all effort without consequence in answer to this challenge. One corner of her lips turned up in a feral grin. The situation is grim, and the odds are against us. So she would fight, to the last, because that was what she'd always done.It was where she had learned to thrive – not because her life or another's depended on it, nor because victory would bring fame, glory, and fortune, but simply because she could . Before her lay a seemingly unconquerable challenge, but Kizmel's nature had never been to accept the impossible, and the man she had chosen to stand by her side had proven on more than one occasion that he, too, would face destiny head on to take its reins with his own two hands.A knowing look passed between the pair."Think you can give me a boost high enough to get close to grab it?" he asked.Kizmel tilted her head as they ducked behind cover from another volley. "Perhaps," she answered. Unlike him, she retained all of the attributes of her avatar, including the maxed-out strength stat of a level ninety-six clearer in Aincrad, but she didn't know if all of that strength was entirely applicable here in this world as well.Still, it was the best chance they had.Reaching out, she found it easy enough to bear her husband's weight, and they prepared themselves. The next time their foe approached, he stepped into her entwined hands; Kizmel silently eyed the altitude and estimated the trajectory, and then she pulled .Yanking his feet upward with all her might sent Kirito catapulting high into the air, right past the bullet lines that formed in the space in front of him as he careened towards the mechanical beast. He reached for its leg as it passed by, stretching to his utmost, and she watched his fingers scrabble for purchase on the smooth metal, only to come up empty. Frustrated, he spun in mid air and let off a volley of shots into the beast's exposed underbelly. Sparks flew from where he struck, but it continued on its path undeterred even while gravity pulled him back down to earth.Kizmel rushed out to catch him, leaping up to absorb the momentum of his impact as she landed in a crouch.Before either of them could do anything else other than get to their feet, another voice called out from amidst the trees. "Heads down! RPG!"A whoosh like a flame being fed by a bellows roared to life, and a small sun emerged from the trees, trailing smoke as it shot into the air and towards the mechanical beast that was harrying them. Violet eyes tracked the airborne projectile as it streaked towards its target, slamming into its wing and swallowing the appendage in a fiery explosion that sent it into an uncontrolled spin to the ground where it slammed down into the muck with a thunderous rumble.It was far from defeated, however, if the angry roar echoing through the forest was anything to go by.But by the time Kirito and Kizmel made it to the crash site, they found that their foe was in its death throes, set upon by a number of men and women with rifles as they fired mercilessly, the report from the automatic weapons impossibly loud, drowning out even the screech of tortured metal as their bullets pierced the steel skin that had so easily brushed off their optical weapons.Once the gunfire ceased and the creature shattered into motes of light to leave behind a crate, the other players turned towards them.-------------------------------Kirito froze for a moment as they found themselves at the center of attention for the group of heavily-armed and, presumably, veteran GGO players. Onyx eyes darted around the clearing as he counted them up while cataloging their equipment with the grim realization that it was well beyond the starter guns he and Kizmel had on them – not that it was any surprise, considering the ease with which they'd taken care of the flying battle droid. There's five of them that I can see...but who knows if that's all of them. Instincts cultivated during the death game had him naturally wary, and GGO 's reputation for being a hard-core PvP game only made him all the more suspicious of their sudden rescue. Still, at least their guns weren't pointed at them, so he figured there was at least a chance they could walk away from this."Um...hi?" he tried."Hi, this kid says," one of the men laughed, slinging his rifle back over his shoulder, before looking at one of his compatriots. "As if he didn't just take a trip through the air like it was nothing."The one he'd addressed shook his head in amusement, before turning towards them. "Sorry about butting in, but it looked like you could use a hand.""Ah...yeah." Kirito scratched the back of his head, realizing that they were speaking in English. "Thanks for the save. I'm Kirito, and that's Kizmel."The man who'd spoken second tilted his head from under the camo-coloured boonie hat he was wearing. "That accent...Chinese?""Japanese," he answered. "Sorry, she isn't fluent in English yet.""Ah," he said, letting his rifle drop and waving his hands. "No problem. We're not gonna fight you guys, so you don't have to worry about that, okay?"Kirito let out a slow breath. There was, of course, a chance that the man was lying, but by now he had to have realized that they had both only recently started out and there was nothing to gain from ganking them. Other than just for fun, but if they wanted to do that, they'd have done it already. "Oh," the man added, "sorry, I forgot to introduce myself. "Name's Lord Maldoror. That joker over there is Liam, next to him is Goldsnake. Mesh Marillion is our sniper, and Agent Xer0 over there is our heavy support.""Um...it's nice to meet you."The sole woman among the group chuckled as she slung a huge rifle across both shoulders. "So polite. I guess the Japanese do have that kind of rep, huh?" She walked into the middle of the clearing and opened the crate, before handing its contents to the man who'd introduced himself as Lord Maldoror. "Here you go, Mal.""Thanks, Marillion." He shook his head in amusement at the redheaded woman's antics, before tossing something to Kirito. "Anyway, here," he said, hooking his thumbs into his tactical vest.The black-haired boy instinctively reached out to catch the long, heavy object that had been thrown towards him. Looking up, he found that he'd caught a hefty, just under a meter-long gun, though it wasn't one he recognized, with its ungainly-looking magazine hanging off to one side and forked, stamped sheet metal stock."What's this for?" he asked.Lord Maldoror shrugged. "It's your share of the takedown. It's an old gun that no one ever really uses, but it'll be better than those flashlights you're using. It's not something we've got a use for, so use it or sell it, either way, it should get you something better for the next time you come back here. Hope you guys don't mind if we take the rest of the loot, instead," he added with a grin, holding up a pair of thirty-centimeter long, sleek glass tubes that had a metal cap on one end and glowed with a shimmering, slowly moving blue light, almost like an old lava lamp that Kirito had seen his mother keep on the corner of her desk.Kirito eyed the strange-looking gun for a moment, before looking back up. "Thanks...but are you sure you want to give it to us? We didn't really do a whole lot to it.""Actually," Agent Xer0 said after he finished reloading the rocket launcher he was carrying from his massive backpack, "you did a bit of a number on it. Yeah, it wasn't a quick kill, but it looked like you hit the power cell on its underbelly. It'd have run out of juice and crashed eventually, we just hurried the process along.""There you have it," Lord Maldoror agreed. "Anyway, you guys heading back to town now? Your ride's got to be close by, right?""Uh…" Kirito trailed off after reluctantly stowing the rifle in his inventory.Mesh Marillion shook her head, before jabbing a thumb over her shoulder. "I think their ride's toast, Mal."Their eyes wandered over to the smoldering heap of scrap that had been their rental bike. "Ah...yeah, it kinda is," Kirito admitted.Lord Maldoror's eyes narrowed thoughtfully. "A rental and starter weapons, huh? Don't mind me asking, but you two are pretty new to this huh?""We started today.""That explains that." His eyes wandered over to Kizmel. "She's got to be running a ported character, though. No way a new player has enough strength to hurl you as far into the air as she did."Kirito laughed nervously. "Yeah. We, um, we usually play NewALO . It's our first time trying something else."" NewALO , huh?" Lord Maldoror rubbed his chin. "Ah, I think I heard about it. It's the first major VRMMORPG for the AmuSphere, right? The one that just opened up its servers worldwide.""Yeah, that's the one."The older man chuckled. "No wonder you two are so quick on your feet, if you've been playing that for a while. Well, if you want, we can give you guys a ride back to the teleporter."That gave Kirito pause. "There's a teleporter out here?""Yeah. All of the major zones have one. Makes fast travel easy. If you want to move a squad around efficiently, you still want a vehicle, though," Lord Maldoror explained as the group headed towards the edge of the woods where they found a Humvee parked.They piled into the armoured vehicle, with Liam clambering up to man the top-mounted machine gun, and Kirito found himself in the middle row between Kizmel and Goldsnake, while Agent Xer0 and his backpack took up the back seats. With a purr, the engine started up and Kirito couldn't help but look out the window with Kizmel as they drove around the area."This place is called the Forgotten Woods," Goldsnake explained while Lord Maldoror drove the car. "It's the highest-level zone in the game, so imagine our surprise when we found someone using optical weapons to try and fight a Pteroid . Much less when we saw you flying above the treetops.""Ah...hahahaha…"The older man looked over in amusement. "Hey, I'm not knocking it. We're kind known for unconventional tactics ourselves, but even we haven't seen something like that before. Honestly, you've either got good aim or good luck – though judging by the way you adapted, I'd say it's probably more of column A than column B. With a better gun, you'd probably not have had a problem at all." He tapped the gun he was using, before continuing."Anyway, the four major zones in the game are the Remnant Wasteland, which is the immediate area around SBC Glocken, the Solitary Sands to the east, which is the old coastline and oceanfront, the Old South which has a few abandoned cities and bunkers, and this place, which is to the north-west. Each one of them has a teleport station you can activate for fast travel."Kirito nodded while translating for Kizmel, though he was cut off when the Humvee suddenly swerved to the side and the machine gun on the roof came to life with an ear-splitting chatter, the constant staccato accompanied by expended brass casings raining down through the hole above. Goldsnake let out a low curse and reached under his seat while Kirito struggled to look out the window to see what was going on, even while Liam kept firing to deter their pursuers – though whether they were more of the NPC bots or other players, he couldn't tell."Mal! We've got incoming!" came the call from above. "It's PH!"Their driver didn't bother turning around to answer while jerking the car around. "Pandemic Horde, huh? Guess they finally took the bait. Get ready, guys!""Born ready, Mal!""Locked and loaded!""Get down!" Next to them, Goldsnake had managed to retrieve a large rifle with a big drum underneath just as something smashed into the door of the Humvee with the sound of rocks striking steel. Kirito spotted another player on a motorcycle pulling away from them while spinning the sawn-off shotgun in his hand after blasting the side of the car with a shell."You call that a shotgun?" Goldsnake called out, half-leaning out the window before the gun in his hands roared to life, spitting plumes of fire and smoke as it rapidly discharged buckshot into the air and knocking the other player off his bike. "Get lost, you Terminator wannabe!"Others were closing in from their right, and Kizmel had drawn her own pistol to return fire as more impacts rang out against the car's armour plating. A thunderous report echoed from the front passenger seat as Mesh Marillion fired her sniper rifle, the large weapon blowing out entire vehicles as she went while in the back, Agent Xer0 rummaged through the trunk.He leaned across the row of seats. "Here, this is gonna do better than those peashooters you've been using, especially against players," the older player told them, dropping a pair of rifles in their laps.Kirito looked down at the black gun that he'd only seen in video games and movies before. Okay, calm down. Just like the tutorial...check the magazine, check the chamber and safety. He fought with the long gun trying to get an angle out the window while Kizmel seemed to have fewer problems with it from her position as the lilac-haired girl let off a couple of rounds against their pursuers."Incoming!" Liam shouted from above, and their vehicle abruptly slid to the side as the engine roared and the tyres dug themselves in, leaving Kirito to watch the flaming trail of a rocket pass by them. As the Humvee spun around in a full circle, he finally caught sight of the three vehicles pursuing them as they pulled up alongside, exchanging fire with the machine gun up top and Goldsnake to his left. Make that two, he thought as Marillion fired from the passenger seat, causing one of the pick-up trucks belch smoke from its engine and slow to a halt."Technicals! Five o-clock!" Liam belted out.Behind them, Agent Xer0 had arranged himself across the width of the back seat alongside his weapon. "Watch the back-blast!"An answering rocket-propelled grenade shot from its tube towards the approaching players; it crossed the distance between them in the blink of an eye, engulfing the other armoured vehicle in a fiery explosion that rattled Kirito's teeth. Kizmel ducked back inside as return fire hammered against the door, and he caught a glimpse of her flushed and breathless face."It's empty," she mouthed, gesturing towards the rifle in her hands, and Kirito wordlessly exchanged it for his, wishing he could do more than that, pinned between her and Goldsnake as he was. Leaning in between the front seats, he looked out to where Lord Maldoror was taking them as they finally broke free of the jungle and onto the edge of a large cliff overlooking the crashed ship and valley below.A car pulled up on their left side, bullets sparking off the Humvee's armour as the players inside opened fire, but thankfully their aim wasn't all that accurate on account of the rough ground they were riding on.The older man in the driver's seat grinned. "Hold on!"Jerking the Humvee to the left, he forced their pursuing car to the side, using the larger mass of the Humvee to muscle the smaller vehicle around until its left wheels hung off the cliff, sending it off the edge when their ride rocked and slid, finally coming to a halt itself at the edge of the sheer drop. Kirito caught his breath as he stared out of the windshield as another half-dozen cars and bikes emerged from the forest to surround them. Well...crap. He shook his head, glancing over at Kizmel who was lowering the expended rifle in her hands, discarding it since they didn't have spare magazines for either of them. Looks like we're respawning either way, huh? He reached for the optical pistol that still hung from his belt as they all piled out of the car and took cover behind it. Even the tutorial had said that it was going to be far less effective against a player, especially way out here, but either way, they'd go down swinging – at least that was his plan when Lord Maldoror rose out of the driver's seat and exited the Humvee to lean against it casually as though waiting for their attackers to arrive."Guess you guys finally caught up to us, huh?" he shouted across towards their attackers. "Took you long enough.""Time's up for you! We've finally got you guys cornered! So just take your defeat with grace and give us your guns, and we might just let you walk away, eh?" came the reply. Like that's gonna do them any good, Kirito thought grimly. If we have a shoot-out, there's still less of a chance of us dropping everything we've got equipped even if we die . To his surprise though, rather than give in to the obvious taunt, Lord Maldoror laughed, as if they'd just been told some joke that only he knew the punch line of. The black-haired boy shook his head, looking around for an opportunity to spring an attack first while they were still talking to at least try and even the odds since he and Kizmel stood to lose the least, but he was held back by Goldsnake."Don't go out there," the older man murmured, his large, drum-fed shotgun slung over his shoulder as he held back both him and Kizmel. "It's safer here, behind the car, trust me."Kirito was about to object, but he got a shake of his head in return. "Just watch.""You forgot one thing," Lord Maldoror shouted back, thumbing up the brim of his boonie hat, before making a show of looking at his wrist while his other hand rose to his vest, sending his voice over the radio."And what's that?""We're Rooks and Kings."Crimson lines streaked past Kirito, the Humvee, and the others as their attackers all scurried back into the safety of their vehicles while frantically searching for the source of the bullet lines. Kirito, too, turned around to search for the origin point, but with their position atop a cliff, there was nowhere for anyone else to shoot down at them from. No, wait, he breathed, raising a hand to shield his eyes from the sun as his back rested against the door of the Humvee. No...way. From all the way over there ? Looking at the horizon, there was only one point that could be the origin of those bullet lines, as unbelievable as it looked. The top of that crashed ship? Squinting into the distance, he could barely make out a small pair of dots silhouetted against the sunlight atop one of the fins at the rear of the fuselage of the crashed starship.The lines disappeared and for a moment, everyone, friend and foe alike, held their breath. A second passed, then another – eventually, their attackers jeered and rushed out from cover, sure that it had been a bluff, but Kirito's ears suddenly picked up the roar of rocket motors as they shot past them, a ceaseless barrage of rocket-propelled warheads swerving towards their designated targets. Some struck the vehicles, sending them bursting into flames or blowing them out and over onto their sides. Others struck the ground amidst clusters of players, sending them flying. More still burst in the air in between the two groups in a shower of incendiary munitions, sending up a hellish wall of flame in front of their attackers.In the middle of such chaos, the group sprang to action around them, their weapons snapping up and spitting fire all around.Shrapnel and debris showered Kirito even behind the safety of the Humvee's armoured bulk, and within seconds, it was over – the only remains being the burned-out, turned-over wrecks of the attacking cars and trucks while of the players themselves, there was no sign.Lord Maldoror reached for the radio that hung from his vest while Kirito was still trying to shake the ringing from his ears. "Nice shooting, Feanor."A faint female voice came back over the speaker. "Hah. Did we get them all? I can't tell from over here, since you didn't give me a scope to look through. Which, y'know, would've helped. A lot.""Yeah, pretty sure you did."The girl's voice was amused. "Good. I think Eelm burned through all the rounds you gave us reloading me. I'm not even gonna ask how you managed to get a hold of a Carl Gustaf. Those things are rare. And expensive.""Then make sure you bring it back. We'll see you back in town." Turning back around from the wrecked battlefield and ignoring the plethora of items left on the smoldering ground that had been dropped upon their owners' deaths, Lord Maldoror clambered back into the driver's seat. He restarted the battered Humvee's engine and got it rolling again, revealing that its disabling had been for show. "All right, next stop, SBC Glocken."-------------------------------It felt odd to have to rely on Kirito to translate for her, almost as odd as it was listening to him speak a tongue that she'd only rarely heard more than snippets of; even though Kizmel could understand some of the English that was exchanged between her husband and their impromptu rescuers, they spoke rapidly enough that she soon lost track of the conversation, but she trusted him enough to alert her if anything urgent came up. Still, part of her regretted the fact that she had had little opportunity to practice the language she was learning when it came to the spoken word. Thanks to Argo's guides and mother's help, I am comfortable enough with the alphabet and reading, but... listening to a foreign language being spoken was an entirely different experience, and it was only now that it truly dawned on Kizmel that, for all the sheer size and scale of the cities and buildings in her husband's world, his country of Japan was but one of many nations, and a rather small one at that. There were many others, dozens, perhaps hundreds of languages and dialects in his world, dwarfing the steel castle in every scope imaginable. Even though she had met many more people in Alfheim and through her work with Kikuoka's team, they had almost exclusively been Japanese – but this...this was far more akin to the wider world that her husband called his own.At first, she'd been excited and eager to hear the smattering of different languages when she had first arrived, wondering what people from places other than her husband's home country of Japan were like, but it was only now that Kizmel was confronted with the reality of what stepping out from the familiarity of her Japanese surroundings meant.For a brief moment, she toyed with the idea that Cardinal had offered her a while back, that there was a means for her to immediately learn and understand any language in the world.At the time, Kizmel had turned down the suggestion. After all, such a thing, while convenient, would only serve as a reminder that she was... different , artificial, even. For now, she held onto her pride and preferred to learn things through her own efforts, rather than having them handed to her on a silver platter. Then there was the fact that the former knight felt almost obliged to forge her own path; her mother, Cardinal, and her siblings Strea and Yui had all been born with an awareness of their powers, but with that also came an awareness of their limitations and restrictions, a stricter adherence to the protocols that they were originally created to serve.And she'd seen first hand what that adherence had cost her siblings, and almost cost her mother.No, if anything, Kizmel wasn't afraid of the powers themselves, nor did she fear ending up like the other examples she had of a being with such unrestrained powers in Heathcliff and Oberon. But what she did fear was that it would make her forget . Cardinal's powers seemed nigh omnipotent when the diminutive sage chose to wield them to their fullest, and even Strea and Yui would have had little struggle to adapt to the society of Kirito's world, because that knowledge had been ingrained in them from the very beginning. It would be so easy for her to follow in their footsteps and just will herself to know.But Kizmel hadn't ever been that way. She couldn't remember a time when she hadn't struggled to acquire skill and knowledge, and to her, those struggles had made her who she was. It was her curiousity that demanded to be sated, which had led her to journey with Kirito and Asuna, and it was her desire to help the swordmasters who had saved her home that had driven her to seek him out long after her own duty had been discharged. Everything she had ever learned, everything Kizmel had achieved, had come from her choices and efforts.How much would she have achieved, how much would she have grown, what bonds would she have formed if she could simply have snapped her fingers and just willed everything to be the way she wished it?So, Kizmel contended herself with smiling and watching as her husband spoke and translated for her, catching the occasional phrase or word that sounded familiar until they arrived back at SBC Glocken.At first, he'd been cautious, on guard as the years spent looking over his shoulder in the steel castle had made him wary of sudden windfalls, but she only needed to look at the other players' body language to know that they meant little harm. After all, why go through the trouble of rescuing them, if they were going to simply attack them afterwards? Their sudden flight and ambush of the second group of players had come as a surprise to them both, and Kizmel had instinctively fought back even while using the unfamiliar weapon that had been handed to her.The encounter did tell her two things about their rescuers, whom Kirito had told her were members of a guild – which were called squadrons in Gun Gale Online – named Rooks and Kings. They are as closely knit as anyone we've ever known in Aincrad . Their wordless coordination and trust in one another could only come about from a long time spent together, something the former knight recognized in her own bonds with her own comrades from the steel castle.The second thing, which wasn't hard to figure out once she came to the conclusion that their pursuers' sudden and violent demise was not the work of luck or happenstance, but rather a deliberately planned and well-executed ambush, was that they were good at this kind of warfare. Still, despite the methodical and nearly cold-blooded execution of their plans, the group seemed genuinely friendly, particularly once they discovered that the two of them were new players, and had quickly drawn them in, never forgetting to include her even though they knew she could not understand nor speak directly to them....it reminded her of the way the Black Cats had accepted her, all that time ago.Without any further incidents, it took little time to reach the teleporter, and Kizmel and Kirito stepped onto the raised platform that looked very much like a future descendant of the same kinds of arcane devices that had taken them between the floors of the steel castle. Most of the other players remained in the vehicle, waving as their leader briefly exchanged a few words with Kirito before returning to his seat and starting the engine once more.She had been about to wave goodbye as the group shouted their own farewells when another player hopped onto the platform, cautiously eyeing the dispersing group before seemingly deciding that there was no danger as the trio activated the teleporter.Giving the group that had brought them here a jaunty wave as the car departed, Kizmel felt the same sensation that teleported them from one floor to another in Aincrad take hold, and with a flash of white light, they returned to SBC Glocken."Well," Kirito said, letting out a long sigh once they were surrounded by the towering spires and grungy buildings of the game's central city again. "That was...a little more adventurous than I'd expected for our first trip."Kizmel giggled. "It was rather more exciting than I had anticipated, as well. But I had fun.""That's what matters."They stepped off the platform, unsure of where to go when the former knight felt somebody's gaze on them. Kirito's frame stiffened as he, too, noticed the attention, and they turned around to find the tall woman who'd teleported with them still standing on the steps of the platform, her blue-grey eyes fixated onto Kirito with a thoughtful look.Finally, after a protracted silence, she seemed to come to a decision and took a step towards them. "Hey! You two! Wait up!" she called out, her tone friendly. "You guys are Japanese, right?""Yeah," Kirito replied cautiously."Cool. Wasn't sure, since I saw you hanging with those guys from RnK on the other side of the teleporter, but I heard you talking just now," the black-haired woman nodded, sweeping her ponytail behind her shoulder and exposing her tattooed face. "Sorry if this is out of the blue, but you seem kind of familiar.""Me?" Kirito pointed at himself.Blue-grey eyes wandered between the pair as the other woman regarded them. "Yeah," she finally said. "Sorry, I just can't shake the feeling that I've met you before. Your voice sounded familiar." She shook her head. "Anyway, don't mind me.""I doubt it. We just started this game today," came the response.The woman chuckled. "Yeah, I can kind of tell. Not even noobs run out into the field with optical guns. The only people who still use them are people who don't know the first thing about guns, and hard-core challenge runners.""They're that bad?"Kizmel was inclined to agree with her husband's reasoning. After all, we have no need to resupply them with ammunition, they do not need to be reloaded, and they are the simplest to use. She saw no reason why they wouldn't be effective, but to their surprise, the other woman just laughed."They're not bad , but...well, come on. I'll give you the quick and dirty while we walk. I'd feel bad just letting a pair of newbies wander around aimlessly," she said, sizing them up."Um...where are we going?" Kizmel asked.The taller woman chuckled. "Well, you guys clearly need guns...and probably an explanation about how exactly they work. The tutorial's great for teaching you about how to use guns, but unless you dive really deep into it, it doesn't tell you the pros and cons of each. So, there's only one place that can remedy that: the gun store."She set off without a further word, beckoning them to follow; Kirito glanced at Kizmel in askance and the former dark elf merely shrugged in return. They had nothing better to do, and if anything, learning about their new environment seemed as fruitful an endeavour as any. True to her word, the tall, black-haired woman began to talk as they strode through the streets of SBC Glocken."To answer your question," she began, "optical guns aren't terrible by any means. They've got great sustained DPS because they never need to reload and if you can control your fire rate to keep from overheating, but they've got one really big flaw: they don't penetrate armour."Next to her, Kirito frowned in confusion. "But...but they're lasers ."She chuckled. "Yeah. They're lasers. They burn . So if you want to use an optical weapon, you'll have a harder time against an armoured target, because you'll be fighting its HP pool and whatever thermal damage reduction its armour gives it. Now, it can be useful if you're fighting something that's so tough that even an anti-materiel rifle has trouble getting through, then the fact that it ablates armour actually becomes a good thing, because bullets would just ping off of it, which would do no damage at all. Of course, that's if you didn't bring any heavy weapons like RPGs or rocket launchers…"Kizmel blinked at the enthusiastic explanation. "What kind of armour could possibly withstand these kinds of weapons?" she couldn't help but ask, thinking back to the kinds of arms that Rooks and Kings had wielded earlier. Then again, their vehicle also stood up to much punishment, the lilac-haired woman recalled. So perhaps there is a point to it all. "Well...for example, a tank.""A tank ?" Kirito's head snapped up. "There's tanks in this game?"The black-haired woman laughed. "Well, not ones that players can drive. But yeah, some of the automatons have tanks. Or battle-mechs and walkers. Anything with legs usually has weak spots, but tanks tend to be really tough if all you've got are slugthrowers. Laser gatlings work wonders on them. High-powered laser snipers are really popular, too, since they don't have to adjust for bullet drop or windage, and they're hitscan, which makes them worth using even if they're single-shot uses before you have to swap out the heat sink cartridge." She shook her head, before tilting her head towards the sleek pistols on their hips. "Of course, the fact that you're using the starter guns just makes things that much harder. Why'd you pick them over something like the 1911 or Hi-Power, anyway?"Kirito shrugged as he answered for them. "We didn't know what we wanted, and we don't really know much about guns. The whole not having to worry about ammo thing sounded really good.""Ah," she nodded sagely. "Yeah, that's a trap a lot of people fall into with optical guns. It's true, don't get me wrong, but I don't think the trade-offs are worth it, personally, especially with how cheap pistol ammo is. Either would've gotten you through the starter dungeons just fine until you could afford a proper rifle if you hadn't picked one up yet, but once you get into PvP, you'll really want a slugthrower of some kind. Anyway, we can rectify that situation in a moment. Here we are."She spread her arms and turned around, drawing their eyes to a four-story building that had a brightly-lit pink sign hanging above it declaring it as [Deckard's Gun Emporium]. "This place is my favourite in the entire game. It's got pretty much any base gun and attachment you could ever want, barring some of the rare ones and, of course, the ones that only drop from mobs," she said, "plus a gun range, mini-games, and a full arcade."Next to her, Kirito let out a low whistle, as they both craned their heads to look up at the towering building and its flashing lights. "I do not see any NPCs," Kizmel murmured, looking around. The streets were bustling with players, but as far as she looked, she could not spot even so much as a shopkeeper that belonged to this world.The woman nodded. "Yup. GGO isn't really built to accommodate players doing much other than fighting. There's a few NPCs rattling about, but not a whole lot. Most of it is automated and run by robots. So...yeah. If you wanna sell something, do it at the auction house. All of this stuff in here is stock."She strode through the doors, allowing the noise from inside to spill onto the streets, and as Kizmel followed behind her along with Kirito, she couldn't help but gawk at the walls that were filled floor to ceiling with racks upon racks of weapons of all kinds."...that's a lot of guns."------------------------------- This feels like that one scene from the movie Dad actually likes about people being stuck in VR, when they needed guns, Kirito couldn't help but think at the sight of rack upon racks, row upon row, wall-to-wall display cases of guns of all shapes and sizes that he could imagine; some, he recognized from games he'd played before, but for each he did know, there were at least a dozen that he didn't. Pistols. Rifles. Machine guns. Rocket launchers, shotguns, and more. Even larger weapons like mini-guns hung imposingly in their respective display shelves.There were enough of them, he was pretty sure, to outfit the entire JSDF and then some.Next to him, Kizmel, too, froze at the overwhelming sight of so many guns in one place. The gun store itself was busy, of course – other players mingled around the shelves and racks, pulling trial units from the walls to feel how they handled or give them a try on the gun range that stretched on the far side of the building. A mezzanine hung above them, and over the voices and muffled gunshots, Kirito could hear the sounds of an arcade and cheers of people. Neon lights lit the lower level and central area in stark white light, while coloured blue, green, and muted purple lights bled down from above. Man...she wasn't kidding. I didn't even know there were this many kinds of guns. Some of the shapes looked vaguely familiar, but at the end of the day, they all kind of blended in and looked the same to him from the ground level, with the exception of the odd one that had a splash of colour from its wood parts.The woman, whom he belatedly realized hadn't introduced herself, pulled them along to one side of the convention-sized hall excitedly. "Anyway, if you're looking to find a gun you like, this is the place to go. It's like heaven for a gun fanatic like me," she told them with a wide, toothy grin.Next to him, Kizmel chuckled at the enthusiasm in her voice, before leaning towards him. "She appears rather knowledgeable about these weapons. Perhaps we should seek her advice?""Couldn't hurt," he shrugged in return. "Sorry, we don't know the first things about guns," Kirito continued out loud.The woman's grin widened. "Leave it to me! One crash course coming right up!" She gestured towards the wall they were standing under. "So...you'll probably want to find yourself a good primary to start out with. Pistols are nice and all, but they're not going to hold a candle to a proper rifle, so in the grand scheme of things, don't worry about your choice of pistol from the tutorial. You can replace it if you want, but once you've got a primary, you won't be using it a whole lot. Also, it'd be good to pick something relatively cheap, just in case you end up in PvP and losing it. It's just a chance though, so don't be too skittish about it, but that's why I'd recommend something cheap and user-friendly for your first primary. So, speaking of primaries...when it comes to that, you've got options: shotguns, LMGs, SMGs, or your bog-standard assault rifle."Kirito looked up; there were a few frames he recognized hanging from the racks on the wall above, but those were few and far between – third-person perspective on most FPS games didn't lend itself to seeing much of the guns, after all. I think that's an American M4, and uh...an AK-something? The tall woman reached up and plucked one of the guns that he did recognize from its place on the wall before showing it to them. "Standard-pattern M4 carbine. Comes with different barrel lengths depending on whether you want it more compact or if you want the improved accuracy and muzzle velocity that comes with a longer barrel. Most beginners go for this one just because it's easy."He hesitantly reached out to grab it when she held it out to him. "Um...so, you're recommending this one?"She shook her head. "The nice thing about it is that it's pretty modular. It's got more rails than you can shake a stick at, so whatever attachments you've got, you can put on it. But starting out you'll probably not have that many, so that won't be important to you. Besides, it's chambered in 5.56mm NATO…or .223 if you're American.""Two...two...three?" Kizmel echoed slowly."Yup," the black-haired woman responded calmly, before pulling her own rifle from her back to show it to them. "This is my personal gun. I got it recently, so it's still not fully modded, but I'm liking it so far. It's a KTR-09 custom AK-variant based on a Saiga receiver. It fires 7.62x39 millimetre ammunition."Kirito blinked at her rapid-fire explanation. "That's...bigger?" he latched on desperately, trying to spot the difference between the two guns besides their shape.She giggled at his cross-eyed stare. "Yeah. A bigger caliber generally does more damage – the bullet itself is heavier, and it often has more powder, so it's faster. More kinetic energy means it'll go through thicker armour or cover, and maintain more energy over distance if you're shooting really far out."Kirito nodded slowly. "Makes sense.""That's why you see them used for sniper rifles and heavy machine guns and the like. Big bullets like a fifty-cal – that's twelve-point-seven millimetres – or .338 will go right through light and medium cover without problems.""So bigger on this... caliber ...means better?" Kizmel asked curiously. "It sounds like it would do more damage from what you are describing.""In general, but not always," came the reply as the woman stowed her gun and hung the sample back onto its rack. "Caliber refers to the size of the cartridge and bullet, so for example, the 7.62 means that's the diameter of the bullet itself, while the cartridge is thirty-nine millimeters long. Longer cartridge usually means more powder, which means more power. But it also depends on the ammo type. There's also drawbacks to firing a bigger round – a larger bullet and cartridge usually means the gun is heavier and more cumbersome, it holds less ammunition in its magazine unless it's belt-fed, and the recoil is much stronger."Kirito tilted his head. "So...smaller bullets are better then? Like SMGs...they fire faster and hold more bullets, right? I mean, more damage is good, but wouldn't the DPS even out?"The black-haired woman laughed. "Well, that's true only if you're shooting at an unarmoured target. If you run into someone or something that's actually got armour, then you'll have to look at something beefier, because you won't be doing any DPS if your bullets just ping right off or you hit the weak spots just right. Something like the 5.56 intermediate cartridge like that M4. It's damage is decent, it's got okay range, and doesn't recoil too hard, so a lot of people swear by it. It'll do most things well enough, but there are times when you'll want to reach for something bigger, like my KTR," she explained. "Or, even better, something like this ."She shuffled over a few panels and pulled down a different rifle, this one much heavier than the last one she'd handed him, and bigger, to boot. "Here's a classic – FN FAL, the gun that was once called the right arm of the free world...and the left arm of communism at the same time, heh. This one fires a .308 – 7.62x51 NATO, if you want to be precise. It's a much bigger, much heavier bullet that was the mainstay of NATO battle rifles during the Cold War. Even the JSDF used them in something like the Type 64 for a long time. Just don't go mistaking it for the Russian 7.62x39 or 54R cartridge, though. Those are not interchangeable, so make sure you buy the right ammo," she cautioned."Um...so what's the benefit of this one?" Kirito made a silent note that numbers were important when it came to gun calibers, apparently."There's a lot that goes into it – material, thickness, ballistics and all, but here's a rule of thumb I use," she told him, easily manipulating the rifle that felt like a brick of steel, "pistol calibers maybe go through light cover and armour at close range. 5.56 and the 7.62 short, like my 7.62x39, will go through light and medium at short range, and light at medium range. 7.62x51 and 54R, as well as the sniper and machine gun cartridges go through medium even when it's further out and possibly heavy at close and medium range. It's way more complicated than that, but don't worry, you'll get a feel for what your gun of choice can and can't do once you start using it."Kirito stared at her skeptically, before slowly nodding. "Uh-huh," he muttered, but if she noticed his dubious stare, she didn't show it."Other than that, it's just a matter of what you find comfortable and how you like to gunfight. That's really the most important thing. As long as you like how a gun handles and you get good with it, you'll eventually figure out what the best way to use it is. CQC, mid-range, or long range, there's something for everyone here. As far as PvP is concerned, there's no such thing as an invincible or invulnerable player, no matter how much armour they're stacking. Anyway, the best advice I can give is to try your way through the lot here and see what you like best. Not everyone plays the same. I know some top players that swear by PCCs and SMGs and somehow make them work, others really like their one-shot-one-kill snipers like the L96 or FR2 and PSG-1. Plenty of people use assault rifles and shotguns, too."Kirito looked over to where Kizmel was poking and prodding at the gun she'd pulled off the racks experimentally, trying to figure out what all the levers and buttons did on it. His own head was swimming a little bit from everything the older-looking woman had been throwing at them."Um...what about those?" he asked, pointing to where a player was fumbling with a long rifle. Unlike the assault rifles that they were standing in front of, Kirito couldn't really make out a magazine until he looked very closely to finally locate a short, stubby protrusion in front of its trigger. He recognized some as sniper rifles from FPS games. Aren't they usually pretty good in games? "Those are all bolt-action rifles," the walking encyclopedia of a woman answered, reaching for one so she could demonstrate. "It's a really slow-firing, old-timey mechanism. A lot of pre-world war one and hunting rifles use it, and most of them are sniper rifles. I wouldn't recommend it for beginners because you really have to know what you're doing with them. They take a lot of practice to operate smoothly and the rate of fire is really low, plus they tend to be too long to be comfortable for general use. There are semi-auto snipers, too, but those are way more expensive," she said, fiddling with her inventory and replacing the AK-style rifle on her back with a much larger, longer weapon.Patting its stock that protruded far over her shoulder, she grinned. "This one's my pride and joy. It's a Barrett M82A1 fifty-cal anti-materiel rifle. It'll go through anything short of a tank's armour plating from a kilometer away. But yeah, if you're new to the game, and especially new to guns, I'd recommend something more traditional. You can't really go wrong with an SMG or assault rifle."Kirito could only stare at the size of the rifle that almost matched the woman's height, its massive barrel almost as thick as his forearm. An...anti-materiel rifle? What material is this anti? The entire moon ? he couldn't help but wonder in disbelief at the sight of her hefting it like it weighed nothing. I know I used to like heavy swords back in SAO , but that's...gotta weigh a ton. She stowed it away, before pulling a couple of guns off the racks with a wide grin. "Like I said, everybody's got their own style and way of playing. There's really only one way to figure out which one suits you – and that's by shooting them!"-------------------------------Kizmel shouldered the black rifle that she had been handed to try out; letting out a slow breath, she centered her target in the iron sights before squeezing the trigger, sending a bullet hurtling down the gun's barrel with a near-deafening crack .That was one of the first things she had learned about the weapons and battles in Gun Gale Online : they were loud .She was used to the deafening noise of steel clashing with steel, the bone-jarring thud of maces and war hammers crashing into shields or armour, and the general din of combat between knights, swordmasters, or monsters. But even so, the loud, booming thunderclap of guns was something she didn't think she'd ever get used to, even knowing that they were far louder still in reality, rather than the muted versions they got in-game.The second thing she had noticed after a while of using them was that there was far more to handling them than what Leafa had once simply summed up as "point and shoot," much in the same way that there was more to wielding a sword than wildly swinging it about. Centering herself and finding her aim, controlling the recoil, transitioning from target to target smoothly – they all required skill in the same way it took practice and skill to time a parry or riposte with her saber. Even so, she was slowly beginning to get the hang of how to use some of these weapons as Kizmel began spotting similarities in how they were made, and she grew more confident in figuring them out on her own without needing to constantly consult the manuals in their description."So?""It feels...fine," she answered. And that was just it – it was fine, and nothing more. Kizmel felt no particular attachment or affinity for the gun she had just fired, though perhaps that was to be expected. It might have been a little naive of me to imagine I would find something that feels as right in my hand as my saber, the lilac-haired woman mused quietly."Not a fan, huh?" The other woman seemingly picked up on her apathy, but didn't let that dissuade her; Kizmel had quickly discovered that their impromptu guide held a vast font of knowledge and experience with the various weapons of Gun Gale , and an enthusiasm to match. "No worries, there's plenty more. Just because that's the most popular ones for beginners doesn't mean they're the only ones, after all."Putting down the rifle, Kizmel nodded absently as she looked around the store. While there were a vast variety of weapons on display, most of them were either black or sand-coloured, unlike the colourful heraldry of knights or the vibrantly distinct garb of the swordmasters and Alfs that she was used to seeing. With their shapes blurring together in a sea of black and tan, it was easy to lose track of what rifle was which, but the former knight found her eyes inevitably drawn to the sole splash of wood among the seemingly endless floor-to-ceiling racks of weapons."What are those?" she asked, pointing towards the rifles hanging in a section nearby, their wooden stocks having piqued her interest, along with the sheer variety in their shapes."Hm?" The taller woman looked over from where she had been looking for another suitable gun to hand her. "Ah, that part of the store. Those are older weapons...they're considered obsolete when it comes to the game and in the real world, so no one uses them competitively. But they're neat, especially for collectors, and there's some really cool ones there, like rare ones of which there's only a handful left in the world."Walking over, she lifted one from its cradle that seemed entirely made from wood aside from its barrel. Its stock and body gleamed with a dark lacquered finish that complemented the grey, polished barrel easily. "Japanese Arisaka Type 37," the black-haired woman explained. "It's an inter-war rifle used by the Japanese Army, though it wasn't all that good. Then again, it's pretty much a hundred years old, so you can't really expect much."Pulling back on the bolt, she demonstrated its action for Kizmel, before loosing a singular round and cycling it again. "It works and shoots, but these things were pretty underpowered even by the standards of the day. Still fun to plink around with, though, just like all the other ones. Plus, the one big advantage we have in-game is that we don't ever have to worry about a gun malfunctioning. No jams, no failures to load or extract, no light strikes...if your gun gets hit, it'll break and become unusable, but then you just bring it back to town and have it repaired, but that's all you really have to worry about. Which makes a ton of guns that had IRL reliability issues viable now."Kizmel nodded slowly, before approaching the wall of antiques. Everything else in the store looked similar and had the feeling of a refined design that had been perfected over many generations, much like a seasoned blacksmith would eventually master the craft of making their own swords – but these were different. Their shapes and sizes varied wildly, and it was easy enough to imagine them as the ancestors to the other weapons in the store.Running her fingers across the wooden stock of one particular rifle, she couldn't help but smile. Is it because of the wood that I feel drawn to these? Or is it because they are different? More...primal, more basic, as though these are distilled to the raw essence of their being, before they were afforded the luxury of becoming more than their base purpose? There was a simple elegance to many of the weapons that the other woman had called obsolete, as though their designers had made them with only a singular purpose and function in mind.She turned a curious gaze towards the taller woman. "What, exactly, makes them obsolete?"It was hard for her to imagine; after all, a cruder, less refined sword was still capable of striking, slashing, and piercing – it was, as she'd often heard it called, still a sharpened iron bar at the end of the day. It would still swing and thrust, even if it was more unwieldy. But the only reference she had for a less refined firearm was the single-shot flintlock that Kirito had obtained on Aincrad's fifty-first floor, and the cannons of their sailing ships that they had used to move about it.Compared to them, Kizmel couldn't spot a significant difference between these weapons on the wall, and the more modern ones that she had been recommended."Well…" came the somewhat hesitant answer, "they're way more expensive than what you'd pay for a more modern rifle, for starters. Makes sense – they're collector's pieces, and they're rare in the real world to begin with. Plus, some of the really rare ones are almost exclusively ultra-rare drops from certain monsters, bosses, or events, kind of correlating with their real-world production numbers. So an M1 Garand like the one you're looking at or the Arisaka I showed you earlier might be available here in the store, but something more obscure like a Type 100 or a silenced De Lisle carbine or Lewis machine gun? Yeah, those fetch a crazy price at the auction house.""...I see. But they perform the same?""In that they fire a bullet? Sure. There's even a couple of early self-loading rifles available. They tend to not have the modern comforts, though, like extended recoil buffers or rails to put optics and accessories on, which means that you'll have to fight even a submachine gun for control more than you would with anything modern. There's nothing really wrong with them, they're just...outdated. Still wouldn't wanna get shot by one, though," the black-haired woman added with a laugh. "A bullet's still a bullet, even if it's fired from an antique."Kizmel nodded slowly. It made sense – these were the predecessors to the weapons that were now wielded, considered crude and basic by current standards. Still usable, but lacking the comforts and refinement of an improved version.The other woman didn't miss the way she was looking at one particular exemplar. "Want to give that one a try? Go ahead, grab it off the rack."After being shown how to load this particular gun – it had no detachable magazine, so Kizmel was introduced something the other woman called "stripper clips" – she raised the wooden stock to her cheek, using the crude iron sights atop its length to locate her target at the end of the range. Curious as to how it would fare and what it would feel like, the former knight let out a slow breath and steadied herself.The moment she pulled the rifle tight against her shoulder and squeezed the trigger, however, she knew .The barrel roared, belching smoke and flame as an invisible fist punched her shoulder, nearly staggering her backwards. Her grip almost failed as the gun jumped far more than she'd expected, and the thunderous crack of the bullet leaving the barrel was far more deafening than anything she'd fired previous.A second shot followed, and then a third...and by the time she had expended the last round, Kizmel's ears caught a quiet ping as a small piece of metal was flung from within the gun."Like that one, huh?" There was a grin on the other woman's face, but Kizmel couldn't disagree. The modern rifles were smooth and easy to use, but this one felt visceral, primal in its nature. It didn't try to hide its power or impact or noise, nor did it try to make accommodations for those that could not wield it to its full extent; instead it wore them almost proudly as though to say that this was its purpose – no more, no less."It is different," she admitted. "Cruder, yes, but also more...um…""Authoritative?" the black-haired girl offered. "It certainly makes a statement. I'll admit, some of the older guns are a ton of fun to shoot – they've got that thump that most modern guns lack. Too bad that even though it's one of the cheaper collector's weapons, it's still insanely expensive."Looking at the price on its description in her swordmasters' sight, Kizmel found that the tattooed woman was unfortunately correct. It is easily three times the cost of the rifle she first recommended, she recalled of the gun that she'd been told was called the "M4."Despite the fact that she felt an affinity for this kind of firearm over any other she had tried today, and in consideration of her own meagre funds, the former knight didn't think there was any merit in looking for something this far out of her budget – especially since she knew that Kirito himself had spent most of his own on the motorcycle that they had used to tour the world earlier in the day.She returned the rifle back to its cradle, along with a rueful smile as the taller woman wandered off in search of a different, more suitable weapon that was within their means. It is unfortunate, but it is not one we could afford to purchase right now with our funds being what they are. Pausing for a moment, Kizmel tilted her head in thought while she tried to figure out exactly how much money they had left over from the funds the game had initially given them. Glancing back over the prices on the shelves nearest to her, her brows furrowed into a deep frown as she came to a grim conclusion.
Even if we combined our remaining funds, I do not think that we would be able to afford two of even the most basic rifles. One, perhaps, or a pair of pistols, but not much more.
Nearby, Kirito looked up from where he'd been watching her handle the wood-stocked rifle and met her gaze, clearly having realized the same thing, before his face lit up. "Oh, right! We've got the gun that those guys gave us earlier. They said it was an old one, so it's probably not great, but we should still be able to use it." That's right. I had almost forgotten with everything else that happened. Kizmel watched as he retrieved the strange-looking rifle from his inventory and laid it on the table in front of her. "Here, why don't you give it a try, Kizmel."She picked it up, eyeing the ungainly weapon for a moment; its shape was odd and markedly different from the others she'd seen so far, with its boxy, stubby magazine protruding on its left side and a highly angled grip that looked almost uncomfortable to hold but appeared to fit her hand like a glove. Looking at the gun brought up its description window with instructions and information on its operation. Studying them for a few seconds, Kizmel proceeded to use the gun range's menu to procure a loaded magazine, before carefully inserting it and switching the lever away from "safe." Pulling back on its bolt required more force than she had expected, and when she finally took aim, she found that it was surprisingly compact, shorter even than the blade of her trusty saber.Lowering her cheek onto its flared stock, she let out a slow breath, one finger tightening around the trigger as she leaned forward in anticipation of the recoil.The first round spat out of the barrel with a thunderous boom. Unlike the previous one she had tried out, however, as she failed to release the trigger, more shots followed in quick sequence as she fought to control the weapon and keep her aim steady and true. Discarded brass casings spilled out of it on her right with a deafening staccato that subsumed each individual crack into a rolling thunder, and when the last one had finally been expended, Kizmel sucked in a deep breath, pulling away and staring blankly at the target at the far end of the range.Twenty shots she had fired, and seventeen holes graced the paper sheet upon which concentric circles had been drawn."Whoa, that the hell? Where'd you get that thing from?" came a hissed voice from her side.Kizmel looked up at the surprisingly vehement outburst from the otherwise calm black-haired woman, only to find her uncomfortably close, leaning in towards her, while holding another rifle. "It was a drop from a... Pteroid , I believe it was called?""...a Pteroid ?" came the disbelieving response. "Big, tall, mechanical winged lizard-type thing? About as big as a car, with a wing span about three or four times as wide as it's long?""Yes."The taller woman let out a low whistle. "Those only appear in the Forgotten Woods. Those take some work to beat. I know you guys came from there, but you took one down with those ?" she asked, pointedly looking at the sleek optical pistol hanging from Kizmel's hip."We had help," Kirito stepped in, having noticed their argument. "What's the big deal, the guys told us to take it. Said it was just some old junk gun we could use or sell to get us started.""Must've been some help, if they let you walk away with that ." She shook her head, sending the long, black ponytail swinging. "Word of advice: don't let anyone in here see you with this thing. If the wrong people see you walking around with that gun, you'll be asking to get yourself ganked."-------------------------------"...what do you mean, we'd be asking for a gank?" Kirito replied coldly, his instincts flaring up at the implied threat.The taller woman shook her head and took a step back as she found herself the focus of the Black Swordsman's steely glare. "Not by me! But that's a first-pattern FG-42 you're lugging around with you! Those things are so rare, the last time I saw one go on the market it was for almost six million credits!" Six...six million ? Holy cow. Kirito's brain froze for a moment as he recalled the prices for the guns around him. That's...enough for a dozen guns, easily. We could buy anything in this store. What...how is this thing worth so much? Seeing the unspoken question in his eyes, their impromptu guide sighed and started to provide an answer. "It's one of the rarest guns from World War Two, and probably one of the best guns of the war...when it worked. It's one of the first true multi-purpose guns – need to lay down suppressive fire like you have a machine gun? It can do that. Need to make a marksman's shot at eight hundred meters? It can do that, and has a scope mount for a ZF-4 optic. Need a compact carbine with the full-power cartridge of a battle rifle? It's got that, too. The second production pattern is more common and a little cheaper, but you're holding the first serial production model that only had a limited run with the fully-milled receiver and all. Thing's so rare and in demand that the only thing I've seen go for more is a PGM Hecate II. You sell that thing and you can buy pretty much whatever you want.""Huh. Really?""Yes, really. And you say they let you just take it, no questions asked?" Her eyes narrowed. "Whoever let you just walk away with that gun is either incredibly generous...or a massive idiot."Kirito's eyes met Kizmel's, to find an expression of disbelief etched on her face that he knew was mirrored on his own. That guy from Rooks and Kings...did he know? He must have known, right? He's got to have known. What was he thinking? For a moment, a paranoid suspicion coiled in his gut, wondering if it had all been a set-up, but he discarded that thought quickly enough. No, if they wanted to set us up and gank us for it later, they didn't even need to give it to us in the first place. We wouldn't have known the difference, heck, we wouldn't have asked for anything, period. So why… At least now he knew what Lord Maldoror had really meant when he'd told him that it would be enough to cover their starting gear. He'd only neglected to add that it would cover their starting gear several times over.Looking over at the rifle clutched in Kizmel's arms, he wondered briefly if they should do just that – throw it on the market and use the credits to buy anything else they wanted. It would make whatever time we have in this game a heck of a lot easier, Kirito mused. But that's just it. We're here to have fun, what's the point in min-maxing? Besides…He hadn't missed the way Kizmel's eyes had lit up when she'd fired the obnoxiously-expensive gun, and the way her lips were still curled up in a faint smile that he recognized all too well, even minutes after the ringing in his ears had stopped. She looks like she likes it. And we should still have a little bit left over, so getting just one other gun...is going to be tight, but we can make it work. And besides, he'd never, ever turned down a rare item when he'd found one – it just wasn't in his nature as a gamer. Sure, we could buy any other gun if we sold it...but so could anyone else. If this thing is as rare as she says it is, then how many people can really say they're running around with one? Ever so slowly, Kirito found his own lips curling into a rueful smile."I think we'll keep it," he decided."What?" two voices echoed in unison.The former swordsman chuckled, before addressing the taller of the two women. "Sorry. I appreciate your advice, but it looks like she's enjoying that...um, what did you call it again?""...FG-42.""Right. That. Besides, it's a game, right? What's the point in doing something if we're not here to have fun.""Kirito, are you sure-"He waved off his wife's concern. "You liked it, right?""Yes, but-""Then we keep it. Besides, between what we've got left over, I think we might just have enough for another gun, so our problem is solved, right?"Kizmel nodded slowly. "Then...what about your weapon?"He peered at her from under his bangs. "You...want to keep playing?""At least for a little bit," she admitted, leaning towards him with a faint blush. "This world is intriguing, and it is by far the most similar to yours," Kizmel murmured into his ear. "I would like to meet more people that are from your world, even if they are not from Japan.""Sure," Kirito shrugged easily, a small grin on his own lips. "I don't mind. As long as you're having fun. Besides, don't worry about me. I'll find myself something I can use here...I think."He made a show of looking around when his eyes caught sight of something odd among the rows upon rows of rifles and pistols and other assorted projectile weapons. Shuffling over, he reached out to pull one of the short, roughly thirty-centimeter long cylinders from its shelf and turned it over in his hands. It looks just like a...nah, no way, Kirito shook his head in amusement."Hey...what's this?" he asked the tall, black-haired woman that had been showing them around while holding up his find."Hm?" she tore her eyes away from where she had been explaining the details about her rifle to Kizmel and glanced down at the item in his hands. "Oh, that? That's a photon sword. They're really more of a gimmick than anything else-"Kirito's mind snapped to attention before she had even completed her explanation. "Wait, this game has swords ?" he interrupted her incredulously, his exclamation even drawing Kizmel's curious gaze."Yeah," came the answer, accompanied by a shrug. "I mean, you've seen Star Wars , right? That old sci-fi movie about space wizards? It's like those, so people call them lightsabers, beam sabers, light swords...it's an energy sword, basically." A sword, huh? That was something Kirito hadn't expected to find here in a world filled with guns, and he took a closer look at the hilt in his hand – the game's laser guns aside, it was the single futuristic weapon he'd seen so far, and it had him wondering if it would the same way as in the movies. Gripping it like he would a sword, he found it a little unfamiliar since it was perfectly cylindrical instead of oval or rectangular. But I guess if it's really like a lightsaber, then it doesn't have an "edge" for it to matter… His thumb found the recessed button nearer to the top, and with a snap-hiss , a glowing, meter-and-a-half long beam of light flared into existence, about three or four centimeters thick. It hummed with barely restrained energy as he slowly moved it about, leaving a trail of light as it passed through the air reminiscent of a sword skill in SAO – and he had no doubt that it would melt through anything that touched it."This is so cool…" he murmured under his breath, spinning it through the air in a series of flourishes to test out its balance. It weighs nothing. This feels so weird. It made sense – if the blade was made from pure energy, then there was no mass in it at all, though it was completely different from the swords he was used to. For a moment, he wondered if this was what Asuna's rapier felt like to wield, with all of its weight in the hilt and all of the leverage and control right at the wrist."Yeah, they are pretty neat," the older woman agreed, "but barely anyone uses them."Kirito looked up at her, stopping his exercise for the moment. "Really? Why not?"She looked at him incredulously, as though the answer was obvious. "B-because it's a melee weapon. In a world filled with guns. You'd literally be bringing a knife to a gun fight. You'd be shot to ribbons before you got close enough to use that thing!"Kirito tilted his head. She's not wrong, but... he trailed off, looking at the humming blade in his hand. It was hard to divest himself of something so familiar, something so ingrained in him, in the same way that he'd never taken to archery or magic in NewALO ."Ah, but can it not make for a useful sidearm if you find yourself in such close quarters?" Kizmel came to his rescue. "I agree that it would be dangerous to rely on it as your main weapon of choice, but I don't believe it would be entirely without uses. Perhaps in emergencies, when your ammunition is expended, or the enemy is too close to use your rifle?""Well…" the other woman floundered for a moment. "Yeah, I guess it'd be useful, kind of in the same way that some players like having a bayonet mounted on their guns or carry combat knives, as a just-in-case kind of thing. I've got one, too, for my KTR, but compared to a bayonet or knife, those things are just way too expensive. I mean, they cost as much as a decent gun, so you'd be better off buying one of those instead. Bayonets are dirt cheap, after all, and the only benefit to a photon sword is that it can burn through any cover and any armour, whereas a physical bayonet will still struggle to pierce through."Kirito weighed his options for a moment, before shrugging. He'd never been one to turn down a challenge, after all – and besides, they weren't really expecting to dive head-first into the game's most difficult areas yet. Well, we're here to have fun, right? Might as well see how far I can go with this. And besides, I still have that pistol, and Kizmel has her rifle. Besides, if all else failed, they could simply grind the early zones or dungeons for enough money to buy a proper gun afterwards.He eyed the price tag for the photon sword, before comparing it to their available funds. Yep, just about enough. Won't be able to afford a gun after this, but between that FG-42 and the optical pistol I've got, it should be fine. He reached for it, only to be stopped by a stern gaze. "You're not seriously thinking of getting it, are you?"The former swordsman grinned back at the black-haired woman. "Well, I'm not that good a shot anyway...and besides, if I can't use it at range, that just means I have to get close, right?"Kizmel shook her head in amusement, before cautioning him. "I do not have my shield as usual, Kirito.""Ah." For a moment, his face fell, before his eyes lit up with the glint of a challenge. "But there's bullet lines, right? They kind of tell you where you're gonna get shot from. So if I use those…"The tattooed woman shook her head, left speechless for a moment until she found her voice. "Look, you're not suggesting that you dodge them all ? A single bullet, maybe, a semi-auto if you're really lucky, but you'd never get away with that against a full-auto-""Never know 'til I try, right?" Kirito interrupted her cheerfully, before quickly making his selection on the purchasing pedestal and placing down his hand into the glowing outline to log the confirmation for his purchase. A slot on top of the pedestal opened, allowing him to retrieve his new acquisition – a sleek black hilt trimmed with a silver accent, the colours of which reminded him of Kizmel's old cape.He lit it up, the hilt feeling far more familiar in his hand than any of the rifles he'd tried thus far, and was greeted with a glowing, purple beam erupting from the hilt's emitter.-------------------------------"It wasn't bad enough that you decided to keep that relic of yours to use, but I thought you'd at least back me up about that sword and tell him to grab something more normal!" the tattooed woman whined plaintively. "Seriously, when I said to pick something more traditional, this isn't what I meant !"Kizmel wasn't able to entirely hide her amusement at the piteous wail that the other woman was giving off as they left Deckard's Gun Emporium behind; coming from the tall, dark-haired beauty with the facial tattoo, it should have been an intimidating sight, but it was easy to tell that she was protesting in good humour.They had ultimately left the gun store after buying only two items, both of which now hung from Kirito's belt. The photon sword he'd been so enamoured with was one, while the other was a sleek blade that bore less resemblance to a large knife and more to a short sword with its forward-hooked crossguard and fullered blade. The bayonet, so Kizmel had learned, was meant to be attached to a rifle to turn it into a makeshift spear suitable for close combat, but her husband had opted to pick it up without a rifle to begin with, to be solely used as a blade.Simply put, it was by far the sword-like object with the longest blade he could find, his photon sword aside.It was shorter than anything she was used to seeing him wield, at just under half a meter long, but it was still a decent size that eclipsed many daggers, bordering the line of being a short sword. While she was aware that he'd opted to keep the rifle that Rooks and Kings had given them as a gift because she had taken a liking to it, their impending insolvency didn't seem to bother Kirito at all."Hey, you were the one who said that Kizmel's gun could put down suppressive fire. I'll just run up to them when they've got their heads down," the former swordsman grinned, eliciting a laugh from both women as he mimed swinging his sword around."You're pretty confident in your abilities, huh?" the taller of the two replied with an amused grin. "Guess you'd have to be, if you managed to take down a Pteroid with nothing but the basic Betelgeuse . How'd you manage that, anyway? Those things fly pretty fast, so they're really hard to hit from the ground, even with hitscan optical guns. Did you guys just keep chipping away at it until its HP gave out, or something?"Kizmel exchanged brief look with her husband and shrugged. "She threw me up to it," he answered for them."...pardon? I could've sworn you said that she threw you."Kirito nodded. "Yeah, that's what I said.""But...Pteroids fly at least ten, fifteen meters high up. They never go lower than treetop-level.""Yep."Her footsteps faltered for a moment, and the tattooed woman turned to look at Kizmel, searching for any sign of untruth, but the former dark elf merely nodded. "I have a...converted account," the lilac-haired girl answered. "It has maximum strength.""...jeez," the other woman didn't seem quite mollified, but appeared to let the matter drop. "That's one heck of a stunt. But at least that explains why you're not really batting an eye at the recoil of that FG. Guess if you got that close, even a Betelgeuse should have the punch to do some damage."Kirito chuckled. "Well, the RPG it took to the face didn't help it much, either.""That the help you mentioned earlier?"He nodded. "Yeah. This group showed up mid-fight and bailed us out. Said that we'd done some damage to its power core and it would've come down on its own eventually, but I have no idea if they were fibbing about that or not. They ended up giving us a ride back to the teleporter after our bike got blown up by that Pteroid.""Yeah, okay, that makes a bit more sense. So...Rooks and Kings, huh? That's new. Usually they're not known for helping people out. They're not gankers, either, but I don't think I ever heard of them going out of their way to help someone," her grin came accompanied by a low whistle."You know them?" Kizmel asked in surprise.The other woman shrugged. "You won't find a lot of people who don't. They've been playing since pretty much the first day of the game, and they're renowned for being really good at small-unit tactics. Didn't think they were the generous type, but then, I never really talked to them." She paused. "Say...""Hm?" Kirito asked."Uh...you guys...aren't with them, right? You're not in their squadron?"Kizmel shook her head. "Today is the first time we both have played this game, and we had not ever met them before."There was a brief look of relief that crossed the other woman's face. "Um…" she said, her head tilted to the side and looking a lot more bashful than before. "I was wondering...if you two keep playing, is there any chance you'd be looking for a squadron?""...what?" Kirito asked, perplexed, a sentiment Kizmel silently shared."Would you two like to join a squadron?" the taller woman dutifully repeated. "If you're going to keep playing GGO , that is."Kirito shook his head. "But...you don't even know us. I mean, we literally started playing the game a few hours ago, why would you possibly want us in your squad?""Oh! That's all right," she countered with a smirk. "I like to think I got a good eye for people. You two are interesting. You might be new to GGO and don't know the first thing about guns, but I can tell you've played a lot of full-dive games. Plus, Rooks and Kings gave you a hand – those guys don't just do that for anyone, you've got to catch their attention, which means you guys are extra interesting. If I can make decent shots out of you two, you'll be a right menace on the battlefield.""Surely there are better, more promising candidates," Kizmel pointed out."I guess there are, but not a lot of people are interested in joining a small, relatively new squadron, especially a Japanese one," came the answer, a little dejectedly. "I've got a couple of friends I dragged into the game to play with me, but one of them is jumping back and forth between this game and NewALO , and the others aren't always around. Plus, we're looking for a couple extra members to practice with for the next SquadJam.""SquadJam?" Kirito asked.The tall woman nodded emphatically. "You guys heard of the Bullet of Bullets, right? SquadJam is kinda like that. It's a squad-based competition...think of it as a TDM match in a single-elimination tournament format. It's like the team-based version of the BoB.""I see." Kizmel looked up at the moving billboards that lined the sides of buildings above, showing advertisements for the upcoming tournament, scheduled at the end of December. "Speaking of which, I am surprised they are holding another so soon.""Yeah," Kirito added, "with as big as the first one was, I would've thought it's sort of a big annual thing, or something, but now it looks like they're doing one every couple of months? The last one was, what, at the end of October?" That's right, Kizmel recalled. We did not watch it since we were busy in Jötunheim, but I had heard about it from Agil and Klein. Their guide's face lit up as she gestured animatedly. "I guess that was the original plan, but then the first BoB got way more popular than the developer expected. The format's really taken off since then, so Zaskar added the SquadJam as a team version and then announced that because they had so many applicants, they would rework the way they ran the tournament," she explained. "With the way the game has been growing internationally, I guess they realized that they don't have the means to handle a tournament of that scale with competitors from all over the world, even if it's a single-elimination round.""That's true," Kirito agreed slowly. "Time zones and number of players would be a problem. I was wondering how they got down to a final round with only thirty-two players on the map."She nodded. "Yup. And that was after a preliminary round with a hundred and twenty-eight entries, but since the game went international, that's way too few considering how many players wanted to sign up. I heard that the sign-ups were full within seconds for the first BoB, and that was when the game mostly had North American players only. So what they're doing now is that they've decided to hold regional tournaments every two months, which means they can let a lot more people sign up and participate. There's one for Japan, China, south-east Asia, North America, Europe, and so on, which means they can pretty much act as the preliminary rounds for the championship. The winners and runners-up from these tournaments get to go to the grand championship match and fight it out for the big title in the end, and that's now the new big event of the year," the tattooed woman explained."So what's what all these regional tournament ads are about.""Yep. But Zaskar doesn't really want to handle all the regional stuff themselves, so they leave all the promo, billing, and customer support to regional publishers, since they know the local laws and business rules better." She held up a finger. "Oh, but you're only allowed to sign up for the regional tournament once a year, just so they can keep the slots open. So, you get one shot at winning your regional BoB and going on to the grand championship."Kizmel hummed in understanding, only to look up when she saw a familiar logo on the billboard above. That is YMIR's logo...Lind's company, the former knight noted with interest.Kirito apparently had seen it, too. "Ah, that's why. I heard something about YMIR taking on publishing rights for international titles, since they're the biggest VRMMO company in Japan right now. Makes sense, but I didn't know they were handling GGO , too."The black-haired woman chuckled. "Well, that's what I heard, anyway. But because there's more tournaments, that means more people get to apply to take part, and the squad-based tourneys have been getting more attention, too. Rooks and Kings is a pretty well-known American squadron that's famous for being really good. I want to compete, but I need to scrape together enough players to make a full squad out of it so we can compete with them."Kirito glanced over, and Kizmel gave him a subtle shake of her head in response. "We appreciate your gracious invitation, but unfortunately, we, too, usually spend our time in NewALO . I do not believe it would be fair to accept your offer if we have no intention of joining this game permanently."He turned towards the other woman with a wry smile. "That's how it is, so...we're sorry. Thanks for the offer, though."She sighed, before nodding. "Ah well...can't win them all. But hey, if you're ever around, feel free to hit me up."Kizmel smiled amiably. "Of course. Would you allow us to add you to our friends lists?""Sure!" the black-haired woman perked up at that, deftly manipulating her menus, and within seconds, a prompt appeared in glowing script in front of the former knight.Without hesitation, she accepted the offer, and found a new entry listed on her list. Pitohui... I shall have to remember that name , Kizmel mused as they arrived at the base of the landed spacecraft that served as the central tower of SBC Glocken."Anyway, here we are again. If you go up to the higher levels, you can find some instanced apartments that you can buy and decorate to your liking, and it's got a stash that's safe and can store pretty much anything you want. Just keep in mind that if you do get into a PvP fight out in the open, you have a chance of dropping anything you're wearing – that's your armour, gun belt, any magazines you've got on you, and your weapons. Anything in your inventory or the stash is safe, but I prefer putting all of my spare stuff up there, anyway, just so it doesn't take up weight capacity for loot," the tall, black-haired woman explained with a smirk. "So do try not to lose that fancy gun of yours.""We will do our best," Kizmel told her with a matching grin. "I-"She was cut off abruptly when the doors to the lobby slid open and a group of five men emerged, shouldering past them and accompanied by raucous laughter and bellowing voices. "Ha! That XeXeed hasn't shown his face for the past few weeks, he's got to know that his goose is cooked in the next BoB," one of them crowed. "Look, the fool bragged openly about messing with people's builds, it wouldn't surprise me if everyone in the match came after him just for that.""Oi! Tarako, you know that XeXeed's dead, right?""Pshaw," the scruffy, vicious looking man in the middle replied dismissively. "That's just a rumour. You really think that guy went and croaked? Hah, if anything, it's more likely that he's pulling that as a PR stunt so he can have his last hurrah before fading into obscurity!"The man on his left shook his head. "Look, even MMO Today reported on it.""Without naming names or giving an address. Just his gamer tag. Who knows if that's really him," came the scoffed answer. "Who the heck is going to buy that whole phantom bullet crap? Hah, you really believe the idiots who claim there was some kind of grim reaper who shot him through a TV screen in VR ?"Kizmel listened to their jeering exchange with a frown, looking over towards Kirito only to find him looking equally disturbed. "Um...what's all that about?" the former swordsman asked."Ah…" Pitohui shook her head. "I don't know the details, but there's an urban myth going around that the winner of the first Japanese BoB back in October disappeared earlier this month, right in the middle of a livestream. He apparently hasn't logged in since, which naturally means everyone online is speculating on what happened to him.""That doesn't sound so strange." Kirito shrugged. "People lose interest in games, sometimes.""Yeah, well, if he'd just disappeared, no one would be talking about it, but the strange part is that some kind of grim-reaper like figure apparently showed up in a bar here in town during the livestream and shot at the screen while he was on. People are saying that the guy disappeared immediately upon getting shot, disconnected mid-sentence and all," the tattooed woman replied with a shrug. "So...people made it into some kind of a spooky tale of sorts.""A spooky tale? Or a nightmare?" a harsh, raspy voice asked, causing the trio to jump as a disembodied voice laughed, so quietly that Kizmel wondered if she hadn't imagined it at all – only to find out that she hadn't.The air in front of them seemed to shimmer and warp, revealing a cloaked figure that stood taller than even Pitohui. A ragged, torn cloak hid its body from view, and gleaming red eyes stared at them from behind a skull-faced mask before it turned to focus on the five men who'd just emerged from the lobby as the figure blocked their path. All around them, the air seemed to take on an unnatural chill as the plaza fell silent at the sudden appearance, broken only by the rhythmic hiss of the figure's slow breath."Hey! You're in the way," one of the men called out, voice shaky despite the false bravado in his tone. "Don't you know who you're messing with? This guy's Usujio Tarako, he ranked sixth in the Japanese BoB!"There was no answer for a long moment other than the unrelenting, unblinking stare from those vicious crimson eyes, causing them to shrink back, a glimmer of fear and recognition in their eyes."Uh...hey, Tarako," one of the other men muttered, "I think...isn't that-""So, you're not just some internet fable after all." Tarako himself spoke up, trying to sound confident even though the sudden pitch in his voice betrayed the man's anxiety. "What do you want?"Wordlessly, the masked figure reached into its cloak and withdrew a pistol, its frame gleaming black in the flickering light of SBC Glocken's street lamps. Lifting his free hand to touch his forehead, Kizmel watched as an uneasy feeling began to coil in her gut while he completed the almost ceremonious sign of a cross. There was something about the silent, ritualistic way the cloaked figure went about its task that unnerved her, and she realized that Pitohui hadn't been too far off the mark when she had called it the grim reaper.It exuded menace, and terror. It commanded fear.It was death incarnate.There was something familiar about those glowing crimson eyes, a bloodlust that she would never forget for as long as she lived. A wordless scream of warning leaving her throat as she spied the masked interloper's finger tighten on the trigger of his gun.The gunshot was impossibly loud in the plaza, its report echoing off the towers surrounding them and drowning out the murmurs from the crowd that had gathered around them. A flicker of purple light appeared in front of the man called Tarako, and Kizmel held her breath at the sight of the barrier that protected anything and any one from harm within the town's barriers. It was one she was very much familiar with, the barrier denoting an [ Immortal Object] that could not be harmed or destroyed. Kizmel's eyes drifted to the grim reaper's would-be victim, staring at the green life bar above his head.In Gun Gale Online , cities and instanced dungeons were the only place where player-versus-player battles were not allowed, and the barrier protected anyone within its borders. All of them knew this, knew that the bullet that had just been fired would do no harm.It should do no harm.For a second, all was silent, but then Tarako barked out a sardonic laugh. "So...you're Death Gun, huh? Looks like you're all talk, after all. It's a good show, but-"His avatar flickered, eyes bulging in shock and surprise before Tarako's expression contorted into one of pain moments before he disappeared entirely from the world of Gun Gale Online , despite the fact that her awakened swordmasters' sight told her that he hadn't taken any damage. The cloaked figure turned around, sending a shiver down her spine as he spreading his arms as he addressed his audience in a gravelly tone, the voice emerging in a quiet, commanding rasp from beneath its hood."This is the power in my hand. The power of life and death. Let its name strike terror into your hearts. This is the power of Death Gun . "Kizmel turned towards the wraith-like figure just as it shimmered and dissolved, seemingly melting into the darkness and disappearing as quickly and suddenly as it had appeared like a vengeful spirit. Her awakened swordmasters' sight caught only one word before he was gone: Sterben .-------------------------------OMAKE: "Hot Drop O'Clock"A car pulled up on their left side, bullets sparking off the Humvee's armour as the players inside opened fire, but thankfully their aim wasn't all that accurate on account of the rough ground they were riding on.The older man in the driver's seat grinned. "Hold on!"Jerking the Humvee to the left, he forced their pursuing car to the side, using the larger mass of the Humvee to muscle the smaller vehicle around until its left wheels hung off the cliff, sending it off the edge when their ride rocked and slid, finally coming to a halt itself at the edge of the sheer drop. Kirito caught his breath as he stared out of the windshield as another half-dozen cars and bikes emerged from the forest to surround them. Well...crap. He shook his head, glancing over at Kizmel who was lowering the expended rifle in her hands, discarding it since they didn't have spare magazines for either of them. Looks like we're respawning either way, huh? He reached for the optical pistol that still hung from his belt as they all piled out of the car and took cover behind it. Either way, they'd go down swinging – at least that was his plan when Lord Maldoror clambered out of the driver's seat and exited the Humvee to lean against it casually as though waiting for their attackers to arrive."Guess you guys finally caught up to us, huh?" he shouted across towards their attackers."Time's up for you! We've finally got you guys cornered! So just take your defeat with grace and give us your guns, eh?" came the reply.To Kirito's surprise, Lord Maldoror laughed, as if they'd just been told some joke that only he knew the punch line of. Looking around for an opportunity to spring an attack first while they were still talking, he was held back by Goldsnake."Don't go out there," the older man murmured, his large, drum-fed shotgun slung over his shoulder. "It's safer here, behind the car, trust me.""You forgot one thing," Lord Maldoror shouted back, thumbing up the brim of his boonie hat, before making a show of looking at his wrist. "We're Rooks and Kings. And it's just about time.""Time for what?" the other player spat back from across their lines."It's hot drop o'clock."The roar of an engine drowned out any response that could have been made as unseen speakers blared some kind of synthesized tune. Kirito looked back just in time for the down-wash of a pair of massive rotor blades to billow his shirt and a massive black-and-white helicopter rose from behind them, bullet lines already streaming from the three exposed gun barrels on either side of its stubby wings. A large trio of tubes hung exposed from its white underbelly as the entire segment pivoted, spitting forth a series of missiles that unerringly streaked towards the enemy's vehicles while the machine guns opened fire with a deafening chatter.It was over in seconds; the fight – if it could be called that – left only burning, turned-over wrecks of the attacking cars and trucks, while a wall of lead had cut down any player unfortunate enough to be within the attack helicopter's field of fire. Any shots they managed to get off in return had sparked off harmlessly off the helo's armoured skin.Then, as swiftly and stealthily as it had appeared, the chopper pulled up and darted away into the sky.Lord Maldoror reached for the radio that hung from his vest while Kirito was still trying to shake the ringing from his ears. "Thanks for the assist, Hawk. Say hi to Dom for me."-------------------------------OMAKE 2: "I am the terror…""Yeah, well, the strange part is that some kind of grim-reaper like figure apparently showed up in a bar here in town and shot at the screen while he was on, and the guy disappeared immediately after. Disconnected and all," the tattooed woman replied with a shrug. "Just a spooky tale, is all, really."" A spooky tale ?" a harsh, raspy voice asked, causing the trio to jump as a sudden spotlight shone down upon them. "I am more than just a spooky tale. I am the terror that flaps in the night. I am the bubblegum that's stuck to the sole of your shoe. I am...hold on-"Kizmel looked up and around as the lights suddenly dimmed and a muted, hurried whisper sprang up that she could only just make out."What? What do you mean, this is the wrong place? There's clearly crime here, and-" There was more murmuring that she couldn't make out, of some kind of argument.She blinked in confusion as the disembodied voice returned at full volume. " Ahem . Where was I? Ah, yes. I am the bubblegum that's stuck to the sole of your shoe. I am...apparently in the wrong franchise."

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

November 25th, 2025
Kazuto looked over at the projector as he got settled in for bed; perched on the corner of his desk as usual was the shimmering hologram of Kizmel as she looked on with a gentle smile on her lips while she, too, made herself comfortable for the night over in Haven even though it wasn't that late just yet. They had both felt a little rattled after the outright assassination they'd witnessed in Gun Gale Online earlier, although it hadn't taken long for reason to assert itself that such a fear was impossible, after all, further reinforced by Pitohui's reassurance that it was all probably just a stunt for internet publicity.After all, with the exception of Akihiko Kayaba's death game, there was no way for a death to occur as a direct result of something happening to the avatar in-game; the AmuSphere was made to ensure that as a direct result of what happened with SAO . Not to mention, even in SAO you couldn't kill someone in a safe zone with direct damage. By some workaround or exploit, sure, but never by direct damage in the way we saw this Death Gun guy do. Heck, I even saw that immortal object barrier show up, so it's impossible for him to have some kind of phantom bullet that can kill people through the internet. Sure, the initial brazen public confrontation had shocked him at first, but it wasn't anything out of the ordinary; tempers could run short and hot in games, he knew, thinking back to some of the more public shouting matches he'd had with Lind and Kibaou in SAO . But what had really shaken him up was the look in the masked player's eyes, one filled with madness and bloodlust and excitement – it had dredged up memories he'd thought he had put behind him.It was far too similar to the look he'd seen in other eyes, in a different time, on players that he'd fought to the death.Kazuto hadn't had a nightmare about those days in a long time, but he had a feeling that tonight wasn't going to be a particularly restful sleep.He'd done his best not to let it bother him all through dinner and had even managed to regale his sister with stories about the new game at her urging and with Kizmel's help, but apparently he'd not done as good a job as he thought. Looking up into his wife's expecting gaze, he could tell that she knew something was bothering him, but Kizmel had been content to let him decide when he wanted to broach the matter or if he wanted to do so at all.Once, perhaps, in the past, he would've just swept it all under the rug, shoved his worries and anxieties into that box at the back of his mind and done his best to forget about them while putting on a brave face. But this was Kizmel; she'd wormed her way past his defenses, outlasting his stubborn determination to keep everything to himself with an unyielding obstinacy of her own until she'd worn him down, and despite his initial fears, she'd been there for him unfailingly. And when his family had refused to turn his fears of abandonment into reality, he'd finally allowed himself to lower his guard around those closest to him, instead of straying as far away from human contact and comfort as he could like he would once have done."I'm fine," Kazuto tried to reassure her with a weak, lopsided smile. "It's just…""Bad memories?"He nodded, wincing. "Yeah. I know it's just a game, but that look in his eyes, it reminded me of... them ."She didn't need to be told whom he was talking about, and a shiver ran down Kazuto's spine at the unbidden reminder of battles fought to the death, not against the game's monsters or bosses, but against other players. People, trapped inside of Akihiko Kayaba's death game – just like him – who had decided that they found their enjoyment in the deaths of others, who reveled in bringing destruction and carnage, and who would have killed every single one of them without a moment's hesitation and with a wide grin on their faces.Kazuto didn't know how many of the death game's thousands of victims had been the result of a player-kill, or even an indirect one like Coper had attempted on him on that very first night. But it didn't matter – one was already too many. The sight of the other player screaming, dying to his own attempted MPK had been etched into his mind back then. He'd never forget the sight of the Black Cats being murdered in front of him, would never forget the glee and sadistic pleasure on the faces of PoH and his men as they killed some of the first true friends that he'd made in the death game, friends that had accepted even Kizmel at the time for what she was, without question.There were other victims, of course, and other killers, murderers. Even some who'd never dirtied their hands themselves and retained a green cursor in SAO , who'd been accomplices, finding marks and luring unsuspecting players to their deaths. Morte's challenge had been the first inkling that he'd have to fight them at some point, but it was the death of the Black Cats that had truly driven that point home, when he'd been powerless to stop their murderers.He'd decided then that, if no one else would take a stand against the PKers, he would.Not because they posed a threat to the clearing group, although they did. Not because they threatened other players on the mid-level floors, even though they did. No, it was because Kazuto had never wanted to feel that kind of helplessness ever again, because he was selfish enough that he refused to let anyone else he knew die to the murderers that could strike at anyone, from anywhere, so that he would never have to experience that gut-wrenching, heart-stopping terror and guilt of watching his friends die because he had been too weak to stop it ever again.Eventually, though, he'd been able to let go of that fear and pain.It had taken time, but he'd slowly come to terms with the fact that he couldn't save everyone; no matter how strong, how good he was at the game, no matter how much he pushed himself. With that realization, the guilt over the deaths of the Moonlit Black Cats had slowly faded away, encouraged by Saori and his other friends. No, that wasn't what haunted his worst dreams, the ones that he woke from in cold sweat, trembling – instead, it had been replaced by an entirely different fear.It usually featured prominently in his nightmares, one that his subconscious seemed to have taken a perverse delight in shaping into the form of PoH to torment him with. The man's voice, cold, cruel, and gleeful in that taunting manner of his as he pointed out that they were the same , echoing in his mind over and over again while Kazuto dreamt of the faceless masses of players that had died on the Black Swordsman's blade. It was a nagging refrain that left Kazuto doubting whether he really was all that different in light of the many lives he'd ended, himself.Laughing Coffin and PoH might not have been the only PKers in the death game, and all things considered the self-proclaimed Prince of Hell might not even have personally claimed the most lives out of all of the various killers, but it was his face that Kazuto's subconscious had chosen to give voice to the little, unspoken fears in the back of his mind that he refused to acknowledge most of the time.Kizmel leaned forward, her expression softening into one of gentle comfort. "Don't do this to yourself, my love. You are nothing like them.""Am I that obvious?" He wasn't surprised that she saw right through him and to the very crux of his quandary. Sometimes, it seems like she knows me better than anyone, even myself, the black-haired boy mused absently.She drew herself up to the full height of her – at least in projected form – diminutive stature. "The mere fact that you feel this guilt and even contemplate with revulsion the idea that you could be like them proves that you are different. You spilled blood, this is true. Yet so have I. Does that make me like them, as well? Does that make me like him ?""No-" he protested instantly, only to be cut off."Then why do you believe that you are so different from me?" Kizmel admonished gently."Because you're…" he trailed off, and she didn't interrupt him this time. "Because you're... you ," Kazuto finally said helplessly. "You're a knight. You know what you're fighting for. You protect people. You shield them, you sacrifice for them. It's who you are. It's why I love you. But me? I just...I just wanted to live .""And you think that desire to live is selfish of you?"He opened his mouth to retort, only to find no words. Eventually Kazuto just shrugged. "Isn't it? I put my life over everyone else's when I abandoned Klein that first night. What's so different about killing someone when it comes down to it?""Oh, Kazuto ," his wife sighed, her violet eyes narrowing. "Do not conflate those two things with one another. I have heard enough people call you selfish without knowing even a single iota of what you have sacrificed for others, of what you have risked, and given for others that was never asked of you. I will not have you do it to yourself." She shook her head. "You said it yourself. I am a knight. I swore an oath to protect queen and country, to those who would fight alongside me and those who stand behind me."Kazuto grinned bitterly. "I'm not a knight, Kizmel.""You have not sworn an oath, that is true," she grudgingly admitted. "And yet the lives that we have taken, we did not take lightly. We took them knowing that there were others standing behind us, whom we wished to protect. They killed for pleasure, to sate their selfish base desires, we did so because they forced out hand, because to stand as a bulwark between evil and those who cannot protect themselves is the very purpose of a knight."Her image flickered for a moment, and he found her suddenly garbed in the full regalia of the Violet Knight, armour and all painstakingly replicated, resplendent in the colours and equipment that he'd thought lost with the account transfers to NewALO . "The fact that you stood beside me in this task, without having sworn the same oath as I, is even more commendable. You had no duty to adhere to, no one you were bound by oath and honour to protect. You could have run, or hidden away, you could have awaited salvation like so many others did, and yet you chose to stand and fight, so that no others would have to. You may not be a knight in name, but you certainly are one in spirit. And that alone makes you different from the men who would kill to fulfill their own selfish pleasures.""I...I know," Kazuto sighed, burying his face in the pillow to hide the heat rising up his neck – it was hard to stay mopey and dejected when she went on to praise him to the extent of mortal embarrassment, and it wasn't the first time they'd had this argument. "It's just…" he trailed off, unsure how to put the whirlwind of emotion into words.As it turned out, he didn't need to.Kizmel smiled at him as she reverted back to her regular, every-day clothing, and in her violet eyes he saw the one thing that no one else could give him. Not because they didn't care, or didn't want to, but because she was the only one who'd been there . Who understood. She had been by his side through everything, the best and the worse; every battle, every time he had bloodied his blade, every time he had taken a life from the moment she had joined him. Kizmel had never left his side even when he'd broken down, and then carefully helped him put together the pieces of himself, including the ones he'd thought lost long ago.Saori, once, had likened their relationship to kintsugi : the Japanese art of mending broken pottery by carefully rejoining the broken pieces with lacquered gold inlay to create new pieces whose breaks and repairs stood not as a sign of weakness and failure, but renewal and strength.Others had shown him understanding. Plenty had given him gratitude for what he'd done and achieved. Some had offered grudging respect. Many had openly showered him with recriminations and accusations...but only Kizmel's eyes had ever shown him absolution."They were little more than animals that let their base urges rule their actions. They would sacrifice others freely for what they want," she told him kindly. "Kazuto, you may think that wishing to live or wishing your friends and family to live is a selfish desire, but yet you were willing to put yourself in harm's way to protect them. You were willing to sacrifice yourself for what you wanted, and that, my love, is the difference between you and him. That is why you will never be like him."Having said her piece, Kizmel settled back down in her seat, though her eyes never left him. It took Kazuto a minute to gather his thoughts and find enough strength to lift his head from the pillow, only to find that it was damp – but he didn't care.The nightmares and self-doubt wouldn't go away with just a few nice words, he knew. Life simply wasn't that easy – but it was a reminder that, for all that PoH's voice haunted him in his dreams, Kizmel's was a welcome lifeline that was there to stay. She was the glue that held him together, and the shining gold that made his broken pieces more than whole.Just like she'd always been."Hey, Kizmel?" he croaked hoarsely."Yes?""Thanks."Her smile could have lit up the room even with the lights turned off. "You are most welcome."-------------------------------
November 26th, 2025
While the world of Gun Gale Online was new and exciting, there was something simple about Alfheim and, by extension, New Aincrad. Even though it wasn't her Lyusula, Kizmel found the familiar sights and sounds of the dark elven capital at peace a refreshing change from the bustle of Alne or Yggdrasil City. Usually, it would remind her that this world, similar though it may be, was not the one she had come from, but today it was a comforting backdrop to the thoughts occupying her mind as she stared up into the starry night sky."Huh. Didn't think I'd see ya back in NewALO so soon, Kii-chan."At least, until the nighttime silence was disturbed by a familiar voice. Kizmel craned her neck over to see a short blonde Cait Sith hopping up to perch next to her atop the wall. "Did you need something, Argo?" she acknowledged her old friend."Nah," came the answer. "Just a quiet night. Saw you sitting around and got curious, is all."It was late at night – late enough in Japan that most had gone to bed, including her husband. Or perhaps it would be apt to call it early morning, instead . Then again, Argo always did prefer the night...just like us, Kizmel recalled with a fond smile . Though I doubt that she came across me by chance. Argo, after all, rarely left anything to chance.Even though the sun had long since set over her husband's lands, there was still a good number of new players from other countries that kept the hub cities busy at this hour as , though the few that had passed through the dark elven capital barely took note of her presence. Still, the world of Alfheim was large, especially with the dark shape of New Aincrad hanging in its night sky, so it was unlikely that the blonde had stumbled across her on accident. Still, usually Argo preferred to reach out by message if there was anything urgent she needed to speak about, something she hadn't done tonight.It left Kizmel wondering just how Argo always seemed to know how to find her.When she voiced that question, the blonde grinned mischievously. "Now, where'd be the fun in telling ya, Kii-chan? Maybe yer just getting predictable...or maybe I just know you too well." I suppose information is her business , the lilac-haired Imp mused with a wry shake of her head. And Argo is the best in her business .Then there was also the fact that when it came to Kirito, Argo had known him the longest out of everyone that Kizmel knew. Longer even than Asuna, longer than Klein...going back to the beta test – so perhaps it wasn't too much of a bluff on her part, after all."So, how'd it go?" Aincrad's most notorious info-broker asked with an amused swish of her cat-like tail. "Thought you were gonna be over in GGO fer a while ta check it out. Take one look at it and decided it wasn't for ya?"Kizmel shook her head. "Not at all. It is...different, certainly, but not in a bad way. I do believe Kirito and I will spend perhaps a few days to see as much of that world as we can before returning here for good," she admitted slowly, trying to find the words to describe her experience. "It was...fun," she added, her lips curling into a smile."Fun, eh?" Argo grinned. "That's good. I don't think I've ever seen ya enjoying stuff just fer fun . It's a good look on ya, Kii-chan."The former knight of Lyusula shrugged. "Is it really so strange to see me enjoying something?""Enjoying something?" Argo made a show of cupping her chin in thought. "Nah. But having fun ? Just for the sake of it, without a greater motive behind it? Yeah. Back then, even when you all were doing stuff to unwind, it seemed like it still always had to do with gettin' outta that death game, to stay ahead of the curve and all. Downtime was less about having fun and more about unwinding so you didn't lose yer edge. But now?""At the time, there was always something to do, some battle to prepare for, or some grand quest to complete," Kizmel argued. "Now, though...it is easy to find time to myself. Perhaps a little too much so, in fact," she added with a wry smile."Ah. Feelin' restless, eh?"Toying with the end of her long braid, Kizmel stared up into the starry night sky for a moment before replying. "A little, I suppose. Now that there are no life-and-death battles to fight, I've found that I have more time to consider the...mundane things in life," she admitted with a chuckle. "Things that I had never had a chance to think of before, or perhaps that never even occurred to me.""Things like what comes after the battle, eh?" Argo pointed out insightfully.The Imp nodded. "Aincrad was...simple," she told her friend. "Despite everything, at the end of the day, I was but a knight. I fought to uphold the vows I had sworn to protect queen and country, I fought for my home, to protect those under my care. And when the war was over, I had found a new cause to pledge myself to. Friends and...family, that I wished to protect, outside of these walls. Injustices that I would see righted.""And a certain swordsman to get close to, eh?" Argo needled with a good-natured cackle.Kizmel shrugged innocently. "Perhaps. But my point is, all I had to do then was fight. There was little else to consider each day other than logistics, strategy, and battle-tactics.""All things you're well-versed in.""Yes." Nodding, the lilac-haired knight looked over her shoulder at the city that was so similar to her own home with a melancholy smile. "Becoming a swordmaster, becoming more than I was at the time...didn't change that. My goals still remained the same: to reach the Ruby Palace with all of you, and win your freedom by conquering it."At the time, even the revelations about her own existence and learning about the steel castle's creation hadn't changed that single, unassailable truth. When she had taken that leap of faith to abandon her home in pursuit of the swordmasters, of Kirito , she'd felt secure in her ability to overcome any obstacle whilst chasing her fleeting dreams and memories. And despite all the turmoil that had wrought, even with her world upended at the revelation that Aincrad itself and everything she'd known, that her very life and existence were creations of the sorcerer Kayaba's making, the one thing she had always been able to rely on to carry her through was her martial prowess.It had seen her through battles with monsters, against murderers and killers of the swordmasters themselves, allowed her to stand firm in the face of the steel castle's most powerful creatures and even fight the world's own creator for their freedom.But in Kirito's world...those skills simply weren't needed.Even if she were so inclined to once again take up the mantle of a soldier – not that she was eager to do so, especially to a place or liege she held no sworn loyalty to – she'd quickly come to realize that even that door was closed to her. Whatever knowledge of strategy and tactics she had would be unimaginably obsolete in the face of the kinds of battles that would be waged in Kirito's world; gone were the days when spears and swords dominated the battlefield, and ranks of knights and men-at-arms maneuvered in large formations to meet one another or lay siege to fortresses and cities. His world was ruled by an entirely different kind of war – their brief visit in Gun Gale Online had made that much abundantly clear to her.A small, selfish, part of her couldn't help but wonder if there would ever truly be a place for her here, in this modern world of theirs. At least in Aincrad, what we did mattered, she mused bitterly. It mattered to us, and to those we fought alongside. In the steel castle, the two of them – the Black Swordsman and the Violet Knight – had purpose . Everything they had done, every battle they had fought, everything they had endured...had meaning.They'd made a difference.Compared to that, trying to find a purpose for herself in Kirito's world appeared almost...mundane. It should be an easy task for one who had helped conquer the steel castle, but she'd never really thought about what to do with herself once the battle was won."I...find myself unsure of what to do now, where to go from here," she whispered silently, knowing that Argo would hear her, regardless. "I've never known anything but battle. I've never known a normal life, outside of being a knight and wielding a sword, Argo. When I went to battle after Tilnel died, I did so expecting to die. When the war ended, I sought out Kirito, and I just fought to live each day. When we defeated the sorcerer Kayaba, I expected to die with that world, with Aincrad, along with my mother."Argo snorted in amusement. "I see part of yer problem, Kii-chan. There's an awful lot of thinking you were gonna die in there. It's not good fer yer outlook on life after."Kizmel couldn't help but giggle – even the death of her sister was something that she could now look upon with, if not contentment, then at least acceptance, her own feelings of regret and remorse long since buried alongside Tilnel herself. "I agree, but that is what it was. When I awoke, outside of the steel castle, unbound by that world, we had our missing comrades to save. And now that all the battles are finally over, I can't help but feel...adrift, in a way.""I'm not surprised," the blonde Cait Sith commented dryly. "Yer not wrong there; at least we had some idea what's considered normal before we came ta Aincrad. But...you were born into that war, right? Add to that, you've never really had a chance to take a break. There's always been the next mission, and now that there isn't…"Kizmel's lips curled into a wry, self-deprecating smile so similar to the one her husband often wore. "Now that there isn't, what need is there for a knight whose only skills are battle? I know that there is more to life, but I cannot help but think perhaps it is that same restlessness that drove me to pursue Kirito as well as my obligations to him. Was I merely seeking out a new battle to fight once the war was over? Had I remained in Lyusula, what would have become of me after the war? Would I have remained a knight, or taken up another trade?" Her smile turned more mischievous. "Or perhaps I would have become a baker?""I can't answer that fer ya, Kii-chan…" Argo trailed off with a laugh, her eyes lingering on Kizmel for a moment before turning back towards the outline of Lyusula's castle silhouetted against the starry night sky. "I see why ya came here ta think.""I know this isn't the same world, and this is not the city I was born in, that I fought to protect, but…""But if ya close yer eyes, you can almost imagine it ta be," the blonde concluded. "Looking fer that answer to that what if ?""Perhaps. This city is what could have been, had we never gone to war with our kin. It is peaceful, despite the battle against the Fallen, and I cannot help but wonder…" Kizmel trailed off."About where you would be if there had never been any war?" Argo hummed in thought. "Or maybe...what this world's Kizmel would be doing?""I must sound incredibly selfish to you. Don't misunderstand, I would not trade where I am for anything in the world. I treasure each and every moment that I am able to spend by Kirito's side in whatever form that may take, but...I fear that I am holding him back, Argo," the former dark elf murmured quietly. "That a part of him is staying behind just to be with me, to his detriment, because I cannot leave the virtual world and set foot in yours, and all I can do is offer shallow words of comfort.""I guess being stuck in VR would be somewhat limiting," Argo admitted, "but I wouldn't call what yer offering shallow . I know Kii-bou sure as hell wouldn't. Trust me, I've known that boy for a long while now, and being around you, being with you, has definitely changed him fer the better. You're giving him something no one else can, because none of us have been through half the stuff the two of you have. You understand him better than anyone else, probably better than he does himself, and when someone just doesn't get it, you're there to put yourself in their way. That matters more than ya think."The blonde sighed. "Look, I know yer itchin' ta find your place in our world, but...maybe this isn't something you should rush, Kii-chan." the Cait Sith turned to look at her, expression uncharacteristically serious. "Look, you've been running full-throttle ever since...well, fer as long as I've known ya, at least. You said it yerself, there's always been one crisis after another, even when we finally won and got out of the death game. Now, you're kinda doing the same thing – don't think I don't see ya running yerself ragged, what with everything you've been doing."A blush heated Kizmel's cheek at the admonishment, one she couldn't entirely refute. "I have much to catch up on," the former knight offered weakly in her defense."True, but we take years to learn it all and absorb it, and I don't see why you'd be any different," Argo countered. "We've had decades to experience it all before we ever get to choose our jobs, and even then, some people decide that what they picked isn't right for them and change halfway through their lives. It took Kii-bou forever to learn that running yerself ragged just leads to burning out and getting tired – and when you get tired, you get sloppy. And sloppy got you killed in the death game.""I remember," Kizmel replied with a fond smile."Well, maybe it's time fer you ta take that same lesson to heart, too, Kii-chan," the blonde pointed out. "Fighting or learning or studying, it's all the same. Ya can't do it all the time at full tilt. And sometimes, just reading about something isn't enough. You've had a lot of different experiences recently. Helping Rain and Yuna with setting up their concert, the stuff you're doing with Kikucchi, even yer little blacksmithing session the other day. The Doc told me all about it, and Higa-kun wouldn't shut up about it, either," she added with a grin.Kizmel blushed slightly, staring at her hands that showed none of the blisters that had formed that night, nor the callouses that came from a lifetime of swinging a sword. It was a reminder that Underworld, even as primitive as it was, was more than even Alfheim or Aincrad had ever been, because it was a world that left scars on her, a reminder of what she'd done and accomplished.
After all, this place is but a game. What we do may matter in the moment, but in the end, this world is unchanging, immutable, because that way it remains forever enjoyable to its players.
"I just...I don't know what to do, Argo." Kizmel let out a vexed sigh. "I know this is not something that can be changed overnight. For all of the advancements of your world, I know that you cannot simply conjure up a body for me to exist alongside you-""Aha," Argo interrupted her suddenly. "Maybe that's the problem right there, Kii-chan. Maybe you've been lookin' at it from the wrong angle.""The...wrong angle?" Tilting her head in confusion, Kizmel found the Rat's eyes staring back at her, glinting knowingly.The Cait Sith gestured towards her. "All this time, you've been looking fer something you can do in our world. A job to pick up, a profession ta learn, something to be normal like everyone else, yeah?""Yes," Kizmel admitted, wondering where her friend was going with this.Folding her arms, Argo's lips quirked up in a smirk that she always wore when she had a plan but wasn't letting anyone else in on it. "So tell me, Kii-chan. What kind of job did ya have in mind? Where do you see yerself workin' in this peaceful world?" The blonde waved towards the castle behind them. "Assume fer a moment that the two of you were back in Aincrad. No battles, no death game. Forget about him returning home, imagine that you both belonged in that world. What is it that you'd be doing, hmm?""I-" Kizmel frowned as she was forced to answer the question she'd posed herself just moments earlier in jest. It had never once even crossed her mind, given that all of the swordmasters, her husband included, so desperately wished to return home to their world. Staying behind in the steel castle was certainly not something she had even considered asking of him upon learning of the circumstances surrounding the swordmasters' captivity in Aincrad, even if it meant being left behind.Closing her eyes, she imagined herself surrounded by a peaceful Aincrad, by a Lyusula untouched by war against the Forest Elves, in a world without the need to claw and batter their way through monstrous creatures to conquer the steel castle, where she never had to pick up a sword. Would she and Kirito be farmers? Craftsmen, like Lisbeth or Ashley, or healers and physicians like Tilnel? Wardens of the forests that were so important to the elves, or perhaps scholars, delving into the libraries of the world to uncover truths yet unseen?"I would have loved to travel the steel castle with him," she finally answered after some thought."Travel?" Argo asked curiously.Kizmel nodded. "It is but a fanciful dream of mine, but there are...so many wonders on those floors, hints of ancient times and relics of civilizations of the past. Even when we were fighting, I saw so many things in my travels, things that were like no other in the world. I would have loved to see and explore them all, perhaps to write down our discoveries so I could share them with others." She'd read about similar professions in the human world. "I believe you'd call it an...archeologist?" That drew a bewildered look from the blonde Caith Sith before she laughed out loud. "Hah, ya got me there, Kii-chan. I honestly didn't expect that one, but maybe I should have – and you'd look good with a fedora. The two of you always liked seeing new stuff, after all."Taking a small amount of satisfaction in actually having managed the rare feat of surprising Argo, Kizmel chuckled mirthfully. "It is just...I cannot imagine us as anything else, at least for now. I do not have the temperament for farming, nor do I have any particular interest in handicrafts, at least not to the point that I would spend my life perfecting them without cause or passion.""That's true," the info-broker agreed. "Ta be fair, most of the jobs in our world are fairly mundane, too. Nothing earth-shaking or ground-breaking, but everyone tries ta find their satisfaction where they can. Even if it's something as small as a job well done when you've put in a good day's work."Argo snickered. "Okay. Now repeat that thought experiment, but put yerself in our world. You've spent a bit of time reading up and learning various things. Anything catch yer fancy? Anything you could see yerself doing fer a living along with Kii-bou?" If I could, I wouldn't be worrying so much about this, the lilac-haired Imp groused silently, but she knew her friend meant well – and Argo appeared to have something particular in mind, though she seemed determined to make Kizmel figure it out for herself with some gentle prodding.She tried imagining herself in Kirito's world, on the streets of the city he had called Tokyo. One face among the myriads crowding its roads as they surged to and fro, attempting to picture herself in their shoes, taking on one of their professions. The Imp's brows furrowed into a frown as she came to the abrupt realization that the only ones that came to mind were familiar ones. A tailor, a blacksmith, an herbalist or physician, a knight, a scholar... these were the ones that had immediately sprung to her mind, but she quickly realized what Argo was after. These are not professions in Kirito's world. They are ones that belong here, in this world. She'd heard of others from her husband's world before, of course: engineer, mechanic, programmer, technician, those were the ones she'd heard him discuss with his parents as his own chosen fields of study. Others that she had heard from his classmates were more familiar, like teachers or craftsmen, cooks or healers – but even then, things were different. Doctor Kojirou, after all, was not solely a physician despite bearing that title, and there appeared to be vastly more diversity in what each of these specialists did.It was the first time she'd truly thought about it, and Kizmel quickly came to find out that while she knew the words, Kizmel didn't truly understand what they meant, or what those professions entailed for the most part. Some were easy enough to envision, of course, and she had built up a fairly deep understanding of what the humans called mechanics and physics, but she would be hard-pressed to imagine what a programmer did even though she worked closely with Higa.Seeing the slow realization dawning on the Imp's features, Argo nodded. "You've been trying ta find something that you can do, but it's all been things that you understand, Kii-chan. Ever wonder why you've had such an easy time understanding all the mechanical stuff?" It's because I've studied it, is it not? Kizmel's frown deepened as she discarded her initial, immediate thought as too shallow. Argo was after something deeper, more meaningful, it appeared, as the blonde looked at her expectantly. It is true, I had a far simpler time learning what they call mechanics and physics than I did with the letters and alphabet of the arcane script...of English. But...why was that?Violet eyes were drawn to a flash of silver in the night, the slight metallic ping as Argo playfully flipped a single coin of Yrd into the air, only to reach out and catch it. Kizmel followed its arc, the moonlight glinting off its polished surfaces as the coil flipped end over end before its flight was brought to an abrupt halt. Because, whether it is in this world or theirs, there are a few immutable truths that prevail, even across worlds, the Imp realized with a start. Things that were dropped fell. Levers moved in the same manner. A waterwheel in Aincrad worked just the same as a waterwheel in the human world. A pot of water on an open flame would heat up, boil, and steam would rise.Argo's grin widened. "These are all things you understand, because yer familiar with the basic concepts that make up their function. You can imagine how it works. Even if you don't immediately get it, you can reduce it down and extrapolate," the blonde pointed out. "But what about the things you don't understand? Things that are more...digital in nature?""Digital?" Slowly sounding out the word, Kizmel pursed her lips. She had a notional understanding of what it meant, but at the same time, she'd never really delved too deeply into the complexities that made up not only these worlds she found herself in, but also her own existence as well as the machines that allowed them to exist. Have I truly been avoiding learning more about... her eyes wandered down her avatar's form. About myself? About the sorcery that creates these worlds for the players and myself? It was true that Kizmel's existence was intrinsically linked to these worlds – without them, she could not exist. She'd peered beyond the veil when she had been given Kayaba's legacy, and with that awakening had come a greater perception of the environment around her. She'd become able to mould and shape worlds like Haven and Underworld to her will, and Kizmel was certain that she could even influence Alfheim or Gun Gale if she so wished.Cardinal was teaching her how to use the powers that had come naturally to Strea and Yui, but unlike Kizmel's pseudo-siblings, the powers themselves had not come with a greater understanding of how they worked."Everything you can do," Argo spoke, her tone quiet and somber, "the power to change things in the virtual world with a snap of your fingers...it's second nature to ya. It's something you do subconsciously. You will it to be, but do you really understand what it is you're changing? What's underneath?""...I do not," Kizmel admitted guiltily.The blonde shook her head. "It's nothing ta be ashamed of, Kii-chan. After all, unlike physics, there's nothing like programming or software in your world, so it's not easy to imagine. But think of it this way: a house is built brick by brick. They make up the walls and give it shape and strength. Then you plaster and paint over that brick, and you can no longer see them, but that doesn't mean they aren't there. You see the house, the painted wall, the shape it is in. Cardinal and Higa, they see the bricks, even under layers of plaster and paint. That's a programmer's job. They understand everything about the system, its architecture, its code...and they know that when they make changes, they don't do it from the top down, but from the bottom up. Right now, yer lookin' down from the top."-------------------------------
November 26th, 2025
The ping on his desk drew Kikuoka's attention away from the report he was reading. Reaching out, he pushed the button on the desktop holo-projector that Professor Shigemura had provided for use within Rath and found the only person who would contact him in this form taking shape in miniature atop his desk."I take it this isn't a social call?" he asked after one look at Cardinal's grim countenance.The short-statured, brunette woman shook her head. "This is about the matter we spoke about previously."Kikuoka sat up straight. "There's been another incident?""As far as I have been able to verify," Cardinal answered, a foreboding undertone in her voice. "At twenty-one-thirty-two yesterday afternoon, an altercation between the player avatar called Death Gun and a player named Usujio Tarako occurred."He looked at her sharply. "You're certain of this?""Absolutely. There is recorded video evidence that was uploaded shortly after the incidence.""Let me see." Kikuoka settled back into his chair and watched with a progressively more dour expression as the confrontation unfolded in front of him on the display called up by Cardinal in the holo-projector. "This Tarako," he finally said, "do we know anything more about him?""He placed in the top ten in the previous regional Bullet of Bullets tournament," she answered. "Sixth place, I believe. It seems he is quite a highly-ranked player."The ministry official let out a tired sigh. "And you're sure this is authentic?" he gestured towards the still image that had frozen on the last frame.Cardinal nodded. "I am. The footage appears to not have been tampered with, and I have verified the authenticity of the recording.""Verified it?" Kikuoka's head snapped up.The brunette woman's expression tensed for a moment, but it was gone so quickly he wondered if he'd imagined it. "I do not have access to the Gun Gale Online server data, but there are numerous corroborating reports.""Hm. Has there been any activity on his account since then?""Not as far as I have been able to determine." Cardinal shook her head. "However, it has been less than twenty-four hours.""And the usual period for missing persons is forty-eight hours, so I'm not surprised we haven't heard anything yet. Everything is telling me to just ignore this, because it should be impossible for anything to happen, and if it did, it'd be one heck of a coincidence." But if it does happen again... he mused darkly. Once is coincidence. Twice is a pattern. But it's not like we can just go looking for the guy to make sure he's still alive. Not just yet, anyway, it's far too early, and his family or friends would know best. However, there was a nagging part of him, an instinct he'd learned not to ignore during countless deployments and operations, in combat and behind enemy lines, that there was more to this case than mere coincidence. Between the almost ritualistic way the execution took place and what Hosaka had told him, Kikuoka feared that this was something he could not ignore."You suspect that something may have happened?""Maybe. There's got to be something we can do in the meantime to check." The ministry official grimaced. "Okay. Let's see if we can somehow find the player behind the avatar and confirm whether he's alive or not. Right now, I'm hoping that everyone else is right and this is just an elaborate hoax, but…""But you assume that you will find another victim?""Yeah." Running a hand down his face, he sighed heavily. "As impossible as that sounds, but I'd rather be proven wrong than be proven right. We'd better get on this quick. I've got a few phone calls to make, maybe I can call in a few favours, convince a judge-""I have a suggestion," Cardinal interrupted him. "The regional Bullet of Bullets tournaments worldwide are sponsored and managed by a regional business, rather than the main office of Zaskar itself. You may have more success in contacting them than you did contacting the main U.S. branch."Nodding slowly, Kikuoka exhaled roughly. "That's a good idea. They might even fall into our jurisdiction. Let me see if I can find out who's handling the tournament here as Zaskar's proxy.""That won't be necessary. I have the information you require," she told him."Who is it?""YMIR." Cardinal paused, folding her hands in front of her. "It is likely they have at least some of the player information, considering that prizes were shipped out to the top ten participants from inside of Japan, and the registration form for the Bullet of Bullets participants requires a valid email and mailing address."The answer caused him to freeze for an instant, hand halfway to the phone. "I'll give them a call," Kikuoka murmured, a glimmer of hope welling up in him. Maybe if we're quick enough, there's a chance. If they'll give me the information without needing a subpoena or warrant, we can make it in time. It took him a moment to find the right number to dial. "Good afternoon, this is YMIR Productions, how may I direct your call?""This is Inspector Kikuoka with the Ministry of Internal Affairs," he introduced himself to the pleasant female voice on the other end. "I would like to speak with Takeo Ohtsuka-san, please.""I'm sorry, but I cannot connect you without an appointment. The earliest Ohtsuka-san is available would be December the third, if that is satisfactory for you, Kikuoka-san?"He shook his head. "I'm sorry, but this is an urgent matter. I'm calling on official business.""I can inform Ohtsuka-san of your call and ask if it would be possible to adjust his schedule, but that is the best I can do. May I know what this is regarding?"She was being perfectly pleasant and accommodating, but he also didn't have the time to go through a receptionist. "Please just inform Ohtsuka-san that Inspector Kikuoka would like a word with him. It's urgent. Just let him know that it's a follow-up to the SAO inquiry."There was a rustling from the other end of the line, followed by a brief click that had him wondering if he'd been hung up on, but then the voice returned. "One moment please. May I put you on a brief hold?""Go ahead."Soft, nondescript music emanated from the speaker on his phone as he tapped his finger nervously on the desk. A small eternity passed, but the clock told him it had only been two minutes. "Hello? Inspector Kikuoka, are you still there?""I am.""I have spoken with Ohtsuka-san, and he is willing to take your call right now. Please hold on while I transfer you through."The music returned, only to be replaced by a male voice this time, one that Kikuoka remembered from the time he had conducted interviews as the head of the SAO case victims response task force. "This is Ohtsuka.""Ohtsuka-san, this is Inspector Kikuoka." The ministry official breathed a sigh of relief, but the battle wasn't won yet. "I don't know if you remember me, but we spoke about a year ago."He could almost hear the smirk on the other man's face. "I do. You're a hard man to forget, Kikuoka-san. I am told this is a follow-up to the SAO inquiry, but what is this really about? As far as I know you got your answers last year and the case is closed. Even the...subsequent events.""Forgive me the slight deception, Ohtsuka-san, but I needed to speak with you on an urgent subject. It's a matter of life and death.""That sounds rather drastic."Kikuoka sighed. "Believe me, I wish it didn't have to come to this. But allow me to get to the point. YMIR currently has a contract with Zaskar over in the States in order to handle publishing of Gun Gale Online , correct?""Yes.""And this includes handling the organization, promotion, and hosting of the regional Bullet of Bullets tournaments?" he prodded further."...it does," came the hesitant reply. "Inspector Kikuoka, what is this about? You know I cannot divulge contractual information.""I'm not asking you to...well, not really." The ministry official swallowed. "I know that this is a big ask, but...I need the records of one of the participants from the last Bullet of Bullets."The line went still for a moment. "Records? What records, and why?""I cannot disclose that to you." It sounded hollow even to himself. But if anyone finds out that I divulged information pertaining an ongoing investigation to a potential ly related party, there'll be hell to pay. A sigh came through the speaker. "You know I can't give out private and protected information, Kikuoka-san. Even if it has something to do with the SAO case, which it sounds like it does not – I have a company and employees to protect. I won't jeopardize that on just your word. If you had a court order of some kind-""I can get one." I hope. Kikuoka grimaced, knowing his chances were slim without evidence. Evidence which he needed the other man's cooperation to obtain. "But I would really appreciate if we could obtain some preliminary information to speed up the process.""That's not how this works," the other man admonished him, a hint of steel in his voice; Kikuoka wasn't surprised, after all, this was one of the leaders of the clearing group who'd fought all the way from start to finish through Akihiko Kayaba's death game while holding his guild together. He hadn't accomplished that much by being a weak-willed pushover. "I'm sorry, Kikuoka-san, but without proper authorization, I cannot hand over privileged information. It'd be a violation of Japanese law and I'd be putting my entire company at risk. That's not something I'm willing to do without good reason."The words died in Kikuoka's throat. He could reveal to him what he was looking into, but if they showed up on the player's doorstep, and he was still alive? At the end of the day, we don't have any proof that there was any foul play involved. And my gut feeling and the hunch of a single data analyst who shouldn't even know about the case is hardly probable cause. And if it got out that YMIR had leaked the private information of even just one of its players, there would be hell to pay for the company – no, he couldn't fault Ohtsuka for being cautious.Kikuoka swallowed his protest. "I understand. Thank you for your time today, Ohtsuka-san.""I'm sorry I couldn't help you." Ohtsuka's tone grew softer. "If you have anything at all that you can tell me, please don't hesitate to call again.""...thank you."The line went dead, and he sat back in his chair, rubbing his temples. "Well, it was worth a shot." He turned to Cardinal. "Can you send me a copy of that video? I'm still holding out hope that it's going to turn out to be nothing."Nodding, the brunette AI complied and soon after his phone chimed with a new email. "Is there a reason you suspect that there will be another victim?" she asked curiously. "We have discussed this previously, it is impossible for a murder to occur as a result of an in-game action. The hardware is physically incapable of inducing the heart attack that was the previous victim's cause of death.""I know." He ran a hand down his face. "Everything we've gone over tells me the same story. It's impossible . There shouldn't be a connection. Maybe it's just an unlucky coincidence. Some really bad timing. But…""But?"Glancing up, he found her staring back at him, though to his surprise, there was no judgment in her eyes, just inquisitiveness. It made it easy to confide her in, especially since she was the one person on the planet still alive with the kind of intimate knowledge of what was possible and what wasn't. "Call it a gut feeling. It's...too convenient. Even the coroner said that he was in too healthy a shape to suffer from a heart attack, and while it is technically possible, the odds are extremely small. Add to that the timing, the way this Death Gun seems to have chosen his target, the way he's acting very deliberately, it's all too suspicious.""But would not a murderer want to keep his identity a secret?" Cardinal countered. "It appears counter-productive for him to announce his actions and conduct himself in such a manner in broad daylight in front of witnesses. Assuming he was , in fact, responsible for the death of Tamotsu Shigemura, he must know that it would be easy to determine his location and identity from the account data. I understand that usually criminals would try to avoid such behaviours in order to escape punishment.""You're right, of course," Kikuoka conceded, "and he's definitely doing his best to stand out. It's almost like he wants the attention. Which is the other thing that doesn't make any sense. Unless…"He trailed off mid-thought as another possibility occurred to him. There had been a string of murders and deaths that resulted from direct action of certain individuals inside of a full-dive game...individuals that had gotten away without being even prosecuted for their deeds. But that doesn't solve the issue of how the murders actually occur. It's not like SAO where the hardware is responsible. We've ruled that out already, it's physically impossible. He couldn't have killed him from the game. And the player himself has an alibi, too – he was at home, logged into the game. Does that mean it really was a fluke? He'd long ago learned that, no matter how strange a situation, as long as he eliminated the impossible, whatever option remained, however improbable, must be the truth. But what if every option was equally impossible? We don't have motive, we don't have means...at this point, we don't even have anything resembling suspicious behaviour. It's a game about shooting other people, for crying out loud, no one is going to bat an aye at one player shooting another inside the game. All we have is a string of unlikely coincidences ."If only we had some witnesses we could talk to, maybe they'll have picked up on something that we missed in the video," he mumbled to himself. His eyes drifted to the still frame of the video that was still shown from the holo-projector, only to find two familiar figures in the crowd of players.-------------------------------
November 27th, 2025
Kizmel looked up from the book she had been reading when Kirito groaned and stretched at his desk. Looking through the window into his world, she found him letting out a quiet yawn and closing the textbook he had been working on ever since coming home from school."Well, that's done," he announced. "Man, sometimes I wish I could do my homework in VR. It'd be so much nicer," her husband commented meaningfully.Kizmel giggled. "As much as I would like that, I do believe it would also prove to be somewhat...distracting."Kirito shrugged. "Hey, I still think we can make study groups work. It'd be nice to get everyone together, and if we do it in-game, Asuna could be there, too. Just have to find a nice, quiet spot we can do that. Can't keep bumming off of Fuurinkazan's guild home all the time.""Perhaps we should think about finding a homestead for us?" she suggested."Maybe." Kirito grimaced. "But...I don't know about you, but I haven't really found a place in NewALO that I'd really want to settle down in. Not yet, at least, but who knows, maybe New Aincrad will have some nice places once they open up the higher floors.""You dislike the idea of a home in Alne or Yggdrasil City?"He shook his head. "I wouldn't go that far. It's just...it doesn't feel right, you know?"Kizmel thought about it for a moment, before nodding. "I see...I suppose I feel the same. There has not yet been a place in that world that I would feel the need to call home , myself.""Yeah. Too bad the others can't connect to Haven. I mean, they could , but considering what it's connected to…" he trailed off. "Oh well. Anyway, did you want to do something? We've got a bit of time before dinner. Maybe two hours or so. We could go back into GGO if you want.""I'd like that."He stood and moved over to his bed, retrieving the AmuSphere from the shelf next to it. "All right, give me a minute and I'll meet you there."Kizmel nodded and watched as he activated the device and placed it on his head before laying down in bed. With a final grin and thumbs-up at her, she heard him speak the words that would catapult his consciousness from his world into hers."Link start."With her husband's body silent as though asleep, the former dark elf lingered only a moment longer before turning her attention away from the window through which she could observe him. All around her, Haven faded away, leaving her in the whitespace that she had first found herself in when she had awoken after escaping Aincrad, and which she had since learned was something that Kirito and the other players called the lobby or hub, a place from which all of the Seed's worlds could be accessed.At first, moving to and from Haven or Underworld had required her to summon the expanded menus that were at her disposal as an "administrator," an authority she'd learned had been bestowed upon her by Kayaba himself. Now after some practice, however, she could simply will herself to move in between places without the need for spoken commands or menus. Selecting the game, she confirmed her choice and found herself drawn into a rainbow-hued tunnel that terminated in a blinding white light.When she opened her eyes, she found herself in the world of Gun Gale Online once more, surrounded by the by now familiar sounds of the city of SBC Glocken. Kizmel was exactly where she had logged out last, in a corner of the main lobby inside of the central tower, and within moments, Kirito appeared beside her."So," he asked, taking a moment to gather his bearings and stretch languidly, "what do you want to do today? Go out into the fields now that we've got some better gear and practice, or try and finish clearing that dungeon we started yesterday?"He was dressed in a sleek black jacket that had been part of their spoils from the previous day's exploration, and both its colour and cut fit him in a manner rather similar to the style of the Black Swordsman. Kizmel's own armour, however, if it could be called as such was little more than a bulky vest that had some kind of solid plate on the front and back, but not much more.To the former knight, it felt more than a little... light .Of course she hadn't expected a breastplate that would protect her from the kinds of modern weapons the players wielded in this game, but it was hard to divest herself of the notion that armour should be more...substantial, and she wondered if this mass of fabric and the odd, stone-like plate inside of it would really be able to protect its wearer. At least it offered plenty of pouches for her to stow spare magazines and other items around her chest and waist where they could be reached with ease, and according to Kirito, it should offer at least some protection from the kinds of weapons they would be facing."Let us complete the dungeon first," she decided after a moment's thought. "I would not mind more practice before venturing into the open where we can be attacked by other players. Besides, we have never left a dungeon unfinished in Aincrad, and I am loathe to start doing so now."Kirito grinned. "All right, back to the bunker it is. Time for round two."On the previous day, they had chosen the dungeon called the Abandoned Bunker for their first real foray into the game for this very reason, as neither of them had much, if any, experience with the weapons and tactics that players were expected to wield in Gun Gale Online . And while she didn't mind conflict with other players out in the open fields, it was not something she relished going into unprepared and unpracticed.It had been a good decision, too, as it turned out, and neither of them were too prideful to admit that the first real day playing the game had been...rough.Kizmel's first real experience with actual battle in this world had quickly shown her how different it was to the battles she was used to fighting – the kind with sword and steel, clashing just within arm's reach as two duelists used their skills to best one another in a deadly ballet of sharp blades. Combat in Gun Gale Online was, much as Argo had told her months earlier, far more impersonal, and far less reliant on the individual skill of the combatant in exchange for their grasp of strategy and tactics.Where she was and when she chose to fight held far more importance in these kinds of battles than how good she was with her chosen weapon, though that still played a role. But there would be no blocking an enemy swing, no exploiting an over-extension following a skillful parry; instead, it would be an exchange of withering barrages of gunfire, and cover, positioning, and initiative were far more important than even in the battles of Aincrad or Alfheim. The previous day had put their inexperience in stark perspective, and they had failed and respawned more than a few times before finally getting the hang of it and adjusting their approach to battle in this world.There would be no rushing into the midst of a fight to attract attention and absorb blows for her comrades as a tank, there was no switching or coordinating their sword charms with one another to take down a tougher enemy while ignoring its companions. Instead, she found herself having to abandon the ingrained instincts and reflexes of a tank that shielded her party and partner, focusing instead on becoming an ambush predator, locating their prey from a distance and choosing the right time and place to begin the battle – if done correctly, it would be over incredibly quickly, and they had learned that a drawn-out battle was a losing one.Their trek was a short one, as the Abandoned Bunker was situated right on the outskirts of SBC Glocken, where the city's roads bled over into the dunes of the Remnant Wasteland, standing prominently at the boundary of the zone. Just like on the previous day, a number of vehicles were scattered around its entrance while players came and went, so the pair of former clearers attracted little attention as they, too, approached the structure.Its large, partially-sunken entrance rose from the sands in front of them like a dark, giant maw made from stone and concrete, and from their prior exploration Kizmel knew that it led deep underground. Much like the castles she was familiar with it had thick walls to protect its precious contents, though the large, rusted hinges no longer held aloft the massive gates that had at one point barred its entrance. Once, she surmised, it had likely served as a refuge for its creators, though now it was the earliest dungeon in the game, infested by mechanical beasts and creatures that Kizmel had come to learn the players called combat droids or battle bots.Passing by the vehicles and other players, they came up to the translucent, warbling barrier that separated the instance inside from the outside. Stepping through it and into the tunnel that led to a large ramp down felt almost like entering a different world; the heat of the sun outside and the hot, dry air gave way to a cool humidity that felt more like they were about to enter a cave rather than a man-made structure, and while her sense of smell wasn't as acute in Gun Gale Online as it was in Underworld, Kizmel thought the very air around them felt stale.Flickering lights suspended from the ceiling high above them cast an orange glow that did little to alleviate the shadows of crates and boxes that had been haphazardly placed right at the entrance as some kind of makeshift barricade. Deep furrows in the stone beneath her feet spoke of massive vehicles that had once traversed this entrance, and one side of it was taken up by a burned-out, rusted hulk.A battle had clearly taken place here at one point if the scorched and scarred walls were to be believed, though its remnants had long ago been picked clean by scavengers, its only remainder the lone, metal skeleton that had been her first close-up look at the kinds of beasts that dwelt in this dungeon. It was notable by actually still being here, in a world where bodies and corpses of defeated players and enemies disappeared into the ether, and was made from steel rather than bone, but unmistakably bipedal and vaguely in the form and size of a human. Its narrow, almost cylindrical head was lowered onto its chest, the single large "eye" at its center dark and inert as a result of the damage it had sustained. Three-fingered hands clutched at a broken rifle, and Kirito briefly stopped by to check it for anything they could claim."Huh. Some ammo and junk parts this time, nothing too useful," he declared, standing back up from the remains of the robot. There was nothing in the other crates around them, and the pair quickly continued down the ramp and into the depths of the bunker below.The foot of the massive ramp opened up into a large chamber that Kizmel had recognized at once as an assembly area, akin to the parade ground in front of Lyusula's palace – only where she was used to seeing knights and men-at-arms assembled there, this one had been made for the vehicles housed in this underground fortress. The chamber was littered not just with crates and boxes, but also the burned-out and stripped carcasses of vehicles small and large. Some were barely recognizable as similar to the bike they had taken, while others were the size of a small hut, made entirely of steel and metal that cast intimidating shadows in the barely-lit hall; tanks , Kirito had explained to her, a vehicle meant to be a hulking, protective beast of steel from which Kizmel's own role had taken its name.The pair stopped at the entrance to the assembly hall, knowing what awaited them inside. Slow, shuffling steps and mechanical clanking announced the presence of a patrol of the kind of bipedal combat droids that they had found everywhere inside the bunker on their first excursion inside.Crouching down and using some of the crates nearby to hide, Kizmel risked a glance around her cover to find a quartet of droids shuffling in between the gutted hulks as they had expected, searching for any foe that dared intrude upon their territory.She held up four fingers to signal her husband, and Kirito nodded. "Wait till they turn around, then we take them," he murmured into her ear.Yesterday, this had been the first encounter that she had fought on their terms in this world – and the initial attempts had gone rather poorly, at that. Kirito, though his photon sword proved to be a deadly close-combat weapon, no longer had at his disposal the absurd strength, speed, and durability of his avatar, his pistol taking nearly a half-dozen shots to bring down even just one of the bipedal machines. And while Kizmel herself could take a few hits from the droids' optical rifles, against four of them the pair had quickly found themselves outgunned, and her husband had discovered the hard way that charging into four rifles was a quick way to be sent back to the city.They waited in silence as the shuffling steps passed, resisting the urge to peek over their cover and possibly expose their position. It was only when the footsteps moved away from them that Kirito began to move with a soft rustle of cloth.He wasn't as nimble or stealthy as she was used to, but Kizmel had to remind herself that he had none of the skills and abilities that the Black Swordsman had cultivated over the two years in the steel castle. Still, Kirito moved silently and expertly while she shouldered her own rifle in preparation. It was a tactic they had worked out through trial and error to make up for their shortcomings; he would nimbly draw their opponents' attention without worrying about dealing damage, allowing Kizmel and her rifle to pick them off without being pinned behind cover or subject to much return fire so that she could make use of the powerful weapon in her hands unhindered.The metal of its stock felt cold to the touch as she lowered her cheek onto it, finding the sights in the dim light and lining up the quartet of droids.With a snap-hiss that echoed around the chamber, the purple blade of her husband's photon sword burst to life, painting harsh shadows across the bare concrete walls. The noise instantly attracted the attention of the patrol as they turned in his direction, their rifles coming up and humming to life with a low whine that they had come to associate with the laser weapons of the game.Kirito didn't wait for them to attack, and the pistol in his right hand began spitting fiery bolts of light as quickly as he could pull the trigger, tracing crimson beams across the room in an attempt to draw their attention and land a few hits by sheer volume. A few shots found their mark, chipping away at the life bars of two of the machines and sending sparks exploding from their torsos, but the swordsman's weapon lacked the raw punch to put their foes down without sustained fire.But his opening barrage accomplished what he needed it to – the attention of all four droids was now firmly on him as they pivoted and brought their own weapons to bear. She watched as Kirito swung back into cover behind one of the wrecks as the return fire bored into the charred steel.Taking that as her cue to join the battle, Kizmel opened fire herself. Pressing the trigger under her finger unleashed a thunderous report as the FG-42 spat its eight-millimetre ammunition towards her targets, muzzle blazing with a flame akin to a dragon's breath. Her first two shots buried themselves into the torso of her chosen target, causing the machine the come to a violent halt as its chest-plate caved in, before it finally crumpled into a motionless heap.Not satisfied with claiming just the one, she swept the muzzle of her rifle across in an arc, continuing to fill the air between them with a lethal hail of projectiles that enveloped the remaining three battle droids.One shot blew the arm off a second, and the former knight let off the trigger, taking a split-second to adjust her aim through the thin trails of smoke drifting up from the barrel of her gun before firing once more. Four shots rang out in quick succession, the first two missing before the third found its mark on the torso of the third droid, punching through the armoured carapace and staggering it backwards, its life bar half depleted before the final bullet smashed its head to pieces, causing the debris to disappear in a shower of colourful light.Finally reacting to the new threat, the fourth machine turned around, only to find that Kizmel was quicker on the draw, and a trio of shots broke the joint of its left leg; combined with the damage Kirito's initial volley had done to it, the droid's life bar emptied fully.A crimson line speared through the space in between them a split second before a green bolt lanced towards her, striking Kizmel in the chest in return; the former knight grit her teeth at the numbing sensation that spread through her body in lieu of an actual impact and prepared to shoot back, only to find her husband darting towards the final machine that was awkwardly handling its rifle one-handed, the photon sword in his hand cutting it neatly in half as the two parts slid to the ground with a clatter.He turned to look at Kizmel over his shoulder and gave her a thumbs up, before retracting the blade in his hand. Letting out a quiet breath, the former knight stood and lowered her rifle, walking over towards her partner as he rifled through the spoils of their ambush."Well, that went better than yesterday," he told her with a grin as they took in the chamber that had fallen silent after their brief, but violent altercation with its guards. "So, on to the left this time?"-------------------------------The photon sword in his hand hummed quietly, its glow just barely enough for Kirito to watch his footing as the further down they got into the bunker, the worse the lighting got. Sugu would hate it down here, he thought to himself with a silent chuckle. It almost feels like a horror game. Bare, sterile concrete walls and the utterly abandoned nature of the spaces they moved through did little to disabuse him of that notion, either. He'd been in plenty of other dungeons before, but this one seemed especially spooky, between the dust-covered chairs and tables in the living spaces, some even with plates and mugs and silverware on them as though people had just been sitting down to eat. It wasn't abandoned so much as it looked like everyone had simply...disappeared years, if not decades, ago. He almost expected ghosts or undead to come out from the underground, instead of the mechanized enemies that seemed to be the main antagonists of the game.It was only the occasional encounter with isolated bots that told him they were moving in the right direction as the pair delved further and deeper into the complex after passing through the large annex just beyond the motor pool by the bunker's entrance. Unlike the initial patrol of four, however, the other mobs inside the bunker were either alone or in pairs, which made dealing with them much easier, though the narrow corridors and passageways posed their own challenges when it came to a distinct lack of cover.Still, Kizmel's rifle was as potent as Pitohui had alleged it to be, and her aim was just as good, so the bipedal droids weren't that much of a threat.The same couldn't be said about the other things that lurked down here, however. Kirito stopped at the entrance to another open space, squinting as he struggled to scan the area for vents and ducts just as his ears picked up the distinct scrabbling of metal talons on concrete.Bringing the photon sword down, he slashed through the area in front of him in a slanted cut reminiscent of the sword skill of the same name, even if there were no such skills in GGO , the glowing purple blade trailing an arc of light behind it as it flew through the air. It intersected the path of the smaller droid with the acrid stench of burning electronics and the hiss of melting steel, carving a crimson damage line through it as their attacker dropped to the ground in two pieces before breaking apart into pixels.Kirito had very quickly learned to be wary of large vents and ducts or other kinds of openings in the walls and ceilings; the eight-legged crawlers that looked a little like dog-sized scorpions and which mounted vicious saws and pincers really liked to charge at them from the dark recesses of those, skittering around inside of the walls and ventilation ducts before springing an ambush in close quarters where guns were of little use.Next to him, Kizmel's gun roared to life as it spat bullets into the ceiling moments before a metal grate dropped down, revealing another pair of the skittering bots as they came down on top of them, only to be greeted by a hail of gunfire as her muzzle flashes lit up the room. Kirito added his own pistol to the mix for good measure even if the Betelgeuse wasn't nearly as powerful as his wife's rifle, and between the two of them, the crawlers never even got close.He let out a deep breath as the room fell silent again, the only noise the hum of his blade and the click-clack of Kizmel replacing the magazine on her gun.Gunfights in the close confines of the bunker's hallways felt a lot different from the shooters he was used to playing before being trapped in the death game even though some maps had been just as claustrophobic. Arena and deathmatch-style shooters had been popular at the time, and they were always fast-paced, frenetic affairs with highly sensitive movement and demanding incredibly quick reaction times that had worked well with his own reflexes; but the gun battles in GGO were entirely different, and rushing around wildly was much more difficult in full-dive and far more hazardous as well, he'd quickly found out. I guess that's why the first dungeon is such close-quarters, he mused as they slowly proceeded further down into the bunker's darkened depths. Lines of fire, cover, sight lines...they're a lot easier when it's all narrow corridors and open rooms. Plus, if we'd only brought the beginner laser guns, we'd probably still be all right down here, it'd just take us longer. About the only thing that proved useful to him here was his reflexes, even if he sometimes had to fight against the ingrained instincts to launch himself into close combat using the sword in his left."Stairs," Kizmel whispered as she came to a halt. There, in the flickering light from a singular bulb above their heads that struggled to cast enough light for him to see more than a meter in front of him, was a black void.Holding out the glowing blade of his photon sword, Kirito found that it was, indeed, an intact stairwell."We've got to be getting close to the bottom by now," he murmured.His wife nodded slowly. "I agree. This is the...third floor down so far? I do not think any structure in Aincrad ever went this far underground.""So, do we keep going, or take a break?" he asked.Kizmel hummed in thought. "Let us continue on. We may not have to worry about clearing our way out, but something about this place unsettles me. I much prefer the open plains.""Yeah, I get what you mean. It's too dark, and too deep underground for my tastes," Kirito agreed with a chuckle. I guess you can take the elf out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the elf, he mused fondly. They knew from the previous day that defeated mobs wouldn't be respawning, so they technically had all the time in the world to rest and sort their equipment out – but sitting around in the darkness in an abandoned bunker wasn't exactly his idea of a good time, either.They carefully proceeded further down, only to find that the stairwell deposited them into a large, open area the size of a small warehouse with a high, vaulted ceiling. Crates lined one side, stacked on top of one another nearly ten meters up, while on the other side a series of clear, cylindrical tanks bubbled with what he guessed was some kind of bluish-green contaminated water and fuel.And, unlike the rest of the bunker above, this place hummed with electricity as machinery worked all around them. Generators spun quietly in the corner while pumps whirred and moved liquid through the tanks. Lights came on as they set foot inside, bathing the place in a warm, orange glow that caused him to shield his eyes from the sudden brightness. Oh, that's a boss arena if I've ever seen one , the former swordsman grinned to himself. Just like the assembly plant on the other side of the motor pool that we found yesterday. "Looks like this is it. Wonder what the boss is going to be like." It better not be another tank. That thing yesterday was a pain to deal with. The previous day had given them their first taste of fighting something that was actually armoured – aside from the Pteroid they had fought over in the Forgotten Woods – and they had gone in expecting Kizmel's rifle to be able to work through it the same way they could chip away at a boss in SAO .They had been wrong.Watching his wife's rifle spit fire only for the bullets to ping harmlessly off the tough front armour of the miniature, roughly car-sized, honest-to-goodness tank on the other side of the bunker in its assembly bay, had driven home what they had been told about the drawbacks of each weapon. Shots that he'd seen rip flashlight-heads to shreds had not even scratched the thing's paint, much less its HP bar, while his optical gun had slowly but steadily worn it down and his photon sword had been exceptionally useful in breaching its armour, cutting straight through the thick plating that even Kizmel's eight-millimetre bullets had struggled to penetrate in places and leaving parts vulnerable for her to exploit."Shall we?" she asked with a grin, stepping into the hall."Let's."Slowly, their footsteps echoing in the cavernous chamber, they made their way past stacked crates and tanks, taking note of where they could seek cover and keeping their eyes open for anything that moved.They didn't have to wait long.Near the center of the hall they found a three-meter tall machine. Moving around on six ball-wheeled legs, it skated around the chamber sedately, three domed "eyes" searching for any players to attack. A spider-like body gleamed with a dull, matted blue colour and carried a boxy container on its hind end, surmounted by a pair of swivel-mounted heavy machine guns, while an underslung large-bore autocannon rounded out its armament.The game put up the boss's nameplate and an HP bar as they got close enough, and Kirito grimaced at the number he was seeing displayed as its health. A...Mechanized Arachnoid Response Unit, MARU? That thing is tougher than the tank from yesterday, which means that that was the side-boss, and we're looking at the actual dungeon boss right now. His grip on the photon sword in his left tightened – given the sheer number of hitpoints this thing had, the pistol would be all but useless, unless he wanted to be here all day."Here we go," Kirito muttered as Kizmel readied her rifle."Ready," she called out. All right, let's see what you can do. Kirito nodded and swung out as wide as the space would let him, before taking aim with the Betelgeuse in his right. A squeeze of the trigger sent a trio of bolts flying towards the boss, and then the battle was on.His shots splashed themselves harmlessly against the MARU's carapace as he'd expected, making only a minute dent in its large HP pool, but at least he could tell they had done some damage. It spun towards him immediately, reacting and moving quickly despite its size, and with a whir its machine guns came up to track him. Crimson lines streaked through the air moments before the two barrels opened fire with a roar, spitting bullets in his direction, forcing Kirito to duck back behind one of the metal crates for cover as a staccato of impacts assaulted his ears.Kizmel opened fire once the machine was distracted, her gun spewing forth a near-continuous stream of flame and lead as she poured fire into their opponent from the side. Kirito watched in dismay as its armoured carapace withstood the large-calibre ammunition from her rifle, if only just, until a solitary round found and shattered one of the three domed "eyes" on its body.The machine spun towards her as it reevaluated the threat she posed, the machine guns on its large, backpack-like abdomen turning to spit fire in response, forcing Kizmel to duck into cover. Kirito leaned out from behind his own, the optical pistol in his hand running up heat as he pumped shots into the MARU's flank as quickly as he could pull the trigger, stopping only when the overheat warning flashed and steam vented from the gun's barrel with a hiss.In the shadows painted by the muzzle-flashes of their guns, he barely made out his wife scrambling for a better position as the autocannon on the underside of the mech's body opened up. Its blast was deafeningly loud in the cavernous hall, unleashing its large-calibre ammunition that shredded clean through the liquid-filled tank she had been taking shelter behind. It exploded in a shower of luminescent blue-green liquid, spilling its contents over part of the warehouse's floor, causing Kirito to lose track of her for a moment.The machine didn't, its weapons continuing to track her, ignoring the pitiful damage his optical gun was doing to it, with bullet lines sweeping through the air like laser strobes as they tried to find their mark on the elusive girl as she ran and dove from cover to cover.Kirito swore under his breath before deciding to dart forward while the MARU had its attention directed elsewhere, rushing towards the combat robot with the photon sword blazing in his hands. He managed to get within ten meters of it when the twin turrets on its back swiveled back towards him, unleashing a hail of bullets that forced him to hastily abort his charge to avoid being being struck. He didn't entirely succeed, as the first two shots slammed into his chest with enough force to knock the air from his lungs, but reflexes ingrained in the Black Swordsman kept his avatar moving, diving to the side and behind a wooden crate that splintered and cracked as the bullets whistled past overhead, showering him with shrapnel.He could hear Kizmel's rifle come to life again, firing in bursts as she moved from one place to the next on the run, trying to stay ahead of the slower-firing autocannon. It's like that tank all over again, only this time, it's got more guns, and it's faster, to boot, he realized grimly. We've got to keep moving, that main gun is going to wreck any cover we can get behind. It wasn't as though his wife's run-and-gun approach wasn't working; despite the heavy armour on the MARU, he could see the occasional hit that landed somewhere the steel wasn't quite thick enough, a joint, a crack, or one of its exposed parts. The damage was slowly piling up and wearing down its considerable hit point total, but in turn, she was also rapidly running out of cover to hide behind. Not to mention... he wondered if it was just imagination, or if he actually could hear the click as Kizmel pulled the trigger only to find her magazine empty, forcing her to stop and reload.Their opponent wasn't keen on giving her the chance, however; realizing that Kirito's Betelgeuse posed little threat, it returned its full attention to his partner, its three guns continuing to pulverize and mangle anything and everything in the chamber between them.His eyes narrowed as he watched her flee from place to place, trying desperately to stay ahead of the booming autocannon while fumbling with the rifle in her hands, but the older rifle really needed a few uninterrupted seconds and both hands to reload properly. I've got to do something. It's just ignoring me, knowing that I'd take forever to wear it down with this damn peashooter. Looking down at the sleek white pistol in his hand, he discarded it in disgust, switching the photon sword instead to his right. Oh, what the hell. All right, here goes. Maximum effort. Retrieving one of the injectors that GGO used for healing, he jabbed it into his arm. With the warnings of his own dangerously low HP silenced for the moment, he sprang out from behind his cover, the former Black Swordsman dashing across the concrete floor as fast as his avatar's legs would carry him. Even without the stats of his old avatar, his mind pushed the interface between his brain and the AmuSphere to its limits as he accelerated explosively, crossing the distance as quickly as he could muster.Just like before, the MARU took note of his mad charge and turned its twin machine guns towards the oncoming threat. Onyx eyes narrowed as he sucked in air, the rush of wind filling his ears and drowning out even the deafening chatter of gunfire as they opened up. Kirito shut out everything except the target in front of him and the angle of the barrels that were swinging over to point at him. The bullet lines appeared a split second before the barrels spat flame and lead, and he pushed this new avatar and his reflexes even further, forcing it to twist and slide out of the way of the first few rounds.One of the crimson lines flashed into being straight in his face and the swordsman squinted, bringing the humming photon sword up by pure reflex as the round left the barrel. Full-metal jacket met glowing beam of plasma, and the last thing he'd expected to happen, did.It struck the photon sword's violet blade with a shower of sparks, before ricocheting off to the side, leaving him unscathed.Time seemed to slow for him as his mind worked to catch up with ingrained instincts, the blade whirling around in complex patterns that found it intersecting as many of the bullet lines as he could physically catch while trying to avoid taking a hit anywhere vital. Kirito grunted with the impact of the ones he didn't as they grazed his shoulder, passed through his calf, and impacted his chest, but the swordsman suddenly found himself within striking range of the automaton after only a few more steps.Bursting through a spray of crimson pixels from the hits he'd taken and with his vision tinted in red, kept alive only by the regenerative effect of the injector, Kirito surged forward, photon sword slung over his right shoulder in an imitation of the Black Swordsman's favoured charge skill.The glowing blade struck its armoured carapace with a sharp hiss of melting steel and vaporizing armour, cutting through with almost no resistance in the same way he was used to from a sword skill as he cleanly sliced its backpack in two, causing the two machine guns on top to finally fall silent.If the machine could have roared in anger, Kirito was sure it would have, its two remaining "eyes" swiveling towards the offending swordsman; he expected it to turn its huge autocannon in his direction, only for the MARU to defy his expectations and instead ram right into him. Body-checked by a three-meter tall automaton, he landed heavily on the ground with their foe looming menacingly overhead, reared back on its four back wheels while the front two were raised up to expose the gleaming barrels of smaller-caliber defensive guns.Before it could line them up, however, Kizmel's rifle barked, flame blossoming from its muzzle as she took her shot, the staccato of full-auto gunfire sending streams of sparks bouncing off the MARU's hull until she found the two remaining "eyes", cracking them just before the rifle in her hands ran dry once more.Reaching over, Kirito swept the photon sword along the ground, carving through the MARU's left leg joints and sending the machine toppling to the ground as it found its center of balance terminally disturbed, yet still it tried to gun him down with the additional weapons in its remaining legs. The MARU was blind and flailing, but Kirito wasn't going to take the chance of being hit; even before fully making it to his feet the swordsman slashed out again, separating even more of the robot's legs from under it, before finally thrusting the glowing blade into the center of its hull, causing it to stop and burst into multi-coloured pixels.-------------------------------Kizmel giggled, taking care to hide her bemused smile behind one hand as they emerged from the Abandoned Bunker with the spoils of their successful excursion safely tucked away in their inventories. The reason for her mirth was the grouchy expression on her husband's face and the equally disdainful look with which he had earlier retrieved his pistol and stuffed it back into his inventory, not even deigning to give it the dignity to be returned to its holster on his hip all the while muttering something that sounded suspiciously like "useless piece of junk."Still, she knew him well enough to see that his indignation was merely superficial; both of them were flushed with their success and victory over the dungeon's final boss, and she was glad to see that there was no trace left of the disquiet that had struck him in the aftermath of their encounter with Death Gun a few days prior.The nightmares would take a long time to go away, if they ever did – but at least for now, the immediate spectre from those bloody nights in the steel castle had lifted from him.Chatter filled the air abruptly once they passed through the barrier separating the instanced dungeon from the outside world, and voices once more filtered through in a variety of languages as other players milled about the entrance. Kizmel swerved briefly to the side to avoid another player who'd just moved to set foot into the dungeon, and the pair began their trek across the dunes to leave the Remnant Wasteland and return to SBC Glocken."Have you spoken with Asuna recently?" she asked as they walked up the gently sloping dunes.Next to her, Kirito shook his head. "Nah. Well, I got a message from her on LINE yesterday, but I'm not surprised. It's getting to the end of exams right now, so she probably won't really be paying attention to much else until they're done. But it shouldn't be much longer."Kizmel looked out towards the golden-shimmering horizon as the spires of the city grew ever closer. "I hope she is all right.""It's Asuna, she'll do fine."The former knight chuckled. "I have confidence that she will excel at whatever she puts her mind to, but I hope that she remembers to take care of herself.""I know," her husband replied with a grin. "But I wouldn't worry too much. If I could learn that lesson, then she definitely did, too. And she didn't even need to learn it the hard way, heh."Kizmel's lips curled into a fond smile. "I suppose that is true. How about the others? Sachi, Lisbeth, Yuna and Nautilus? Are they doing well?""They're in the same boat, I guess," Kirito replied with a shrug. "But I think they'll do okay. It's a lot of stuff they had to cram for."Yuna and Nautilus, especially, had it rough, he knew; the pair had missed their last two years of high school while all of them had been trapped in the death game, and like Asuna, Sachi, and Lisbeth, they had taken a year to try and catch up, but it left them taking their entrance exams a year late. "Not like they had much choice. I mean, by the time we got out, even if they had been in any state to take them, the entrance exams were just about over by the time we got out from Aincrad last year, so it wasn't like they could have taken them even if they wanted to," he added."She turned to look back at him. "It's hard to believe that it has already been a year sincec then.""Yeah," the black-haired swordsman agreed. "Time flies, I guess. I've been so busy with school and, well, everything else that I barely noticed." He chuckled. "It'll be weird, not seeing a bunch of our friends at school anymore after they graduate in March. The rest of us had it easy, we all missed two years, but most of us have a couple of years to catch up. Asuna and Sachi and Lisbeth, Yuna and Nautilus? They only had one year to cram everything into, and they really got put through the wringer.""Could they not have taken additional time to study?" Kizmel asked curiously."Probably," Kirito answered, "but I think it's more about trying to get things back to normal, in a way. Yuna and Nautilus are already nineteen, they're a year behind. If they'd taken an extra year, they would've been twenty when starting university. It's just...time gets away from you, I guess."Kizmel nodded, falling silent for a while when the sand under their boots slowly gave way to pavement, and the buildings of SBC Glocken began rising from the dunes around them as they approached the city. It didn't take them long to reach the Spire, when a soft chime sounded on her swordmasters' sight, and Kizmel glanced up to look at the clock that was displayed there."Speaking of time getting away from you...it appears that we made it just in time," she murmured with a chuckle."Yeah. Good timing," her husband agreed. "I'm gonna have to start preparing dinner soon."She nodded and together, they logged out, but Kizmel was surprised to find that she wasn't alone in Haven. Her husband's form stood in front of her, looking a little nervous; she watched him curiously, silently encouraging him to take the time to collect the thoughts that he undoubtedly had trouble putting into words."About the whole university thing for next year...I, um, I spoke with Professor Shigemura," her husband began hesitantly, glancing at her from under his bangs. "I think I'll take him up on his offer and apply for Toto Institute of Technology next year. He says he thinks I've got a good shot at getting in, and he's willing to put in a good word so that they won't have a problem with me coming from the Survivor's School.""That's wonderful news," Kizmel said, a proud smile curling up the edges of her lips. "I am sure that you will make it if you put your mind to it."Kirito nodded slowly. "Thanks. I hope so. Um...that means that I'll probably need to start preparing next summer at the very latest. I'm sure there's got stuff that didn't make it into what they're teaching us at school because we missed two years, and preparing for the entrance exams is...rough.""Of course. Is there anything I can do to help?"He shook his head. "I don't know. I just...it's weird, you know. Sometimes I feel like this is a little bit unreal, that I'm already coming up on my last year in high school. I mean, I know it's real, but…""But it feels like those two years in the steel castle were another life.""...yeah."She wasn't surprised that he felt this way. Kizmel herself sometimes thought back to her life in Aincrad and wondered if it had all been a dream – there had been so much that had happened in the year since she had left the steel castle behind that it almost felt like a lifetime ago. It wasn't until she had spoken with Cardinal more on the matter that Kizmel realized why her recent memories had left such a strong impression on her; while she remembered a life before that day she had met Kirito and Asuna, she hadn't truly lived until that very moment.And for two long years, that world of swords had been her husband's, too. He had fought and bled and killed , and she knew first hand how jarring it had been for him to return to a normal life in his world after that, as though nothing had happened."So have you decided on a field of study, then?" she asked gently.Her husband nodded. "Yeah. I think...I think I want to join with Professor Shigemura's lab. Electronics and robotics, it's something I'm already kind of into, and it'll help in the future, I think.""Oh?" Kizmel tilted her head in interest.He nodded firmly. "Yeah. Maybe it's just a hopeless dream, but I want to build you a body one day. A proper body, so that you can live in my world with me. So that you can meet Mom and Dad and Sugu in person. So that you can go out and see it for yourself."For a moment, her breath caught in her throat. "I...you do not have to go so far for my sake, Kirito. I am perfectly happy where I am.""I know. I know," he said, running a hand through his hair. "But...I want to. I don't want you to just be forever stuck here, in VR. Because at the end of the day, I will have to log out. I have to eat and work and...and it's not fair to you to be stuck here while we all get to live our lives. In Aincrad at least you had a life, you were free to go anywhere, but-""Perhaps not," she acceded, "but I am perfectly content here. Whatever time I have to spend with you, I will treasure, in whatever form that may take.""But...don't you want more?" Kirito asked. "Like being able to just go out, or explore, or see things on your own, without being tied to some kind of system that has to build that world for you?"Kizmel chuckled. "Is it so bad? Look at Yuuki, my love. She lingers in this world because it is the only way she can truly live. Unlike her, I have eternity to explore and learn and grow – I could hardly consider myself trapped.""I guess…" he sighed. "Sorry, I just...I wanted to study something that I could use to try and do something for you.""I know." Taking a step closer, she wrapped her arms around him, pulling him close and resting her chin on his shoulder. "I know. And I do not think that it is such a far-fetched dream, after all. Think of this – once, climbing all the way to the one-hundredth floor of Aincrad seemed like an unreachable, insurmountable dream. Coming with you, to your world, was an impossible dream. I would not give up hope just yet, my love. Not with you."She felt him shudder briefly in her arms. "Even if it means that I have less time to spend with you?""Even so," Kizmel told him firmly. "And besides, who is to say that I will not be studying and learning alongside you?""I'm sorry?"She grinned, an idea that had been budding in her mind blossoming. "Perhaps we can study together, you and I. If you are truly intent on learning the fields that will one day allow you to create something that I would inhabit as a body, then I would love to be alongside you every step of the way. Let us learn together. Teach me what you can, my love. About your world, about computers, about all of the things that you intend to study.""Are you...sure?" he craned his head over and she pulled back to allow him to look at her. "I didn't think you had any interest in that sort of stuff."Kizmel shrugged. "It has been brought to my attention that perhaps I have been avoiding learning about the things that affect my own existence. Perhaps this will help me gain some perspective about myself." Her smile broadened. "And maybe, I will find a calling of my own – in this world, or yours. After all, who better to work in it than someone who can bend it to her will?"Kirito barked out a short laugh. "Okay. Okay. If you're sure.""I am sure," she affirmed. "We will face the future just as we have everything else thus far. Together.""Together," he agreed.They were interrupted by another chime, this one more persistent than the last, and she quickly answered the incoming call with a mere thought. Leafa's voice suddenly echoed through Haven. "Hey, Kizmel, stop making out with my brother and send him over to help me in the kitchen already!"------------------------------- November 2 9 th, 2025 It wasn't often that Agent Kikuoka asked to meet with him or Kizmel, but it did happen occasionally, so Kazuto wasn't entirely surprised. The fact that the ministry official had requested that they meet in Haven , of all places, however, did cause alarm bells to ring for him, leaving him to wonder what exactly it was that he wanted to discuss.As far as he knew, Kikuoka had only been to the little personal hub that Kizmel used as practically her own pocket dimension once, in the aftermath of the RECT Progress incident when he'd snuck in. At the time, he'd promised her to not show up uninvited again, and as far as Kirito knew, the man had kept his word even if it would be incredibly easy for him to find a backdoor in, especially with Cardinal's help.The fact that he'd asked that told the former Black Swordsman two things. He wants something from us, otherwise he wouldn't have asked politely. But what? And why didn't he ask us earlier? He'd been at Rath earlier that afternoon for work, and while the trip back was much faster for Kizmel, the fact that the ministry official wanted to meet in VR told him that she was involved in some way. But it would've been so much easier for them to have convened in Underworld, or used the company's state-of-the-art facilities instead of using Kizmel's own private space.It just brought up questions, which he wouldn't get an answer to until the man arrived.As it turned out, they didn't have to wait long.Kizmel had just put on a pot of tea – and wasn't that a strange sight for him, as he observed his wife putter around the kitchen of her cottage in casual clothing, doing something as mundane as tending to a hot beverage as though she provided this kind of hospitality for guests regularly. Even a year after they'd escaped the death game, he still hadn't fully gotten used to seeing her in what he'd taken to calling her "civilian" mode; no fairy ears from Alfheim, no armour, no weapons, just whichever outfit she found interesting for the day.If he didn't know her, it would've been easy to mistake her for just any other girl puttering around her house, and the only real giveaways were her hair and eye colour. Other than that, he mused, she could've passed for a tanned gaijin or even one of the more outlandish gyarus .Kirito was in the process of setting the table for three, doling out western-style teacups while looking out over the railing at the endless horizon of Haven. Unlike Underworld, this was a place purely of his wife's creation, shaped by her imagination – the cottage itself was situated on an island that stretched perhaps a hundred meters each way, but it didn't sit on water. Like Aincrad, it floated in the endless sky, irrespective of the hold that gravity should have exerted upon it, surrounded by an endless blue sky as far as the horizon could reach.A warm sun shone overhead, making the temperature far more pleasant than the Japanese fall in the real world, and the small pond that he'd seen the last time he was here had disappeared, to be replaced with a traditional Japanese zen garden. This was her world, her private pocket dimension; time didn't move unless she willed it, the weather changed on her whim, and anything and everything was mutable with just a single thought from Kizmel.And yet, the one thing that had never changed, for all of the iterations she'd gone through, was that there was nothing else alive here except for them. He'd sometimes wondered why, because Cardinal was easily capable of producing a few critters or small animals just for the ambiance, but Kizmel had always shied away from doing so. Maybe she doesn't want to play god, he pondered absently, looking out over the amber sky. Or maybe she feels that she isn't ready for that yet. Arms wrapped around him from behind, and he leaned back into his wife as she emerged from the kitchen while they waited.Kikuoka's appearance was immediately obvious, and probably deliberately so, snapping Kirito from his thoughts as the man arrived with a whoosh of displaced air in his NewALO avatar, which he hadn't seen since Chrysheight had shown up as a mercenary working for Eugene's Salamanders at the Ragnarok capstone raid.Adjusting his glasses and looking conspicuously out of place, the robed Undine looked around for a moment with a curious expression, before his eyes finally settled on the pair on the porch. "Ah! Kazuto-kun, Kizmel-san. I hope I didn't interrupt anything."Despite the heat creeping up his neck, Kirito refused to let go of his wife. "Nah, we were just waiting for you."Chrysheight nodded. "Good, good. Thank you for agreeing to meet with me, and thanks for agreeing to meet here, that makes things a lot easier."Exchanging a glance with his wife before they reluctantly separated, he found a bemused smile on her lips, Kazuto shrugged and waved him over to the table that had been set up on the porch of Kizmel's home. "Come on, have a seat.""Don't mind if I do." Chrysheight stepped onto the raised wooden platform of a traditional Japanese house and stopped for a moment. "Pardon the intrusion," he muttered, before sitting down at the coffee table across from Kirito.The former swordsman followed his wife into the kitchen where he found her placing the final piece of cake onto three plates; he reached out to grab two of them for her, and Kizmel nodded at him with a smile before taking the last one along with the pot of tea that she'd put on earlier. They returned to the porch to find Chrysheight looking back at them in surprise at the proffered treats as Kirito set one of the plates in front of their guest before sitting down.The older man looked at the cake in bewilderment. "Thanks? I...wasn't expecting this."Kizmel smiled politely. "Of course. You are in my home as a guest, it would be impolite to not offer hospitality.""But...cake?""I was experimenting," Kizmel answered with a shrug as she poured tea for all of them, before elegantly smoothing down her plain black skirt and taking her seat next to Kirito. "I did quite enjoy one particular dessert in Aincrad, and I asked my mother for help to find one that most closely resembles it in your world so that I could try and recreate it here. I've heard it's called lemon cheesecake in your world?""Huh. I honestly didn't take you for a baker.""Neither did I," Kizmel agreed with a chuckle. "Please, give it a try. I promise it is edible."Chrysheight picked up the fork and picked up a bite. Chewing on it experimentally, the man's expression lit up. "It's good! It's fluffier than Japanese cheesecakes, and the flavour is strong."Kirito watched in amusement as he took a bite of his own, silently agreeing with the other man's assessment. "Hm. It's a different recipe from last time, isn't it?" he turned to ask his wife, instead."It is," she nodded. "With mother's help, I made a few changes. It isn't quite the same as the cake we had in Aincrad, but it is as close as your world's ingredients will allow.""Now if only we had some moontear wine to go with it," he chuckled.Chrysheight looked up at that. "Wine? Aren't you a little young for that, Kazuto-kun?"The former Black Swordsman grinned wryly. "I don't think anyone cared back then. And besides, it's not like we're really drinking alcohol.""Huh. Did it actually affect you back then?" Chrysheight asked between bites."Nah." Kirito shook his head. "I mean, some of the stuff had a bit of a burn to it sometimes, and some stuff was just vile , but I don't think we ever really got drunk. Not that I'd know what that feels like."Chrysheight's eyes wandered to Kizmel, and the former dark elf shook her head. "I certainly remember being inebriated a few times, but not after I became a player.""Makes sense," the older man finally agreed. "Guess it's easy for the system to simulate it for NPCs, but players are a different matter.""Or maybe Kayaba just didn't want his players actually drunk." Kirito shrugged. "I wouldn't put it past him, but I think in a twisted way he had his standards. Getting children drunk probably wasn't high on his list of things to do, no matter how real he wanted to make that world.""Good point." Chrysheight sighed, settling back as he finished his slice of cake and placed down his fork. "I've got to say, I like what you've done with the place. It's rather...homely. Not quite what I'd expect from a knight – I'm surprised you went for something classically Japanese, rather than something more western like what you would've found in Aincrad.""Thank you. It has been rather enjoyable to experiment with different styles and decorations, and I found that there is something rather soothing about the way these style of houses are built. It's soothing, almost in harmony with nature," Kizmel said, taking a sip from her tea. "But I doubt you came just to admire my attempts at décor.""...that's unfortunately correct." Chrysheight cleared his throat, his prior excitement at the tasty cake forgotten. "I need to ask you two a couple of questions." Here we go. Kirito frowned. "What about?""Calm down, I've just come to ask you two about something that you witnessed recently, and I need your opinion on it. Both of yours." The other man waved placatingly. "You two have recently taken to playing Gun Gale Online , is that correct?"Kirito nodded, wondering why he was suddenly interested in what they did in their free time. "Yeah, that's right.""And you were playing on November twenty-fifth?"Again, he nodded, this time sharing a curious look with Kizmel. "Last Wednesday? Yeah. Why?" Looking back at the ministry official's avatar, Kirito's eyes narrowed. "What's going on? I mean, really going on? This isn't something you had to ask us to meet you in Haven for, so why are you really here?"The older man paused, before letting out a sigh. He removed his glasses and stared out at the horizon for a moment before answering. "This is why I'm here, Kazuto-kun. As to why I asked you to meet me here, specifically, it's because this is the one place that I can guarantee that we will not be overheard.""Overheard?" the former swordsman's suspicions rose exponentially. "Underworld is just as secure. I mean, Kizmel's already practically a state secret, how much more secure do you need it to get?""Depending on what the result of this discussion is, this is something that I can't let the other employees of Rath hear, I'm afraid," came the answer. "It's not a company matter, this is in my official capacity as an investigator for the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which means that while I can ask , I'm not technically supposed to show you what I am about to."Now it all made sense to him; if it was an investigation, then the other members of Rath had little to do with it – but what had the man so concerned that it could leak out? "You don't want any record of this meeting in the server logs for Rath.""That's right. Just in case." He adjusted his glasses. "Which also naturally means that I hope it is understood that this discussion cannot leave this place.""Of course." Next to him, Kizmel looked across the table at their guest. "Ask what you have come to ask, then," she told him firmly."All right. I have come to learn that a certain event took place in the game that you were witness to." Chrysheight placed his glasses back on his face before producing a photo from his menu. "An altercation between a player called Death Gun and another named Usujio Tarako."Kirito's breath caught as his back stiffened. There, on the picture, was a screenshot of that day, moments before the shot had rang out – and in one corner, he could see himself and Kizmel. "Yeah. We were there," he croaked, finding his throat suddenly dry.Chrysheight seemed to notice his sudden agitation and stowed away the picture. He took a deep breath. "What can you tell me about this incident?"Kirito shrugged, but it was Kizmel who answered in his stead. "We had just arrived in the square by the town's central spire when three players emerged from it. One of them was this Tarako," she began. "The one called Death Gun appeared out of nowhere, blocking their way. They exchanged a few words, and then Death Gun drew his weapon and shot."Chrysheight's frown deepened as the man nodded. "That lines up with what others have reported. Is there anything else you can tell me about it? What happened to Tarako after he'd been shot? I understand that in Gun Gale , PvP is disabled in common areas like towns.""It is," Kirito agreed, thinking back. "I saw the immortal object barrier show up right after the shot.""So Tarako's avatar took no damage then?"The black-haired boy shook his head. "I don't think so. But-""He got disconnected, right?" Chrysheight continued."Yeah. How'd you know?" Kirito had wondered at the time if it was all a spectacle the group had set up, or whether there had been some malware involved, with everything timed to make it seem causal. Because the alternative is... he shook off the lingering thought of the last time he'd seen someone disconnect as a result of a PK. This isn't SAO . There's no way. The older man's expression turned grim, before pulling up another picture to show them. It was the face of an unfamiliar man with long, unkempt black hair and silver-rimmed glasses, looking a little on the heavy-set side. "This is Tamotsu Shigemura – no relation to the Shigemuras you know, by the way, just in case you were wondering. Two weeks ago, his body was found in an apartment building in Nakano Ward of Tokyo when the landlord noticed a strange smell coming out from the unit. There was no response to the intercom or telephone, but the lights were on, so he undid the electronic lock with the master key code and entered the apartment to check on his tenant. Shigemura was found dead on site, and at that point it was determined that he'd been dead for just over five days. He was twenty-six."Kirito shook his head. "But...that's weeks before this. What's that got to do with what happened the other day?""I'm getting to that, Kazuto-kun." Chrysheight sighed. "There wasn't any sign of robbery or forced entry, and it didn't look like anything valuable had been taken so the authorities ruled out a burglary. The autopsy revealed that he'd died of cardiac arrest, but they were unable to pin down the exact time of death or any other contributing factors due to the time that had passed. Between all of that, they ruled it an accidental death of natural causes...but the strangest thing was that he was found wearing an AmuSphere, indicating that he was logged in at the time of death."The former Black Swordsman frowned, looking down at the cake he'd been snacking on. We feel sated from eating in-game, even if we haven't eaten anything in VR. It was a feeling that lasted for a good while after logging out, as the brain was tricked into being sent the same impulses of its hunger being satisfied, so there was a very real danger of malnutrition resulting from a long time spent in-game. He looked up, lips parting to ask, but the ministry official had already anticipated his question."No signs of malnutrition. He didn't starve himself in VR," Chrysheight added. "In fact, we found a bunch of take-out boxes in the apartment, along with a receipt for delivery service that day. It's inconsistent with the other accidental deaths we've seen over the years as a result of neglecting personal needs while immersed in a game or the over-usage of energy drinks and other stimulants, but all in all, it's not impossible, despite the deceased's relatively good state of health. Honestly, I wouldn't be looking into it, if not for one thing. Tell me, do either of you watch MMO Stream?""They're the ones that broadcast This Week's Winners , right?" Kirito tilted his head. "I've heard of them, yeah. Wait-"He trailed off. Wait...MMO Today had a feature a while back, speculating about this. Some kind of stream about GGO got cut short because the guest disconnected halfway through, and it was speculated whether the player being interviewed had actually died. I didn't put it together, but I heard Klein's guys talking about it a couple of weeks ago. There was something else going on with it...it took him a moment to remember."Was this the guy that dropped out of the stream because a player in-game allegedly shot at his image on a TV screen?" Kirito asked, an uneasy feeling suddenly welling up in his gut. A player gets shot in Gun Gale and then disappears, only to turn up dead. I think I'm starting to see why he wanted to ask us about what happened in GGO."That's the one. It would appear that he had the heart attack in the middle of the program, which caused the connection to terminate; the events line up to suggest that, at least. And it's not just a rumour – there's a video that briefly became viral when the incident occurred. The timestamps line up. An unknown gunman fired a shot at exactly twenty-three thirty and two seconds on November ninth at a projection of Tamotsu Shigemura's avatar in Gun Gale Online , and Shigemura aka Xexeed loses connection and dies of a heart attack within seconds of it."Kirito shook his head vehemently. "That's got to be coincidence.""That's what I thought, too," Chrysheight admitted. "But it's the reason the case landed on my desk. It's a little too coincidental. Tell me, what do you think are the odds that the two actions – Shigemura's avatar getting shot in-game by someone deliberately styling himself as his executioner and him subsequently dying within seconds – are unrelated?""But...that's impossible," he protested. "The AmuSphere isn't even capable of killing anyone, and even if it could -""Even if it could, it would leave visible signs on the deceased's brain, like the NerveGear," the older man finished. "I know. But investigators found nothing of the sort.""Then…"Chrysheight grimaced. "The only thing we have to go on is the fact that it appears that a player committed an action in-game appears to be tied to the death of another player. Whoever this Death Gun is, he seems to want people to think that he's the ones causing those deaths, even if they're unrelated, but everything looks too coordinated, too choreographed for him to just have gotten that lucky. That's why I wanted to speak with you, to see if you think that something like that is even possible.""You think someone in-game shot some kind of a…a phantom bullet through the internet and it came out and killed someone?" Kirito blinked rapidly, the image of a virtual bullet striking an avatar in-game and being sent as electrons and electrical impulses through the ether of the internet, traveling along wires and cables and wireless signals until it arrived at the victim's headset, and… Boom. He shook his head again. "That's impossible. Maybe if we were only talking about forcibly disconnecting them, like some kind of targeted DDoS attack or malware, but not...not this . We're not just talking about shooting electrons through the 'net.""Kizmel?" the older man turned towards the knight-turned-AI. "What are your thoughts? As someone who for all intents and purposes lives in this environment, do you think it's possible to manipulate your connection to the outside to induce a death through the associated hardware?"She took a moment to answer, looking deep in thought. "I agree with Kirito. It should not be possible." The lilac-haired woman shook her head. "I cannot think of a way that I would be able to do something of the sort. Maybe if Strea was still alive...Mother might know of a way that I do not yet understand, though.""That's what I thought. Cardinal agrees with you on this, by the way," Chrysheight assured her. "And yet, here we are.""But...why?" Kirito asked, as Death Gun's harsh, rasped whisper from the other day echoed in his mind. "What does he have to gain by doing stuff like that in public?"The older man shrugged. "To cause fear? Panic? To make a name for himself? Whatever the case, it's something I cannot ignore, especially since he has since made a second appearance that the two of you witnessed yourself. If there is even just the tiniest chance that what he's doing is real, then I have to look into it. Because Death Gun shot a second player, and the first one he shot ended up dead."Kizmel's head snapped towards him, even as Kirito's own blood ran cold. "And the player who shot at-""Who shot at Tarako is the same one who shot at the image of XeXeed on November ninth. Death Gun."-------------------------------Slowly removing the AmuSphere from his head, Seijirou Kikuoka heaved a tired sigh. Well, that was a bust, he pondered. Talking with them and getting their impression helped, but it sure didn't get me any closer to solving this mystery. The conversation with Kazuto and Kizmel had lasted a little while longer as the pair, who arguably were some of the most experienced with the intricacies of full-dive environments that he had immediate access to, bounced ideas back and forth on how Death Gun's phantom bullet feat might be possible. And yet it had only served to confirm something that he'd already discussed with Cardinal herself: it was impossible. The AmuSphere doesn't have the signal strength to send an impulse strong enough to a user's mind to cause a severe physiological reaction, at least not in a healthy body. Fright might be a possibility, as we've seen cases of players hospitalized after playing full-dive horror games and when the Imagen erator virus came around, but everyone in GGO is aware of guns and they actually enjoy shooting at one another, so that's out. He paused. Besides, even at its worst, the Imagenarator software can only produce images and sounds, not physical sensation. It might be possible to induce epileptic seizures, but Shigemura's medical file says nothing about him being susceptible. For a brief moment, he wondered if he wasn't being overly paranoid, and whether Tamotsu Shigemura's death had, indeed, been an accidental coincidence. But was he willing to bet another life on that? One way or the other, if we find Usujio Tarako's player, we'll know. For a moment, he considered calling around to see if he could cash in a favour, even if it had to be one of the unsavoury kind, to get him access to the YMIR registry of players, but he quickly discarded that notion. The case would already be on thin ice because of its VR nature, I don't need to add questionable chain of custody or evidence tampering to that. The knock on his office door shook him from his thoughts. "Come in.""Yo, Kikucchi," Carina popped in her head, before entering and closing the door behind her."Hosaka-san, I'm surprised to see you're still here at this time. What can I do for you?"The blonde settled into the chair in front of his desk and produced a folder. "More a question of what I can do fer you , Kikucchi," she replied glibly, before sliding it over to him. "Here.""What's this?" He picked it up and opened it, to find a single piece of paper with a name and address written on it. For a moment, the former soldier stared at it uncomprehendingly, before realization dawned on him just who was sitting across from him, along with a tiny frisson of fear. "Is this-""Yeah."Kikuoka shook his head in disbelief. "How'd you even get this?" How'd she even know I was looking for this? "I asked," she told him with a grin. "I've got my ways – ya don't hafta worry, nothing illegal went on. Some people just owe me some favours, is all.""Those must be some favours." The ministry official shook his head in amusement. "I suppose I'll let you keep your trade secret. But how'd you know what I was looking for?""Well," the blonde leaned forward, planting her elbows on top of the desk, "the internet's kinda buzzing with the news of another Death Gun sighting. And besides, did you really think Lind wasn't gonna tell me that you called and ask me ta find out why he'd suddenly gotten a call from the head of the SAO case victims response task force ," she quoted him. They're more closely knit than I imagined, he mused briefly with a silent chuckle. I really should've expected that, but somehow I keep underestimating these people. "And he just...gave you this information?" Kikuoka asked skeptically.Hosaka shook her head. "Oh ye of little faith. I bet when you called you were all, this is of great and utter importance which I cannot tell you about , so I need you to give this to me on my word and trust alone , and you were shot down, right?""...should I feel offended or flattered that you seem to have an uncanny grasp on what's going on around here and what I'm involved in, and yet you seem think that this is my manner of speaking?" he muttered with a chuckle."The one thing you gotta understand about Lind is one thing, Kikucchi," the blonde woman told him, "the one thing that you can absolutely, one-hundred percent can count on, is that Lind will protect his own. It's been that way ever since the beginning. If you want him to put himself out there, he might do it, but if you want him to risk his people, you better have a damn good reason why. When you called them, you probably didn't tell him anything, and when it comes down on the scales, he'll always put his own people first. It's what got him and us through the death game. It's why so many of us trust him, even now that we're out.""And you did?"Her grin widened. "Well, I figured that you might not be able to say anything, but no one's stopping a random civilian from yappin' about random internet theories, right?"Kikuoka shook his head in disbelief. "What exactly did you tell him?""Oh, just a little bit of this, and a little bit of that." She waved her hand dismissively. "I might've shown him an article in a gaming magazine and some of the internet rumours that are spreading. He's smart, he figured out the rest himself."Still, there was something the ministry official didn't understand. "But he said that he'd be unwilling to breach privacy and data security laws to give me that information, but he was willing to hand it to you?"Her eyes brimmed with amusement, despite the serious expression she wore. "He trusts me not to waste it."It wasn't often that Seijirou Kikuoka underestimated the people he dealt with on a regular basis; his experience, hard-earned as it was, lent itself to reading and understanding others, after all. It was what had made him such a good investigator and team leader back in military service and the Special Forces Group. He'd figured that, after nearly half a year of working with the blonde, he'd gotten a good grasp of how she operated, and one of Aincrad's best, most notorious info-brokers was someone he'd come to respect for her skills.And yet, it seemed that he'd not read deeply enough at all, even after all that time. Trust, huh? His eyes wandered briefly to the photo of his old unit that stood in the corner of the room on a filing cabinet. Was I truly so naive that I thought they were all just children playing at being leaders and soldiers? That somehow there wouldn't be anything real underneath all that they went through...or maybe I thought just like everyone else that once they got back to the real world, those bonds would just disappear the moment they logged out. It was a foolish thought, he knew; he'd been the one to write the report on the RECT Progress case, after all. Any idea that this little group of Survivors would somehow simply drift apart after waking up had gone right out of the window then.Somehow, that little group that had formed not just around Kazuto and Kizmel, but also those in their orbit, those close to them, had forged a bond that almost had him feeling jealous, and more than a little humbled, as the ministry official reached for the phone to dial a number."Then let's not waste it," he told her while the dial tone rang out. "Hello, operator? Give me Saitama prefecture police, please. Yes, this is Inspector Seijirou Kikuoka from the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Communications and Digital Media Division. I'm calling to request a state of health check for an individual. Yes, I know the statutory time to file a report regarding a missing person, but I'd like someone to come by the address and check on it, anyway. Yes, thank you. As soon as you can. Let me know what you find."He hung up the phone, before looking back at the blonde across the table. "Thank you, Hosaka-san."