Chapter 1
Kirigaya Kazuto, Kirito, Beater of SAO, and now a Spriggan in the world of ALFheim online, felt himself drifting towards consciousness.
"Kirito." A voice was calling and for a moment he thought it might be her, that he'd made it to Asuna's side.
"Kirito." The second repetition shattered that hope. The voice was familiar, welcome even, but not the one he had hoped to hear.
"Oni-chan!" Kirito opened his eyes slowly and was met by the worried gaze of an unfamiliar young woman, no, not unfamiliar, those green eyes and long blonde hair belonged to the Sylph swordswoman Leafa, the girl he knew as Suguha in the real world, his sister.
Kirito rose slowly feeling an unfamiliar nausea pass over him. He knew some people could get disoriented using a Nerve Gear or AMUsphere but it had never happened to him.
"What happened?" He asked weakly.
He looked around, they were standing on the platform before the entrance to the world tree. Statues of the Guardian Knights gazed down upon them, standing silent sentry. Scattered around them were the other members of their party, a roughly equal number of Sylphs and Cait Syth warriors.
"I don't know." Leafa said. "The last thing I remember was Lady Sakuya ordering the retreat, then everything started to get slow, then I felt pain," She grimaced, "a lot of pain." She looked to Kirito, "Are you . . ."
Kirito smiled weakly. "I'm fine". He said. He wasn't. He'd been so close that time, so close. Kirito clenched his hands tight, no, he may not have made it, but he had proven it was possible. He would reach Asuna, no matter the cost. But to do that, he needed to know what had gone wrong.
Kirito stood shakily and looked around. He soon found who he was looking for. It seemed all of the gathered players had undergone the same horrible experience. Somehow, Lady Sakuya and Alicia Rue, the Sylph and Cait Syth leaders respectively, were amongst the first to shrug it off. Lady Sakuya was already instructing those that could stand to see to the players who were still unresponsive while the Cait Syth saw to securing their mounts, the dragons seemed almost skittish, no doubt they were uncomfortable on the ground.
Lady Sakuya turned to Kirito and Leafa as they approached. "Young Spriggan, Leafa. You wouldn't happen to know what just happened?"
"I was actually hoping you could tell us." Kirito said. "Did the server overload?"
Lady Sakuya shook her head. "No, there was a server crash when the Jötunheimr expansion was released, but that reset all players to their home territory. This is more like what happens when the system shuts down for maintenance." She grimaced. "Without the feeling of being flayed alive."
"Someone needs to call tech support." One weary looking sylph player, a tank judging by his heavy armor, grunted. He removed his helm to reveal short grass green hair and took a swig from his canteen.
Kirito couldn't shake a sense of wrongness as he looked around the gathered players. Something felt, off. On that note . . . Oh no, Yui!
"Yui!" He suddenly said. He heard a small, stifled grown coming from within the pocket of his shirt. A tiny pixie with long dark hair and wearing a one piece dress climbed from his pocket. The former SAO mental health AI, Yui, looked about as well as the rest of them.
Kirito carefully transferred the pixie from his shoulder to the palm of his hand where she sat wit her legs folded beneath her. "Yui are you okay?"
The pixie nodded as she clutched her head. "I didn't like that feeling Poppa." She said and shivered.
"You felt that?" Leafa asked. She turned to Kirito. "I didn't think navigation pixies were that advanced."
"That's because she's not a navigation pixie." Kirito explained. "I guess you could say she's another survivor of SAO."
"Mental Health Artificial Intelligence Prototype-1, Yui." The pixie bowed formally to Leafa and smiled as best she could.
"You're an SAO survivor?" Lady Sakuya asked, she seemed genuinely surprised.
Kirito nodded. "I'm sorry if you feel I've deceived you."
The sylph leader shook her head. "Not at all. I can just hardly believe an SAO survivor would want to dive back into VR gaming so quickly. In any case, it appears we couldn't properly repay you for your assistance the other day. It will be some time before we can regroup for another raid on the world tree. In the mean time, I need to log out and call the technical support service. The feedback that we experienced might have been caused by a bigger problem. I suggest you do the same and get some rest." With that the faction leader reached out with her right hand to summon the user menu. The menu failed to appear.
Kirito felt sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach. "A bug?" Leafa asked.
"It must have something to do with the system crash." Sakuya frowned. "Leafa?"
Leafa gestured to bring up her user menu and again nothing happened.
"Alicia, can you bring up your user menu." Sakuya asked with an edge of concern in her voice.
"Hmm? You know what? I can't!" The Cait Syth leader said with surprise.
Kirito frowned and scanned the corner of his vision, the familiar green and blue life and mana bars were missing. "My HUD isn't working either." Kirito said. "How about yours Leafa?"
Leafa checked and realized that her brother was right. The normally unobtrusive health and mana bars were absent from her vision.
A quick check with the other players confirmed that the none of the present players could open their user menus or see their status bars.
" Yui." Kirito held the pixie close. "Can you get anything out of the system?"
The pixie placed her hands to her temples and concentrated. After several moments she looked up and shook her head. "I'm sorry Poppa. I can definitely detect the Cardinal System but the data I'm receiving appears to be badly corrupted and my data access privileges have been limited. I also can't access any of the external network sights.
Kirito frowned. "This can't be what I think it is." He muttered. "Its an impossibility. Maybe it could happen to me, but everyone else here is wearing an AMUsphere." His eyes turned to Leafa and then came to rest on her forehead.
Leafa stiffened. "W-what is it?" She asked.
Kirito stepped forward and poked her gently on the side of the head. "What? Ow!" She cried.
"I just noticed, you cut yourself."
"Yeah, when I got up after whatever happened I bumped my head. Why?"
"You're bleeding. And I bet that really hurt right?"
Slowly Leafa touched her forehead. She felt something warm and tacky brush against her finger tips and when she examined them her eyes came to rest on . . . blood. It was blood. Her blood.
"W-what is this?" She asked voice shaking. She understood what she was looking at, but she didn't quite believe it. Even as a novice to VR games, Leafa . . . Suguha, had understood the appeal of world where no matter how you got knocked around, you would feel no pain and receive no permanent injury. In real life she practiced Kendo so she was not unfamiliar with either pain or injury, but here in the virtual world it was an entirely unwelcome experience.
"It's blood." Kirito stated the obvious. "What's strange is that ALFheim is a virtual environment, its capacity to model and render the environment is still limited by the available system resources. There's no way the developers would waste time and resources trying to faithfully recreate something like a bump on the head." Kirito said.
"Do you know that for sure?" Sakuya asked.
"He's a bit of a computer junky, even in real life." Leafa explained. "Ah, sorry." She apologized, it wasn't polite to reveal details about real life without another person's permission. Leafa went back to rubbing her head.
"There's something I want to try." Kirito said. Unsheathing his sword he took the weapon in one hand and attempted to bury it in the hard bark of the world tree. The tip of the heavy blade sank less than a centimeter into the surface before coming to rest. What was shocking was that it had cut at all. The world tree was a permanent fixture of ALFheim and thus was protected by its classification as an "Immortal Object." Yet for whatever reason Kirito's blade had been allowed to do damage. Damage that was being faithfully rendered.
"That shouldn't be possible." Sakuya whispered. Strange that such a simple, every day thing as a blade cutting into wood could shake her so.
"But it did just happen." Kirito said. "And an impossibility cannot be disregarded when we have just observed it. Other things are wrong too."
"Other things." Leafa asked?
"I don't know if you would notice. But I spent two years in SAO, the environment feels too real. Computer resources are limited so things have to be done to simplify the gaming world." Kirito squatted down and ran a hand over the bark of the world tree, feeling the roughness as it varied beneath his finger tips. "No, now that I think about it. You would only notice if you were a total immersion junky, or had spent as much time in virtual environments as an SAO survivor. This feels too real."
"Are you suggesting that this is reality?" Sakuya asked. "That's quite a leap Kirito-Kun. ALFheim is a game, a game, no matter how realistic is just data on a computer."
The Spriggan stood and nodded. "I agree with you completely. Which is why I'm waiting for someone to come up with a better idea than my poor imagination."
A distant scream cut off Lady Sakuya's response. The sound had come from bellow them. Down amongst the buildings of Auron, the capital of ALFheim and its largest neutral territory.
"What was that?" Leafa leaned in towards her brother.
"We need to check it out." Kirito said. "I'll go."
"Me too." Leafa said.
"Then I shall accompany you." Sakuya said. "Alicia, can you see to things here?" "What? You're heading out?" Alicia asked.
"I'll be back soon." Sakuya said. "We need to know more about the situation."
"Right." Alicia replied, she wasn't sounding so confident.
"So, the user menu is down, we can feel pain, and everything is too real." Sakuya took a breath and focused on her back, imagining herself with two pairs of wings. As she performed the visualization she was relieved to feel her wings extend once more and stretch into their flight configuration. "Well, it seems our wings still work."
"Do you want to risk that until we know what happened?" Kirito asked.
Lady sakuya bit down on her lip but nodded. "We need to move quickly. Other players may be as confused as we are." She smiled. "Besides, I don't fancy walking all the way in these clogs."
The spriggan just smiled and sheathed his sword. "Shall we then?"
The trio extended their wings and kicked off lightly, separating from the ground, and set off gliding downwards towards the city bellow.
The light seemed to be cast for ages, far longer than a normal summoning. Was this even a summoning? Kirche thought desperately. What crazy thing had the Zero done this time?
Worse than the light was the shaking and the strange keening noise that filled the air. The earth trembled as if the fiercest earthquake were to go on and on. Kirche dare not open her eyes to the blinding light, but she imagined that even the Academy buildings, magically reinforced by the highest level earth magics, would be badly shaken by the assault.
And the noise. It wailed like a banshee's call before fading into the harsh roar of a river and then rising in pitch to assault the eardrums in a series of warbling cries. The assault on her senses was so violent that her ears grew numb and it was not immediately apparent to her when the spell finally ended.
"Miss Zerbst?"
Kirche opened her eyes and looked up. Professor Colbert was standing over her, the Zero held in his arms. "Miss Zerbst, are you all right?" Beyond the processor Kirche could see clear blue sky and the academy buildings, it didn't look the world had come to an end at least.
"Well, I'm alive and in one piece, I suppose that counts." She smiled ruefully and got to her feet. As she patted herself down she looked about. Everything seemed normal enough. At least, the school was still standing and in the distance she saw the other students and their familiars moving about unharmed. It was sort of disappointing really. A big light show, earthquakes, noise, but nothing to show for it.
"Well then, maybe the zero didn't screw up so . . ." Kirche noticed that Professor Colbert was starring past her. She turned around slowly. " . . . badly." She finished as she looked up, and up, and up, and up.
"That's some tree." She said quietly. Though did it still count as a tree when it was larger than some mountains? Didn't that make it some sort of geological formation? Maybe she should have paid more attention to her Earth magic lessons.
It was a tree. At least, it had a trunk, branches, and leaves like a tree. But the trunk had to be almost a mile across, and several miles high, composed of a strange arrangement of spiraling segments curving around each other and tapering in a cork screw fashion, the branches had to be half a mile long and hundreds of feet thick, and the twigs were the size of airship masts. The few clouds in the sky cast shadows that barely reached half way up the trunk.
"Indeed." Professor Colbert said quietly.
A dawning sense of shock filled Kirche as she wondered if the tree was her rival's familiar. The facts fit what she was seeing. Louise's spells had unexpected effects, usually explosions, she had seemingly failed to cast summon familiar yet had collapses from exhaustion soon after, and then a tree had appeared, a really big tree. The Zero had summoned a tree. And yet, no matter how stupid that might have been, it was certainly the most impressive tree one could summon. Kirche wasn't sure how to feel about that.
Professor Colbert did't seem to make the connection or else was keeping it to himself. The Proffesor turned slowly, unwilling to pull his eye from the sight. "Come along Miss Zerbst, we should get Miss Valliere to the infirmary."
By the time they arrived back at academy building the faculty was out in full force. The younger students were being gathered together under the watchful eyes of the senior faculty while the third years and most capable of the second year students were organized into groups and sent to patrol the grounds or run errands.
Colbert left Louise with a pair of water mage students who promised to take her directly to the infirmary and then proceeded hurriedly towards the main hall. Kirche felt a tugging on her blouse and looked down to see that Tabitha had somehow returned to her side.
"Oh, Tabitha, are you alright."
"Mmm." The smaller girl nodded. "Not hurt."
"Yeah, that was some show but it doesn't look like it did much damage." Kirche agreed.
"Big tree." Tabitha said.
"Yeah, you noticed that too?" Kirche asked.
"Louise's summons?"
Kirche frowned. "I don't know. Maybe."
Tabitha nodded. "Need more information. Reconnaissance."
"You sure are talkative." Kirche said. "Sure you haven't gone over your word quota for the day?"
"Special circumstances." Tabitha said and then her lips twitched. "Make it up tomorrow."
Most people found the relationship between the flamboyant and extroverted Kirche and the taciturn and introverted Tabitha entirely improbable. When in fact, it was the most natural thing in the world, the two were simply comfortable with being themselves.
The faculty that were not occupied with overseeing the students were gathered together in the main hall. It was strange to see the faculty in heated discussion where they could be over heard by the students but they could hardly afford to retreat to the headmaster's office in a time of crises.
Old Osmond was at the center of the chaos directing faculty, servants, and students alike. Rarely did the elderly head master take such an active role, but thanks to his efforts the students and faculty were organizing themselves in good order.
Kirche followed Tabitha as she walked up to the group of gathered faculty and senior students.
"Volunteering." Tabitha said.
"Ah, Miss Tabitha." Old Osmond said. "Yes, you're rated as a triangle class correct? I may have a task for you. It seems that we are short handed and I would like to ask you and some of the other students to assist the faculty."
"Head Master, with all due respect," Professor Colbert said, "Tabitha is one of the students who just completed her summoning. She shouldn't be using her magic until she is comfortable with the refinement of her elemental affinity."
"Know the risks." Tabitha said quietly.
"I understand your concerns Professor." Osmond said. "But this is a very peculiar situation and we need every available mage to see to the safety of the academy. I have already sent dispatches to the Palace with my first report and have faculty on patrol throughout the school grounds. What remains is to get a closer look at that strange tree. The faculty are stretched to their limit which is why I would like to enlist the aid of your students."
Colbert sighed. "You may be correct Headmaster. Very well. But if that is the case I insist that I go with her. I'm a fire mage, I'm used to dealing with poorly restrained magic."
"There is no need to worry of that." Osmond waved. "You were my first choice to lead this excursion. I would suggest that you select one or two other students or faculty to take with you. Miss Tabitha is skilled with both wind and water so perhaps an earth mage to round out your party."
"If Tabitha is going than I'm going too." Kirche announced.
"Miss Zerbst?" Osmond said. The wizened old mage stroked his beard. "Is this acceptable to your Professor?"
"Miss Zerbst is a skilled fire user." Colbert agreed. "But we still need an earth mage and the current student body doesn't have many of very high level and most have already been assigned to aid the teachers in reinforcing the academy wards."
"There's that wanna-be casanova dot mage with the golems." Kirche said. "What was his name again, Grammond?"
"Guiche de Grammond." Tabitha offered.
"Yeah that's him. He's not very strong but isn't a dot that can manage golem's like that pretty skilled?" Kirche asked.
"I suppose he will have to do." Colbert said. "Miss Tabitha, Miss Zerbst, please find Mister Grammond and report to the front gate. I suggest that you all leave your familiars here for the time being as you haven't had time to properly bond with them."
The girls nodded simultaneously and went off to find the fourth member of their hastily assembled group. They found the youngest Grammond son amongst the gathered students, busily attempting to impress a group of first and second year girls with varying degrees of success. A skinny blonde young man, he wore his shirt unbuttoned in what Kirche could only described as an underwhelming display of masculinity.
The boy loudly protested as he was dragged off by the duo but perked up when Kirche explained that he had been selected to accompany one of the Professors on a special mission.
"I, Guiche De Grammond now depart, my skills as a member of the Grammond family are desperately needed elsewhere fair ladies. Farewell!"
Kirch and Tabitha let go of the boy and let him fall in behind as Kirche explained the situation.
"You saw that tree right?"
"The one visible over the academy wall?" Guiche asked. "Of course, I would have to be blind to miss it!"
"We're supposed to go take a look."
"That hardly seems like a task for three mages." Guiche commented.
"Four." Tabitha said.
"Pardon?" Guiche asked.
"Professor Colbert is coming with us to supervise." Kirche explained.
"Is it really expected to be dangerous?" Guiche asked, his enthusiasm ebbing.
"Summons are unpredictable." Tabitha said.
Guiche turned to Kirche for an explanation.
"Tabitha and I think it may be the Zero's summon." Kirche said.
"Are you serious?" Guiche asked.
Kirche pursed her lips but nodded. "I wouldn't believe it myself but I saw Louise collapse from willpower exhaustion just moments before the summon circle appeared. Maybe it just took longer to complete the summon."
"Surely you jest." Guich said. "The Zero can't do anything right. What would this say for her power?"
"Who knows." Kirch said. "It's big. But it's a tree! Who's ever heard of a tree familiar!" She cried.
"Gustav II." Tabitha said. "Summoned Ash Oak."
"But he was the only dot to ever become a king." Kirche huffed. "And it wasn't even a very big ash oak!"
The trio arrived at the academy gateway in time to see professor Colbert arriving a top one of the academy's horses while leading three others. Three were large powerful Gallian steeds, the last was a smaller Tristanian pony.
"I trust you're all familiar with riding?"
The three nodded simultaneously. Tabitha and Kirche looked the horses over and then exchanged glances. Without saying a word they mounted the two remaining Gallian's leaving the pony for Guiche.
Professor Colbet stifled the young Grammond heir's dismayed protests of being left with such a sub satisfactory mount. "There's no time to waste Mister Grammond, we must be off."
The boy huffed but took to the saddle without further complaint. Professor Colbert clicked his tongue and gently spurred his horse into an easy gallop, setting off in the direction of the great tree.
As the trio of faeries approached the center of Auron, it became clear that something was very amiss. The side streets and alley ways were empty of players, and NPC stalls along the main streets stood unattended. As they approached the city square, Lady Sakuya noticed the players that had already begun to gather. The city square was a natural place for players to meet up and so it was an equally natural place to go now. Yggradsil city was a neutral territory and thus open to all of the factions. No matter which way she turned Sakuya could see representatives of all of the playable races in a single glance from her own nimble Sylphs, to stocky Gnomes, and martial Salamanders.
The situation in the square was chaotic. Players were shouting and arguing amongst themselves, far from the relaxed atmosphere that had pervaded the city earlier that day.
As they set down many of the surrounding players turned to watch their approach.
"Wait, is that Lady Sakuya?" A Cait Syth player said.
"What, Lady Sakuya?" His Undine companion asked.
"The Sylph leader never leaves Sylvain, there's no way she'd be here." Another undine commented.
"No, I saw her arrive, with an army of Sylphs and Cait Syth." The Cait Syth answered back.
"Didn't the Cait Syth and Sylph form an alliance? I saw it on the message boards!"
Chaos continued to reign across the square but as time went by more players noticed the arrival of the faction leader and gradually the chaos died down. Sakuya walked to the center of the square, all eyes following her and her companions. Some hoped she knew things they didn't, other just wanted someone with authority, be it real or make believe, to take charge. All were curious.
"I am Lady Sakuya, leader of the Sylphs." She called out in a loud clear voice. "I understand that you have all undergone a traumatizing experience not less than half an hour ago. I confess that I know no more than any of you. But I urge you all to remain calm."
"Remain calm?" A stocky man, a Leprechaun by his build, called out. "We can't log out. Isn't that how the SAO incident started."
Sakuya cringed, she'd hoped that word wouldn't come up. Suddenly the players were all shouting and arguing once more. Fortunately few seemed to believe that this could really be another SAO incident, but the fear and anxiety that name spawned made the crowd a riot waiting to happen.
"Enough!" Sakuya boomed, face turning stern. For the Sylph players it was rare to see their normally serene leader suddenly so serious. It was enough to shock the Sylphs in the crowd to attention and gradually the other players began to settled down once more.
She turned to the Leprechaun player. "We cannot immediately assume the worst. SAO was a tragedy. But it was only a tragedy, an isolated incident."
"If I may, Lady Sakuya." Kirito stepped in to join her at the center of the crowd. Sakuya gestured for him to continue.
"Good evening everyone. My name is Kirito." The Spriggan nodded to the gathered crowd. "I'm an SAO survivor."
The crowd began to murmur amongst themselves. "Kirito? Kirito? Isn't that one of the names that got leaked out of the SAO incident?"
"They say he beat Kayaba Akihiko."
"There's no way this kid is Kirito."
"Wait, didn't someone named Kirito managed to defeat General Eugene just the other day."
"No way, that's definitely impossible."
"Pics or it didn't happen!"
The Spriggan allowed the murmuring to die down. "It probably seems hard to believe that an SAO survivor would went to play another VRMMO, but, how to put this?" The Spriggan screwed up his face in concentration. "From my experience, whatever is happening now, doesn't feel like the SAO incident at all. But if this really were like what happened in SAO, players panicking and acting foolishly is definitely more dangerous than the game itself."
Lady Sakuya nodded. "This is no doubt the case. I would like to ask everyone to remain calm until we can contact the GMs and determine what is happening. While we wait, please refrain from leaving the city or challenging players to PvP. It is unclear what has happened but the game engine appears to be modeling damage and pain with a much greater degree of detail and intensity than normal." Lady Sakuya touched her right forearm with her left hand, recalling the pain that had burned through her body for that brief instant.
"Even if death is impossible, we should avoid needless injury until the situation is understood. On behalf of our alliance, I would like all Sylph and Cait Syth players to do their best to serve as role models in keeping order at this time. Currently a squadron of high level Sylph and Cait Syth players is gathered at the base of the World Tree and I will be ordering a contingent to return to Sylvain shortly to determine if this phenomena is local or covers all of ALFheim. Are there any more question?"
There were many. The gathered players began to shout over one another in an effort to have their questions answered. Sakuya did her best to answer those that she could, like what the Sylph and Cait Syth were doing about the situation, while trying to reassure the players about those she could not, like what had happened and when would they be able to log out.
In the end, Sakuya's authority as a faction leader held enough sway to calm most of the players and at her urging the players gathered together with their friends and departed for inns and homes to wait the crises out. A handful of players remained in the square afterwards, they were of no particular faction, sylphs, salamanders, and undines were the most common, but the odd leprechaun, imp, and spriggan were also in attendance. Judging by their equipment they were almost all high level players.
"May I help you?" Sakuya asked.
One of the players, a slender undine with wild azure hair stepped forward as spokesman. "Lady Sakuya, we thought we should bring this to you."
The Sylph leader nodded for the man to continue.
"We're amongst the players who had just arrived in Auron when whatever happened, well, happened. We noticed that the terrain outside of the city, doesn't look right."
"Doesn't look right?" Lady Sakuya asked. "As in improperly rendered?"
"N-no." The Undine shook his head. "I mean, there were rivers and forest where there should not be. The lay of the land is completely wrong."
Sakuya bit her lip. "Have you told any of the other players?"
"No My Lady." The undine said. "We didn't want to start a panic which is why we brought this directly to you. I think most of the other players were too shaken to notice. Just what is happening?"
Sakuya shook her head. "I wish I knew. In the mean time, thank you for this information. You should go find someplace safe to stay for the time being."
The undine nodded and a large salamander player wearing the heavy armor of high level tank stepped forward. Beneath his helm his face was covered in a fiery beard and his golden eyes glinted dangerously. Kirito and Leafa both tensed up, ready to move to protect the Sylph leader. Their concern proved uncalled for.
The salamander stood to his full height and saluted smartly. "Ma'am."
Leafa and Kirito were treated to the bizarre scene of a Salamander standing at stock attention before the leader of his faction's mortal enemies.
"Y-yes?" Sakuya asked, recovering quickly.
"I would like your permission to help reconnoiter the area. Until the GMs contact us we have only ourselves to figure out what's going on. In real life I served in the JGSDF until last year when I was discharged due to a back injury. And . . . " The man took a breath. "I was playing ALFHeim with my niece and nephew. They're new sylph players ma'am."
Sakuya nodded. "I understand your concern, but I can't access the faction controls at this time or I would find them for you. Were they with you before?"
The salamander shook his head. "We were supposed to meet up here to do the quest "Hunt for Nine Eyes", they told me they were traveling from Sylvain."
Sakuya nodded. "It appears that all of the players have been reset to the nearest town or safe zone. If that's the case, they may be back in Sylvain or one of the neutral towns. I will have some of my soldiers patrol Auron and compile a list of players in case they were amongst those that made it here. Do you have their user names?
"Balandene and Bardiche." The man said. "And I'm called Carmond."
Sakuya nodded. "Balandene, Bardiche, Carmond. I will instruct my soldiers to keep an eye out for them. In the mean time is your offer of assistance still open?"
The man nodded solemnly. "With the user menu down we'll have to rely on our own senses to get the lay of the land. I was in the infantry so you can count on me for that."
Sakuya turned to Kirito and Leafa. "Kirito-kun, Leafa-chan, I would like to request your help as well."
"Us?" Leafa asked. "I'm sorry lady Sakuya but Kirito need to . . ." The Sylph stopped as she felt her brother place a hand on her shoulder.
"It's alright Leafa." Kirito smiled weakly.
"But . . . Asuna." She said.
"The world tree will be here when we get back and I'm sure Asuna will still be there as well." Kirito said softly. "You were right . . . I can't do it alone. And I can't do it blind either. We need to know what has happened."
"Are you okay with that Kirito?" Leafa asked.
Her brother smiled and rubbed his eyes as if fatigued. "Of course not. I hate waiting. I hate not being at her side. I hate not being able to protect her like a promised." When he looked up, Leafa saw the wetness around his eyes. "But most of all, I hate the idea of never seeing her again. So for now, I'll wait and we'll plan so that when we try again we'll definitely reach the top of the World Tree."
Leafa nodded to her brother. "I hope I get to meet her soon, Oni-chan."
"We accept your request Lady Sakuya." Kirito said.
The Sylph leader nodded. "Then, let us return to the base of the world tree and make arrangements. Carmond, will you accompany us?"
The big salamander nodded and as a group they extended their wings and took flight.
