Hello everyone, ArtLotus here to bring you a new chapter. Review if if you will. Well...bye.

Chapter 3: I Miss You

Floor 35: The Forest of Wandering

"Now where is it?" Izayoi asked to himself as he was in the forest and as the name implies; a place where it is easy to get lost. He wandered after being automatically transport elsewhere after he'd just set foot in the forest area.

"Typical." He said as he sigh, continuing to search for the hidden dungeon. Then, all of the sudden he hears stomping sounds coming at him. "Not this Drunken Apes again." He exclaims as he immediately back flip over a Drunk Ape that had the intent to smash him with its crude club.

Izayoi lands and then looked behind to see another Drunk Ape about to smash him. "Too slow." He said mentally, vanishing into thin air.

The two Drunken Apes searched for him, but then a voice caught their attention as a Drunk Ape was suddenly killed. "As I said too slow…" He whispers, appearing behind the only Drunk Ape with his twin swords in a stabbing motion. The Drunk Ape doesn't have time to react as Izayoi stabbed the ape, decreasing his Hp by a quarter.

Then, he jumped away and lands, in an instant his hands were holding twin guns.

"The show's over for you." He said bidding the ape farewell, as he fired two blue charged-energy bullets at him, ending the ape's life as it's Hp goes down to zero and Izayoi sees that he made an Overkill on the Ape. The Druken Ape burst into particles of light as the twin sword that were stabbed behind his back, fell and were stabbed into the ground.

Izayoi went over and clutches both of their handles as he sheathed them in their sheaths, behind Izayoi's back. "It's a good thing they were sharp. But I know they'll never break, and that's why it's a bonus on my part." He stated with a smile as he then proceeded to search for the dungeon.

After some time….

"Now where is that place?" Izayoi said to himself, looking around at the back of the forest, still looking for the dungeon. He searched until… "There you are. Let's see if anything changed since I've been gone." He stated said as he stumble upon a giant grey door. "It's better than to fight the slow Drunken Apes. They're boring but this…is fun!" He said with a grin.

He touched the giant door and pushed it, adrenaline pumping in his veins with an excitement of fun on entering this place. Then, the door burst open, by the force of Izayoi's strength.

"I'm glad to be back here again. Now if this the same dungeon I went, then it must have…" He said to himself as several high-level Kobolds approach him and then surrounded him. "It must have monsters right after you open the door. It hasn't changed a bit, I see. Now that's more like it, Kayaba." He said grinning, but then the door to the main entrance slowly closes.

"Well, let's get this party started!" He said unsheathing his twin swords and slashed at the Kobolds even though he was surrounded. By the time he was done, the door was nearly closing. "The fun is just starting…" He whispers as a glimpse of light that was passed through the giant door disappeared at the same time, the door closes, leaving the player into a realm of darkness.

December 2, 2022

One month has passed since the game began. During that time, nearly two thousand people have died. They are rumours spread that The Thousand Blades had saved the nearly two-hundred people from their death by monsters. However, no one has yet been able to clear the first floor.

The four thousand players that were left, were still in the City of Beginnings, hoping that help would come from the outside.

"Didn't they hear my speech? After all I worked on it. Huh…" Izayoi said with a sigh. He admit that getting to the 35th floor is to beat the first floor. So, without anyone realizing he did defeat the Floor Boss and no one knew, I mean no one. He did think of a plan to get to the 35th floor and that is to beat the 1st Floor Boss without anyone finding out, or else he will have some explaining to do and he doesn't want that or not he will killed someone. After what he experience in Beta-test, he can practically remembered every floor and location of the Floor Bosses except above 75th.

So as plan he went out when everybody was asleep or resting off in their inns. He entered, defeated the Floor Boss and safely arrived to his dungeon. He may call it selfish, but he can do whatever he wants to get some fun around here. He was not one of those that were just waiting around though while they are fun things he can do while he was here.

Not too far from the town of Tolbana, Izayoi was walking towards one of the dungeons he had not visited since the Closed Beta.

It was actually the only real sizeable dungeon on the first floor, but as the monsters inside the dungeon were too weak for him as his level was pretty high and sadly he did think to solo the boss, but it's no fun if you can kill it with just a single hit, but on the other hand it has a part of it's fun. And If not for the message from Argo about the strategy meeting the next day, he might not have even stopped by. But, something told him elsewhere, that he should come.

Entering the dungeon, he saw a group of Ruin Kobold Troopers up ahead. A gnarly club could be seen in the hands of each monster.

"Only level five? I thought it was much higher than that." Izayoi muttered as he saw the monster's level. He knew that he should have been expecting that. He had been having an easy time gaining levels lately because of his secret grind dungeon. But he had choose to explore a little cause it was not fun just staying in one place all day, grinding. He knew entering the dungeon, the monsters was easy to defeat. He was ten times the level higher than the monsters that made up the first floor, and the floor after that. Including the boss.

Sighing, he drew his Heaven sword but kept a focused face. With his fingers firmly wrapped around the hilt of the sword, he held the blade so that he could perform a slash with it. He dashed forward as the blade glowed white and swung the sword horizontally. He dragged his sword while the sword just slashed through their bodies, given that he's levels was extremely higher than his opponent, he was able to cut the monsters completely in half.

Without even waiting for the kobolds to shatter, he ran towards the last one with his hand holding the sword backwards, given it in a dagger position. As soon as he was close enough, he vanished.

Then, suddenly slashes of white energy confront the Kobold as it slashed upwards, downwards, and then came a piercing attack at the kobold as it pierced right through the chest, instantly killing it. "Now that was fun…maybe not, they're just charged at you with their clubs." He said with a sigh, suddenly appeared as he sheathed his sword as within the span of a couple of seconds, a group of Kobold were destroyed, though it barely gave him any experience.

Moving along through the dungeon, he dispatched a number of monsters with ease. There was no real challenge in the fights, but that was to be expected.

He spent an hour in the dungeon, continuing his grinding and searching ways to have fun.

Just when he was about to turn around and head back out of the dungeon, he heard the sound of fighting.

Picking up his pace, he came within view of an intersection. He sees a hooded cloak figure and apparently she was a girl by the looks of it. He then noticed that she was fighting another Ruin Kobold Trooper. Unlike the ones he fought earlier, it was a level six. He idly wondered what level the hooded player was as the figure dodged the kobold's three-strike combo.

"Who is this?" He asked himself as he was surprised to watched the cloaked figure use a quick thrust that he recognized as Linear. It was the most basic technique a rapier-user learned, but the speed behind the attack was incredible. But he doubt the speed is second under him, of course. They wouldn't call him The Thousand Blades just because only of his skills. He was the fastest player in Sword Art Online second to none. But overall he was impressed.

It took one more Linear to finish off the kobold, though Izayoi couldn't help but be surprised by that choice of attack.

"That's an extreme overkill, you know," he remarked as he walked towards the figure.

With a start, the rapier-user turned to Izayoi who's hood still hide his face.

So as he looked at the rapier-user, he could read the person's body language. Confusion was the only emotion that seemed to stand out.

He had never seen a Linear so perfect, so he had assumed that it was a fellow beta-tester. It took most people longer than a month to obtain such skills, especially on the first floor. But the figure's confusion at the relatively common MMORPG term told him different.

If anything, it made him wonder if this was the rapier-user's first game.

"Overkill means that you did a lot more damage than the opponent's health," Izayoi explained, remembering the kobold's health by far. "The kobold was almost dead before that last Linear. You probably could have poked it or kick it and it would have died."

"Is that a problem?" the cloaked figure asked.

Izayoi was not surprised by the voice, as he knew that she was girl and he was right. Let's say that he can recognize a girl that was disguised as a boy pretty easily. If not in a minute. Even though she wasn't wearing any boy's clothes, and only wears a cloak to hide her identity or herself.

He could remember how the mirrors had changed everyone so that their avatar looked exactly like they did in real life back on the first day of Sword Art Online, and one thing that had stood out was that at least two-thirds of the players had been male. Standing before him was one of the world's rare female players.

"Sometimes," Izayoi answered. "It's not really practical. You have to concentrate to use Sword Skills, so using them is a good way to get tired. And then, of course, there's the return path, so you don't really want to get too tired."

"Return path?" Her voice was faint from fatigue, but even so, Izayoi felt the need to help her and strangely to be with her.

"Yeah, it took me about an hour to get here from the entrance, and that's the only way out of the dungeon. From there, the closest town is about thirty minutes away. And if you're exhausted, you'll make more mistakes. For a soloer, any small mistake could cost you your life. It's a one in a lifetime chance, or not...you'll die.

"Then there's no problem. I'm not returning," she managed to say, as Izayoi realized the exhaustion evident in her voice.

Izayoi narrows his eyes "What do you mean? You need to go back if you want potions, food, equipment repairing, and sleep…."

"I do not need medicine when I am not taking damage, I still have plenty of bread with me, I bought five of the same sword so that I can switch when they get too damage, and I use the nearby safe area to rest in."

Safe areas were rooms in a dungeon where monsters could not enter. While hunting and mapping, it was a nice place, but it could only be used for maybe an hour of short rest. With a floor of cold stone, no beds, and the constant sounds of monster's footsteps and growls, deep sleep was pretty much impossible.

"How many hours have you been here?" he asked after a few moments.

"Three days… or was it four…."

"If you keep this up, you're going to die," Izayoi remarked with a frown as he scratched his head. He did not know how she even had it in her to stand. There was no way that three or four days in the dungeon would do anything good for a player's fatigue levels.

"Everyone will die in the end," she said bluntly. "So what, we're gonna be dead anyway. No one can clear the 100th floors. The first floor still has not been cleared. It simply isn't possible to beat this game. Sooner or later, everyone will die. The only difference is when it actually happens." She said causes Izayoi to suddenly grabbed her hand forcibly and brought it up to their faces, they're hoods were facing each other. The hooded girl was shocked by his actions, even though she guessed that the both of them can't see their faces because of the hoods.

"You know if you keep that attitude, you're dead. And for the record, you're wrong. The game can be beaten. As long as we do not give up, we can beat this game and get out of here." He said to the hooded girl as he continued.

"Don't say that, Okay? If no one can clear 100 floors then I will, cause I got someone precious out in the real world waiting worriedly for me, and I will clear this game to be with her again because I hate to see her sad just because of me, playing in this death game. I have always protected her but now when I'm stuck in this game, who will protect her out there, I couldn't imagine how she will protect herself from the world. And so, I will never give up until I see her smiley face again. I will get out of this game no matter what, to be with her again." He said to her.

The girl looked taken aback by his words. No, that was not quite what fully happened. There was something else that affected her. It was something more than mere words. It was the sheer conviction, resolve and not to mention the warmth that he carried for his loved one, which shocked the girl, as Izayoi's eyes soften.

"And don't you have someone precious to you out there waiting for you too, to be safe?" He asked which the girl hesitantly nodded and then suddenly she hugged him, as Izayoi was surprised as he could hear her crying. She doesn't know why that she was hugging him but she was feeling alone, and this guy was strangely familiar to her like she knows him as she cried into his jacket.

"I-I want to get out of this game. I-I want to meet Izayoi-kun again! H-he always was with me the entire time when I was sad or angry about something and he always cheers me up when I'm having a hard day. W-When we met on the first day of school, h-he made me laugh after he saved me from those creeps." She said as Izayoi widen his eyes, shocked by what he heard.

"We always went shopping at the Mall and he never let's go of my hand even for a second. I asked him why? He said I could always watch you and I know that- "She said paused as Izayoi continued for her. "You are safe." Izayoi stated as the girl stopped crying and sobbed a little but in the end she slowly look up at him, surprised on how he knew the same sentence unless...

"Izayoi-kun?" She asked as Izayoi let down his hood as Asuna widen her eyes, as tears ran down her cheeks as Izayoi slowly let down her hood for her. "I-Izayoi-kun?" She asked if this was a dream or not. "You don't recognize me anymore, Asuna-chan?" He asked with a smile as Asuna just hugged him tightly, as she cried silently into his shoulder. "I miss you." She simply said teary-eyed, as she doesn't know what to say to him after they're awkward conversation, but she knows now that he is here with her and for that she was glad and happy.

"I miss you too." He said hugging her back, remembering he saw her at The Town of Beginnings and dismissed for some illusion but it was true. Now the proof is hugging him now, as he was finally with her again.

After a while, they parted as Izayoi broke the silence. "How did you get in this game?" He asked. "I borrowed my brother's NerveGear when he had a sudden business trip and he could not play on the opening day. So I logged into it before I realized the Tutorial." She said to him. "I'm glad that you're okay." He said smiling at her as she smiled back.

"So what are we going to do now?" Asuna asked as Izayoi immediately remembered the meeting. "There's a meeting tomorrow in Tolbana about clearing the first floor," Izayoi said, looking at her. "Clearing the first floor? Did they found out about the Floor Boss, there?" She questioned as Izayoi shrug. "I don't know but we can find out." He said as he opened the main menu and sent her a request to form a party with him.

With a smile, Asuna accepted as she just found out about her Izayoi. Now she can be with him.

"Let's head back to town then. None of the monsters between here and the entrance should have respawned by now, but they may have changed that since the beta," Izayoi said as he turned back towards the way he came as Asuna was beside him, letting down her head onto his shoulder while Izayoi had his hands around her.

The two exited the dungeon while being comforted by each other.

That was touching right? No? Whatever i still like it. Not to offend you or anything. Well, see you. I'm out.