(Shanxi Orbital Station/ Defense platform )

A team of eight people walked through the now empty space station, they had hunted down and killed all of the dog-sized rats, a task made easier by the fact that the pests had tracking devices put on them. Now, however, they only had one job left, activate the space stations main computer and gain control over both the communications network and the factory that was inside the station, itself.

Each player had been forced to wear some form of gas mask for the stench inside the space station was nearly unbearable, the air filtration devices had either long since broken down or had been turned off for so long that the tech of both the original Human inhabitants rotting stench, had mixed in with the rats putrid smell.

Still, as they arrived at the main computer they found it completely undefended, no passwords were needed, in fact, any form of device keeping intruders away was none existent, the only thing that was out of the ordinary was a bright red bottom that was constantly blinking.

(Enemies eliminated) said one of the mech pilots, who's machine was being repaired.

As he looked at his help screen to check up on the battle on the planet below he couldn't help but think, how incredible it was that the mechs had covered so much ground.

Sure the mechs were impressive machines, but to be able to go from one side of a city to the other side over and over again was impressive, already they were beginning to abandon the city's and spread out into the unmapped lands.

(Stazione one we're on the bridge) said one of the other team's that was inside one of the other space stations.

(Same here) answered another team

(Activating the Stations computers, now) announced an overly eager voice.

Instinctively the team leader pressed the red button and the space stations computers came back to life, unfortunately, what the team would see would reveal to them that they had indeed been too late to save the people of these worlds.

Videos of planets that the players themselves having never laid eyes on before were shown to them and do to the fact that the space stations had several drones showing live footage to both the guild leaders and the research and development team.

Five years of constant fighting had broken most of the people's wills and it was only in Humanities birth realm that people were still fighting for their freedom and lives.

All of a sudden it began to make sense, the fact that there was no real defense fleet for the aliens, the fact that the people below are barely having any problems and the simple undoubtable truth that there are hardly any people on those worlds below.

These planets were already conquered and what they had encountered was the cleanup crew, just getting whatever they had left behind, before completely abandoning the now useless worlds.

For a brief moment, the player's help screen gave a small glow and changed into one better suited for navigating space, on it multiple worlds were marked, these were the alien's worlds. The problem was, that there were different colors for them, conquered- client- warring- and high risk.

A light hum began to filter through the space station, the factory and its forges onboard had been reactivated.

The computers began to show the space stations doors open up and begin to draw in one of the captured alien ships, next to the video the broken tenants of the planets defense fleet was being brought in and immediately dropped into a nanotech poll to break them down for the much-needed materials.

Another computer showed the remaining defense ships that could still be used.

The players began to exhale, if they did this there would be no turning back, something as simple as a computer chip would change everything in the long run. For a brief moment, the team leaders hesitated but placed the chip on the computer none the less.

Instantly the blueprints for railguns, plasma cannons, low-level shields, the space stations computers were already looking for ways to mix the new technologies brought in with those it already had.

(Aincrad Guild and Team leaders meeting)
The feeling of the room was comparable to one that had a person aiming a gun to a completely defenseless individual.

This was going to be a problem, for one they could just ignore the entire thing and leave the people of these worlds with both the technology and ships they had or were already building and repairing.

The four-eyed aliens were slavers and that meant that they needed to have clients for them to sell the slaves.

Apparently, there were worlds so dangerous that the aliens stayed away, others were still fighting, but what worried the guild and team leaders was what the star map showed.

The location of Earth and the fact that the Soul Sistem was classified as a war area.

( Shanxi character change Kirito)
Kirito walked forward, it had already been hours since they had arrived, the effects of the mechs ongoing fight was affecting everything now, so much so that they had to pull them back. The smell of ash now lingered in the air, so much so that he could taste it.

His body was stronger than the one a normal person would have had and it was for that reason that he was able to keep going when a normal person would have fallen under complete exhaustion, slowly the red markers all over the city were either vanishing or turning green, meaning that they had surrendered.

Like it or not the mission was complete and this planet now belonged to them, it was time to begin to rebuild the city, but in all honesty, Kirito himself, didn't know what for. Just fixing the foundation itself was something that would take years, not to mention all of the electronics and plumbing.

Hell the buildings themselves were little more than rubble and those that weren't destroyed were littered with bodies.

Ruined cars, ships, power suits and weapons were scattered all over the place, so just rebuilding the city alone was a risk on its own and soon it would get a lot worse, there was no way that the refugees would be allowed to stay onboard and there were too many people involved in this mission for anyone to simply accept to leave without getting any real form of reward.

Kirito looked at his help screen and noticed that already things like power armor, mass accelerators, genetic shields, tanks and so forth, there were even things like Virtual Intelligence and personal photographic computers that needed to be attached to the wrist of a person.

On an interesting note, things like hover tanks were being put up for the players to buy but from what Kirito could see very few people were trying to buy them at the moment.

Already the computers inside Aincrad had begun to access the information the colony had and Kirito didn't like what he was seeing, it seemed that every news station or channel be it entertainment or informative was covering the war with the aliens, at least until they entered the system, then everything went dark.

Before the players had walked into the planet several markers had been dropped onto the planet, wherever the markers had landed the players had immediately made sure to reinforce the area around them.

Now the refugees were starting to come out of those markers, it seems like the guild leaders wanted to get rid of them as fast as possible. Already his help screen was beginning to show multiple lights coming from the area the markers were located, for now, they would serve as the people's stronghold.

The sound of concert falling from a broken building, made him look around for a moment, Aincrad had so many memories in it, it was there he made his first friends, it was there he had met his wife, where he had learned to fight and become who he is now.

But it also had so many dangers could they really raise a child inside it, inside the same place that had killed so many people, granted that this planet wasn't any better, his surroundings certainly proved that.

He couldn't help but look at the blue sky and notice the black clouds of smoke, he was going to be a father...

He was going to be a father...

The cold wind blew behind him, while the hot air moved slowly, somehow the chemicals lingered in the air.

They would have to arm the people of this world now, truthfully they didn't have to, in fact, they had already helped them enough and any more help would only say that the planet was in fact now under their control and by extension so are the people living on it.

They had the technology, if not to defend the entire planet to at least defend entire cities and a few continents.

( Incoming Guild/ team leaders message wide communication)

..." There's no real easy way to say this so I'll just get straight to the point. The reason we sent an immediate notice to everyone is this, from the information we gained from the alien's ships, all of the humans on the colonies had already been captured and sold as slaves.

Everyone that has seen how the aliens treat people can get an idea of what fate awaited those people." 1 said

"These people are nothing to us, we don't owe or have any connection to them. So we have no reason to get them back, not only that but if we do go and get them back we will be making a lot of enemies." Said another guild leader.

"Finally there is another issue, we know where this dimensions/games version of Earth is located and from the looks of it, the aliens do too, but if we go and help them, then we risk losing the only planer we have under our control and putting Aincrad in danger."

"It's for this reason that we will put it up for a vote, so it will be up to the majority to decide everyone's fate."

"Anyone that wants to go and help the people taken by the aliens press the green light that will appear after this message is done."

"Those that chose to stay and keep what we have already captured push the red light."

"Those that want to go and help the Earth, press the blue light and finally those that don't want to participate press the white light, but be aware that regardless whether you want to participate or not, if Aincrad is attacked you will have to defend it.

"We understand that the mining world is still being fought over. There is a lot of cleaning up to do." All three of the guild leaders said before the lights began to glow and pass by the screen.

At the end people chose not to go and help anyone, the risks were just too high and they neither had the numbers, not the weaponry needed to fight in a real war at the moment.