Chapter 6 Scum of Society: KSers

"So remind me, what quests do we have again?" I asked as Kana went around simply accepting quests.

"Several slaughter quests, a treasure hunt and one deliver an item quest." Kana said nonchalantly, not even bothering to check her quest list.

"How do you even know that?"

"Beta tester remember? Hurry up and finish reading your quest logs, I want to get the slaughter ones done quickly before more players show up.

"But... This woman's husband died from a wasp sting! How tragic is that?"

"Not as tragic as what will happen to you if you don't get your ass out here quick!" Kana said, causing me to run and close the window for later.

The slaughter quests slowly dropping one by one as we mindlessly submitted ourselves to the grind, my focus only on the next monster in front of me and the counter in the quest tab open beside me. Waiting and praying it would drop to zero faster.

"Mifune! Watch yourself!" Kana barked, from behind me, a particularly angry wasp attacking from my left.

Not even bothering to change my stance or dodge I shifted my arm slightly to activate a sword skill, lashing out with a horizontal slash, landing a critical on the pesky insect and stunning it at the same time. Twisting my body to face the stunned creature I raised my scimitar above my head finishing it off with a vertical slice.

"You were saying something?" I called out to Kana as she jerked in response.

"Nothing. You seem to be handling yourself."

The counter finally ticking into double digit monsters remaining, I let out a content sigh as I prepared to finish another wasp. Only to have it burst into polygon fragments in front of me.

Eh? Did Kana come into my area to hunt?

No, Kana is to my right, which means...

Standing to my left and panting happily as he lashed out at another wasp a boy not much older than me started trying to kill the monsters in the area I was hunting.

"Excuse me, can you please hunt somewhere else? I'm currently doing a quest here right now and I'll be finishe soon so..."

"If you can't kill faster than me then screw off noob." the boy replied, blocking an attack with his shield before countering and killing another wasp.

"I was here first, can't you just find another area or wait a few minutes?" I asked, trying to reason with him.

"Doesn't matter who comes first. If you can't kill faster then find your own area."

Guess there's no point reasoning with this guy.

"Monoka, I'm heading to area G to finish the quest." I said into party chat as I took out a potion and started to sip from it.

"Your area has the highest spawn. Why are you moving to area G?" Kana replied.

"Some brat's rushing around killing all the spawn. No point fighting with him." I replied, already in area G and starting to kill wasps.

"I'll take care of it, start moving back now." Kana said curtly as she disappeared from the map.

She went into stealth?!

Already on my way back as instructed I arrived just in time to see Kana rush by the kid before disappearing into stealth again, the wasps chasing the boy instead of Kana.

Unfortunately Kana didn't stealth properly and still dragged half the train of monsters she had created after her.

"Momoka watch out!" I yelled, chasing after the wasp swarm activating a sword skill in order to close in on the closest wasp.

"Hey! Save me!" a voice cried out from behind me.

Turning to the source, it seemed that the jerk from before was having problems with the wasps, his health dropping into the yellow zone already.

"If you can't kill faster, screw off noob." I snapped, turning around and engaging the next wasp as Kana reappeared to fight off the mob of wasps following her as well.

The wasps going down as we hunted them one by one, our quest counters ticked to zero the moment we finished the swarm.

"That's awfully convenient." I said with a sigh while pushing my hair back, "So what's next?"

"I guess we can start the treasure hunt, or do you want to deliver the package?" Kana replied, opening her quest log.

"Help me you fuckers!"

Both of us turning to look at the boy, both of us couldn't help but grin at his predicament.

Having fought off the swarm, it seemed one of the wasps had gotten in a last minute strike before it died, leaving him paralysed in the middle of an empty field.

"Help you? How and why?" Kana asked, sheathing her weapon and standing on one leg.

"Isn't it obvious? I'm paralysed and low on health just help me out of this damn status already!"

"Normally I would but why would I bother going through the trouble of helping someone when I put them in the predicament they're in in the first place?" Kana replied, giving the boy a condescending look.

"She has a point. Plus you're still talking down to us even though it's your life on the line." I drawled.

"Shut the fuck up and help me already!"

"You can talk tough now since there's no spawn but what do you think will happen when the monsters respawn?" I said smugly, the boy glaring back at me.

"I just killed everything, they won't respawn that fast are you going to help me or not?"

"No, I don't think so. It's against my personal policy to help people who don't even treat me nicely." I said with a shrug.

"Plus, you didn't kill everything from there, most of the wasps you killed came from area D. You're in area F." Kana said, the colour draining from the boy's face as he realised the situation he was in.

"Alright alright I'm sorry, can you help me please?"

"No can do, a wise person once told me that "It doesn't matter who comes first" and that "If I can't kill faster I should find my own area". I'm about to do that right now." I said, waving a hand over my shoulder before walking off.

"Tell you what, I'll give you a fighting chance. If you can reach this and drink it you'll get out of your stun. And because I'm such a charitable person I'll even throw in a health potion." Kana said, walking over to the boy and leaving two bottles of liquid in a nearby branch just out of the boy's reach, "You might want to get to them quick though, I'm sure you know that area F has the fastest spawn rate since you were so quick to rush in and claim it for yourself regardless of who was already there.

Kana running a bit to catch up after me as the boy screamed and cursed, I looked over at Kana with a grin, "Remind me never to piss you off."

Grinning at my statement, Kana smiled as she pointed at a spot on her map, "The ring should be around here. If we search in a spiral method we should find it."

"Neh, Kana."

"What is it?"

"Have you ever thought about having fun? Like not going at this all day every day?"

Truthfully the question had been nagging me for quite some time now and I had never had the courage to bring it up. Even though we're in a death game, where dying here meant dying in real life training and getting stronger shouldn't be the only thing we ever do right?

"That's why we're doing quests. The last time I came here I just grinded my level until I was sure about facing the boss before joining the raiding party. It was incredibly boring and totally not worth it. The boss had the crappiest drops ever."

"Are you sure it's the boss had crappy drops and not the players themselves hiding all the good stuff for themselves." I muttered darkly, Kana's face scrunching into one of deep thought.

"You could be right, and I thing you're explanation is almost definitely the reason. But what's with this need to have fun? Aren't you having fun now?"

I wanted to tell her. That I enjoy every day that I am alive and with her. That I've had the longest crush on her to end all crushes. But now isn't the time.

"Well, I am but... I just wondered if there were other things to do other than hunting or questing."

"Well there's a casino on one of the upper levels but I'm not sure whether they removed it..." Kana replied, rubbing her chin, "Plus it doesn't give experience and shouldn't that be our main concern here?"

I guess she's still a tad too serious about levelling.

"I guess... Well the ring is definitely not in a monsters gut or something right? I don't wanna have to go all the way to the field and find that we have to perform another slaughter quest on the spot."

"Don't worry so much, the spawn of the ring is random but it's definitely not in a monster." Kana said with a laugh as we arrived at the specified field, "Oh well, this should make things easier."

Looking in the same direction that Kana was looking it seemed that several players had gotten together to form a party and were hunting the Trembling Cow that spawned in the open field.

"How does it make things easier?" I asked, turning to Kana.

"Originally the plan was for you to gather all the hate of the Trembling Cow in the area as I searched for the ring and then switching out with you while you searched. But since they're already hunting it seems like it would be a shame to waste this opportunity right?"

"Shouldn't we ask them for permission to go into their hunting grounds first?"

"Of course." Kana said.

Both of us walking closer to the group, Kana waited for the group to dispatch the cow before approaching the group.

"Excuse me, we were wondering if you wouldn't mind the both of us going around here for a quest? It's a search quest so we won't interrupt your hunting."

"Yeah sure go ahead, just let us know where we can pick it up when you're done ok?" one of the guys said, winking at Kana before joining his friends as they chased down the next cow.

"Thanks!" Kana yelled after the guy as I caught up to her.

"So I guess we're good?"

"Yep, now start searching. That ring isn't going to find itself!"

"It's people like that who restore my faith in humanity." I muttered while smiling as the boys found another cow to attack.

"Not everyone you meet will be a nasty prick Mifune. C'mon, the place where I found it the last time is close by."

-End of Chapter 6-

Author's Note: Well, the review quota was met so here's another chapter of Blade Dancers! I'll probably make a sequel story every 10 floors or so because I have lots of ideas spread across many floors. Also, I'm having a personal dillemma right about now... As SAO has a rather large player base I'm wondering whether my readers are ok with this story not having much screen time with the original characters from SAO like Kirito-san or Asuna-chan. Agil and Lisbeth would probably make an appearance but what are your thoughts? Leave replies to this in review or in a PM to me, I value any opinions you all might have so just write what you think. Naturally flames will be used to toast my marshmallows but I don't think I've done anything flame-worthy thus far right?