Sword Art Online: Special Edition Chapter 9:
Kirito was eyeing in shock, Leafa was preparing to get ready to attack, and Chronicler went a little limp where he stood all the while the trio watched as the large, robust, intimidating Kirigaya Ken flexed and moved his muscles about to stretch and practice some punches and jabs with his body as he looked away from the trio.
"So who's first?" Ken asked all the while Kirito had jumped forward mid-sentence and pulled out his two-handed sword and performed a vertical slash against Ken's body; the blade, upon impact, shattered like glass as the attack didn't even faze Ken very much. As the triangular head of Ken turned to face his son, Ken lunged as he grabbed hold of Kirito's head and slammed him into the ground a good distance away from Leafa and Chronicler.
Leafa did what she could to try and analyze just how strong Ken's avatar was, but due to how exactly Chronicler's virtualization worked from what she had seen the day before and now, she had no access to any sort of UI interface. That wouldn't, however, be a problem for Chronicler.
"Chronicler… How strong is Ken…?" Leafa asked, as Ken walked over to Leafa chuckled as Kirito was knocked out in the dirt behind him.
"Come now, child, or, rather, a fully grown adult; did you honestly expect your adulthood would leave you free from my wrath?" Ken asked, as Leafa growled towards Ken, as Ken simply chuckled and patted his daughter on the head in a mocking matter, before looking over towards Chronicler as he watched his broken state with interest.
"Come now, Chronicler… nothing to say to daddy?" Ken taunted Chronicler, as he still didn't get much of an answer after Chronicler had more or less froze in place. Chronicler didn't know how to comprehend seeing this man again; all he could even remotely manage to do was use the spell he had used before to summon forth his shire again. However, Ken, thinking that Chronicler was trying to flee, materialized an axe of dark energy and struck down the shire in a single blow.
The horse, giving a loud, agonizing call as it was attacked on sight, fell to the ground towards its side, as its body had went limp. Chronicler, looking over towards the fallen horse in absolutely horror, slowly fell to his knees as he tried to hide the emotions going through his mind right now; Ken, though, simply walked over towards him and laughed.
"Come on, it's just a toy like everything else you've had to live alongside. Did you honestly think it was even alive?" Ken asked Chronicler, as Leafa moved to quietly move to face Ken from behind as she tried to figure out how to attack the demonic man before her. Chronicler, beginning to choke up a little as Ken simply watched him the whole time, eventually fell flat onto the ground as he had begun to cry.
"You're no killer; you're no man; you never were even an actual human either way. An AI like you has no actual rights to freedom as you'd so dearly wish." Ken spoke towards Chronicler, as he had heard the piercing sound of an arrow flying through the air; moving to quickly grasp behind him, he held in his hand to look at a reinforced arrow in his hand that was aimed towards him.
Ken turned around, hauntingly slow and casual about it, to look as to wherever Leafa could've been; he had lost visual on her, and since Kazuto was still in the grass knocked out, somebody had fired at him, but Ken couldn't quite identify who. Ken's UI told him that Leafa was in the area still, but in a mere instant, his UI completely crashed on his visual and auditory end as Ken panicked, before looking over towards where Chronicler had been.
The AI he had known had vanished from the area, but it was clear with Ken's senses effectively blinded, that Chronicler was still here for what little he had known about him. Ken tried his best to access any of the communication channels to get into contact with any of the other game masters; no signal from any of them, not even considering Ken's much more refined virtual avatar or abilities compared to Kirito or Leafa's. Moving to suddenly dodge upon hearing a low quality sound, Ken just barely dodged Chronicler appearing out of the blue with a glowing, rune covered longsword.
"Annoying brat, didn't I already tell you about how this game goes? Your weapon may be strong, but without the stats to back it up, you can't do jack shit to me, boy." Ken scolded Chronicler, all the while he founded himself with his hands forcefully held behind his back by Kirito finally getting enough strength to get back on his feet after an opening was presented.
"What do you think he'll do? He'll kill us both like this!" Ken told off Kirito, but Kirito didn't listen to what Ken had to say.
"Fine; this isn't my story either way…" Kirito said in a dark tone, as Chronicler stood idle in stance as his ominous longsword transformed in shape into a shield with a diamond shape to it. Ken's eyes widened as he observed Chronicler's weapon transform.
"That's… that's not how that works…" Ken spoke up, as eventually threw Kirito out in front of himself as he spun around, and this time effectively manage to spot Leafa firing an arrow at his eye; striking him directly with a poison tipped arrow, Ken growled as he was thinking to himself as to how exactly Leafa had managed to harm him at all.
It didn't make any sense, he thought; his stats were maximized compared to these three, he thought; he should've been invincible, he thought to himself again. As he was wondering what exactly was going wrong, he checked his own UI and noticed something; he was effectively being blinded by the very superweapon Chronicler was born from, which prevented him from checking his UI to check his own vitals properly.
'Persistent pests… This is why I never liked the two of them let alone all three…' Ken thought to himself, as he snapped his fingers and summoned forth two, large, gargoyle monsters to his aid; without even a chance to react, Chronicler slammed his shield into one of them, allowing for Suguha to charge in with her sword and strike the beast in the chest for a fatal blow. As the second moved to attack, Kirito took it down in a single, horizontal slash which cut the gargoyle in half.
"If you're saying stats ultimately matter, why the low level guardians?" Kirito asked Ken, as Ken simply chuckled a little.
"You might think that they're low level, but you do not know the truth, or even as to why Chronicler over there is near stagnant." Ken brought up, as he looked over towards Chronicler, who was glancing back over to the corpse of his shire horse. Chronicler, slowly beginning to growl a bit in anger as his fists tightened together, as Ken simply responded by grabbing Kirito in a choke hold upon seeing him trying to rush at him from the corner of his eye.
As Leafa fired several more arrows from behind Ken, some of them actually landed, and instead of poison, exploded upon contact with Ken's back, all the while Ken looked over at her with his demon avatar beginning to slowly roar towards her in frustration. Slamming Kirito into the ground, Ken moved to fire off powerful, immense bolts of fiery energy towards Leafa. Leafa dodged all that she could manage, proving to be much more nimble on her feet than her brother did.
Ken, not having been paying attention to Chronicler this whole time, looked over towards him as he fired an immense stream of fire towards the boy to provoke him into attacking or at least something of that sort. Ken, in hindsight, should've just ignored him as he was earlier; by the time Chronicler reacted, he could be heard chuckling as the flames around Chronicler dissipated near instantly. Leafa, taking Ken's surprised reaction to her advantage, coated her sword in poison as she moved behind Ken and thrusted it right through his back and out of his gut.
As Ken recoiled in pain as he looked over towards Chronicler, he was stunned to see Chronicler's eyes almost completely red save for white, hellish slits for pupils as Chronicler looked over towards him with a general lack of the innocence he had before. Ken's eyes slowly widened as Chronicler began to chuckle more and more with a sense of malice directed straight towards Ken himself. Chronicler simply gestured to have Leafa get Kirito out of range; Leafa didn't waste time since she was now beginning to wonder what exactly Chronicler was going through right now.
"Over the past 18 years you all had wondered who my father was; where my father's half of my VNA originated from, and why you all had feared whatever he was even though he looked perfectly human. I'll tell you something right now, Ken; I can feel his unique flow of energy coursing through this virtual body now. I wonder, though… can I finally achieve the transformation of my sibling…?" Chronicler said as he began to charge an immense influx of mana directly into his very body and soul.
Ken moved to immediately strike Chronicler with an electrical spell, before finally rushing forward with his axe to try and kill him in haste. He didn't stand a chance, however, with the massive explosion of magical energy that completely sacked the whole landscape in the nearby vicinity. Leafa and Kirito watched from a distance as they both were now worried for Chronicler; Kirito was mentally cursing Ken for having provoked Chronicler, and Leafa was beginning to worry about Chronicler's sanity now that she knew Ken had a bigger part in his insanity than initially thought.
As Ken backed away as he was beginning to cough and wheeze immensely from the poison hitting his system, Ken looked on in horror as Chronicler's hair turned silver as his whole body glowed with a blinding white light; his gauntlets having shattered to reveal the runes underneath, his runes were now completely unbound in terms of their destructive potential. With his cloak transformed into angelic wings, Ken looked paranoid as to Chronicler's newfound form. Ken, rushing forward with a charge energy spell of dark magic to strike Chronicler, didn't expect Chronicler to, within mere milliseconds, to respond with his runic laser from both of his hands to parry the wave of energy fired in his direction.
"Foolish Chronicler… You're blinded by your own rage and anger… Is that why you tapped into your secret power so suddenly?!" Ken asked, as his beam of dark energy pushed against Chronicler's runic beam with a greater force, as Ken merely chuckled, "Even if this is the end of me, there will be someone who will take my place; you can count on it!" Ken spoke up, as Chronicler chuckled from his end of the beam struggle.
"Ken, for all of the abuse you've given the three of us, you can go straight to hell!" Chronicler shouted, as his runic laser suddenly exploded in terms of sheer power output; vaporizing right through Ken's dark magic beam, Ken himself was caught in the explosive firepower of the runic laser as his body was beginning to vaporize on contact. However, as Ken struggled within the beam itself, his mouth began to fill with something strange as he vomited some kind of metallic sphere out into the air and over the horizon.
Ken's body, however, did not last for much longer; within seconds, his body was vaporized by Chronicler's runic laser without question. Neither Chronicler, Leafa, nor Kirito knew, however, is that Ken still lived in the form of his physical body still in the real world. Ken raised an eye as he chuckled to himself as to the fact Chronicler seriously believes he is dead.
'Fool, that's what I hope he'll believe for the next week or few until I return again as if nothing happened.' Ken thought to himself from the backseat of his limousine, as he snapped his fingers for the driver's attention.
"Alright, take me home; I've had enough to deal with in this little game for the day." Ken spoke up to his driver, who nodded in response as he began to drive off from the parking lot he was stationed in.
Back in the virtual world, though, Leafa and Kirito were quick to head back towards Chronicler, as Chronicler looked over the two of them as his eyes still looked frenzied from Ken's provocation. However, before Chronicler could remotely have the chance to attack them out of a blinded fury, Ryōtarō and Lisbeth stepped into the fight from the game on their end; Lisbeth raised a shield to block whatever attack Chronicler had, all the while Klein looked ready to stand up to Chronicler should he try anything fishy.
"Guys, please; leave him be." Leafa spoke up, as she looked around and saw Sinon with a rifle ready to snipe away at Chronicler if she truly had to, seated right at the top of a tall cliff. With Chronicler still at edge with his friends and the divine power flowing through his body, it was clear that even with the fierce exterior, from what Sinon could see, Chronicler was suffering more than he showed.
"Guys, if you want to save his life, you're going to have to knock him out of that form; it's dealing damage to his maximum HP every five seconds he uses it!" Sinon informed Klein and Lisbeth, as the latter two looked at each other as Leafa and Kirito both came out from behind the duo as they both dropped their weapons and rushed over towards Chronicler; before Chronicler could do anything to retaliate, both of them were quick to hug Chronicler towards themselves as to help Chronicler calm down from his immense amount of rage.
"Chronicler; you're not a killer, you're not a monster; you're human, just like all of us!" Leafa spoke up, as Kirito spoke next.
"Chronicler, regardless of your very creation, regardless of whatever you were intended to be, you have the choice of who you truly want to be; please make that choice for your own benefit!" Kirito spoke to Chronicler, as Chronicler's frenzied gaze looked towards the two of them; Klein and Lisbeth visibly cringed as Chronicler still looked hostile, but they let out a sigh of relief when Chronicler divine transformation died down to allow Chronicler back to his normal self.
Chronicler, sighing heavily due to the severe exhaustion he felt, looked towards both Leafa and Kirito and hugged them both in return as he used whatever power he had left to take all three of them back into the real world. Their bodies fading into molecules, Klein, Lisbeth, and Sinon looked in disbelief as their transfer back into the real world occurred. Sinon, who didn't have any knowledge of this prior, was the most surprised of the three.
Materializing back in the real world, Kazuto nearly keeled over in immense pain around the same time Damion himself did as well.
"Damion, sheesh…! Is this the kind of pain you're forced to deal with every time you do this?!" Kazuto asked as his muscles were beginning to tighten up as he could feel Asuna move from behind him to lift him back up to his feet. Damion merely groaned as he tried to get the strength to answer, but Suguha helped him back up and onto a couch for him to seat himself to rest. Oddly, Damion's gauntlets were back in place as if his transformation did not occur.
"Damion… What were you referring to when you mentioned your actual dad…?" Suguha asked, as Damion looked over at her and calmed more upon seeing her genuine concern for him.
"I've heard a lot of rumors about who my dad was; or, rather, what very little the workers at my original home had mentioned about him. They saw him for themselves, they could see he was human; his DNA, on the other hand, did not show it at all. VNA is the term used to describe the DNA of artificial life-forms like myself, standing for Virtuanucleic Acid. Compared to my mother, whom I get the majority of my VNA from, my birth apparently did not properly mix my mother's VNA with my father's DNA; as a result, my father apparently bestowed upon me a great power I could only access when my father's DNA within me fully merged with that of my mother's VNA within me, becoming a "whole" being in a sense." Damion explained for what little he knew, as he took the time to mentally curse to himself about something.
"… And it looks like I'm going to need to go back into SAO soon…" Damion groaned as he facepalmed, "I forgot to go search for my mother while we were still in there; that Ken prick distracted the three of us more than he should have." Damion said, as Kirito groaned, only for Asuna so moved him into a couch to relax as she walked over towards Damion.
"I'll go; so will Ryōtarō, right?" Asuna offered, as she looked over towards Ryōtarō as the man nearly flinched.
"Wait why can't I just use my in-game avatar?" Ryōtarō noted, as Damion sighed.
"Your in-game avatar doesn't have any trace of VNA in it; my mother won't recognize you as anything other than a typical player if you don't have VNA present within yourself." Damion said, as Ryōtarō sighed as he watched as Rika reassured Ryōtarō with a cheerful gesture. As Ryōtarō and Asuna joined hands with Damion, all three of them could feel a sensation going through them as Damion did what he could to traverse all three of them in such short notice back into the game.
As Damion translated himself, Asuna, and Ryōtarō into the game, he translated the trio into a region much further away from the grassy plains, in the form of a savanna type of environment with a giant waterfall next to the landing point, which connected to a large spring at the bottom.
"Alright, so let's get one thing and one thing very simple with what I'm about to explain to the two of you, more like, how I'm going to go about that." Chronicler said as he scouted the area for any signs of life; up ahead, further away from the spring, he could identify horses in range of the group. Klein, however, merely looked around in a panic as his equipment materialized onto his form, as he looked around half nearing ready to scream. Unbeknownst to Chronicler, though, both Klein and Asuna took sight of something which made Klein let out a loud, ear piercing, shrill of a scream, as Chronicler turned to face the entity with piqued interest.
It was a giant horse.