A/N: Have you guys figured out the hidden message in Kayaba's riddle? It's gonna be a hard one, certainly one that Kirito and Lightning are not gonna figure out for a long while. While they are gonna take a while to figure it out, we'll move on to the next chapter of the story, where Eidolons come to the world of Sword Art Online.

JUNE 12TH, 2023. FLOOR 20, TELEPORT GATE.

We run up the stairs of the 19th floor dungeon.

We had just defeated the boss, which was the leader of these Blood Elves. It wasn't the Damned Lord. He'll probably be on one of the dungeons of the 20th floor we'll have to conquer to unlock the 20th labyrinth.

Many players ahead of me have made it to the 20th labyrinth.

Once I step foot on the 20th floor, I get a view of the world. Nature, a bit. Green grass, autumn trees of red and orange. It's partly beautiful, but not peaceful. As far as I can see, there are Legion bases.

Asuna and the rest of the Assault Team are activating the Teleporting Gate. As I gaze at the view of the floor, an alarm goes on. I look to see it's my quest log. It's been updated. How is that possible? Maybe we will receive a quest for entering this floor? Well, only one way to find out.

I click on the icon and a quest window opens:

"Congratulations!

You are the first Swordsman to reach level 100. The Eidolons saw incredible strength within you. You have been chosen to bare one of the most legendary powers of the Aincrad. Head for the Southern Area of the 20th floor to the Shrine of the Gods. There, you will meet your fate...or your doom."

There's no choose of declining it.

Eidolons? I've heard about them in the legends, but never imagine they would be real. What am I talking about? This whole world is a game. None of it is real. The Eidolons in this world are not real, but data objects of the legends.

I'll look into this later. Right now, I need to rest after facing a powerful floor boss. I'm sure the rest of the team would agree.

20th floor. We have made it all the way to the 20th floor. Pretty much the end of this whole 'Legion' world.

Not only that, but I wonder about the riddle we found in the 19th floor labyrinth. It's from the game Shadowhunters, but what does it have to do with Warlords Wrath Online? If only I could somehow log on to Google, maybe I can look it up and see if there's a connection.

Kirito and Hope can't figure anything out as well, and they've spent hours looking over the message. Nothing comes to mind.

FLOOR 20, SHRINE OF THE GODS.

I follow the quest mark on my map to the place where I'm suppose to go.

I'm gonna have the power to summon an Eidolon? I don't know online gaming very well, but I do know summoning isn't a swordsman kind of thing.

I arrive at my destination. Up ahead are a total of nine alters, eight of them have statues. That's weird. I'm guess someone else must have gotten the quest and did something to the statue.

"Lightning!" Hearing Leafa's call startled me. I did not expect to run into anybody over here. I turn, but Leafa isn't alone.

Behind her are Shinon, Hope, Yeul and Kirito.

"What are you guys doing here?" I ask.

"We are here because of the mysterious quest we received when we entered this floor." Yeul says. "Did you receive one as well?"

"I did." I say with a nod. "About being the first Swordsman to hit level 100. And that I'm gonna learn how to summon an Eidolon."

"It makes sense for a Dreamer, Cleric and Wavemaster to have summoning magic, but...Shadow Snipers, Assassins and Swordsmans?" Shinon asks.

"I agree. This wasn't even on the Beta Test." Kirito says.

I have been gathering as much information of this death game for a long time, but I've never heard of this quest.

I follow the log, and I end up turning the quest in to one of the statues. The Eidolon, Odin. Everyone else turn to the statues they were guided to as well. Hope, Eidolon Seraph. Shinon, Eidolon Hecatoncheir. Yeul, Eidolon Phoenix. Kirito, Eidolon Shiva and Leafa, Eidolon Valefor.

That just leaves two Eidolons: Typhoon and Hades. I don't know who the ninth Eidolon is, that one that's already missing.

After turning the quest in, I received a new quest:

"The Statue hums quietly. The sleeping Eidolon's power pulses through its veins as it feels your presence. Odin is calling out. He has chosen you as his champion. You must prove yourself worthy. Face the Eidolon and tame him, or die by his wrath of judgement."

Reading the part about dying doesn't sound very encouraging, but I don't let it get to me. I will face the Eidolon and conquer it.

I assume Kirito and the others have gotten the same quest, but they must face the Eidolons they turned their quest to instead of Odin.

We all learn the rules: A trial battle can only happen one at a time. We have two minutes to tame our Eidolons before they kill us. For me, I have to tame Odin by proving my strength and courage. As for everyone else, I have no idea.

"So...who's going first?" Leafa asks.

We all exchange expressions. Shinon, Leafa and Hope are a bit afraid. Kirito just looks stern, but I can tell he doesn't want to go first. Yeul is just the same as Kirito, but I know she's fearless. I let out a sigh before speaking.

"All right. I'll go first."

Everyone else stands at one end of the shrine. I stand firm, facing against the lifeless statue of Odin. I touch the statue and a window opens.

"Odin challenges you to a deal. Do you accept?"

I hesitated a little, just psych myself a little before entering a deadly combat, then I hit accept. Nothing happens for a moment, but I still draw out my Gunblade as I glare at the statue.

The statues shakes, little by little, then starts to crack. Lightning energy seeps through the cracks, then finally, Odin awakes from his slumber. A burst of wind blows upon his wake, everyone else from behind yells in surprise as the large Eidolon stands a few feet in front of me.

Odin respectfully bows, and I do the same. Odin casts Doom upon me, I can feel my life leeching away from this dark magic, then Odin positions himself. His Gagnrad weapon. We both position ourselves and then we first. I make the first strike with Pulsing Fang, where I charge while shooting at the target, and once I'm ten yards away, I switch to sword and slash the target.

Odin deflects the bullets and he blocks my attack with his shield. He's a tough boss all right.

Odin throws a couple of attacks on me, but I dodge and parry, then counterattack whenever he has an opening. Odin blocks and fights well with his shield and his two-bladed lance.

My HP constantly falls, not from the Doom spell, but from Odin's attacks. I'm slowly dying, you would think Odin's attacks would have no affect on my HP. He doesn't even have an HP bar. Only a cursor and his name.

How am I suppose to tame him?

I only have 45 seconds left, that is when I go berserk on the Eidolon. I unleash a massive display of Sword Skills. Pulse Shot, Sweeping Dance, Thunderfall.

Odin blocks of the attacks. There were few times when my attacks land on him, he staggered for quite a bit, granting more openings for me to strike him. Even so, he still recovered and continue blocking.

In the end, I collapse on my knees, and the Doom spell hits zero seconds.

I expect to instantly die from the dark spell, but death does not come. I look up, Odin still stays in battle stance, then stands straight. He plants his weapon on the ground then kneels before me.

I'm surprised by this, then Odin glows and slowly fades into small stars of light. Right after he vanishes, a window opens in front of me.

'Congratulations! You have learned a summoning spell: Odin.'

Looks like I have tamed Odin.

I'm exhausted. That fight has really drained my energy. But that doesn't stop from everyone else who watched the fight from surrounding and congratulating me. Even Hope is amazed, and he's seen me in combat several times, both reality and in this death game. Even though he never doubted, it's still unbelievable.

I had a little help to get out of the ring of battle. Once I'm out, Kirito is next. He's going to face the Ice Eidolon Shiva.

Shiva's transformation goes through the same process as Odin did. Shiva stands before Kirito. Her footwork is different though, she acts like she's skating on ice. Kirito takes out his dual swords and attacks Shiva.

The fight against Shiva is different then I was exacting. Whenever Kirito gets close and strikes, she skates away at high speed. Kirito moves fast and strikes hard at the Ice Eidolon. I'm glad I didn't get Shiva, looks pretty tough to follow.

Kirito's purpose must be to catch his target and strike hard. Assassins are known for speed. I cannot see Kirito's Doom debuff, the longer the fight takes the more I start to worry. I'm not too attached to Kirito, but I do not want to see anyone else die right before my eyes.

The battle finally stops. Kirito shows no sign of exhaustion, but i can tell he's worn out. Shiva bows before Kirito and vanishes into stars of light. He tamed the Eidolon.

"That was amazing, big brother!" Leafa says.

"It was nothing compared to Lightning's battle." Kirito says.

I give a stern look. "Flattery will get you no where." I say, in a serious tone.

After Kirito, Yeul is next for her Eidolon. The Flame of Rebirth Eidolon, Phoenix. Yeul accepts the duel and fights. Yeul is indeed a powerful Wavemaster, but I still worry if she'll even lose.

Phoenix is different then I expected. It's a humanoid bird. Human body with wing arms, normal face with a bird beak helm. It's like a human bird hybrid.

Before casting the Doom spell, Phoenix does a defensive technique. Casting some kind of flaming shield on it. And then it casts Doom on Yeul. Phoenix casts fire magic. Yeul defenses herself from fire magic with Flame Ward. Then Yeul focuses on casting offensive frost magic.

Nothing new happens for a while, then Phoenix switches to a frost protection. That's unexpected coming from a fire boss. The second it does switch defenses, Yeul starts casting fire magic on it. I think I get it. Fire shield makes it immune to fire, but weak against frost. Frost shield protects against ice but weakens it from fire.

The last thing Phoenix does is switch to a fire and frost shield. Yuel doesn't use any of the two spells against it, but instead casts arcane magic.

The fight lasts for the entire two minutes of the Doom timer. Yeul pretty much lost all of her MP in the fight. Still, Phoenix bows before her and vanishes. She has learned how to summon Phoenix.

Shinon steps forward. She now faces her Eidolon. Hecatoncheir. The large Eidolon has no element, but it has like a thousand arms. Shinon readies her bow to shoot. But just as the fight begins, Hecatoncheir transforms dozens of his arms into gatling guns.

Shinon completely froze up seeing the guns. She's in trouble. "Shinon! You have to face your fears!" I call out to her.

My calling has gotten her attention. She takes a while to sink it in, but then nods. She takes a deep breath and faces her Eidolon.

She must face her fear. Her very life depends on it.

Hecatoncheir casts Doom upon her and the battle begins. Hecaton goes crazy with shooting. Shinon dodges and avoids the bullets, starting with some flips and side runs. While she's running, she shoots at Hecatoncheir.

I must admit. Shinon is doing an excellent job at facing the Eidolon. Normally when she sees a gun, she freezes. But now she's completely active.

The fight ends and Shinon conquers her Eidolon. At first, we were excited, but then Shinon falls to her hands and knees. Normally, it would be exhaustion, but I know it's anxiety. I approach, up close she's panting heavily and sweating.

"You okay?" I ask her.

It takes a while for her to answer. Once she relaxes, she speaks. "Y-yeah. I just..." Shinon stands up, she's a bit shaken. "One little step at a time...I guess."

"Right." I all I say, but what she says is indeed true.

Leafa is next. Against her Eidolon Valefor. Valefor is the Eidolon of winds. The winged creature floats before Leafa. She holds her sword out as Valefor casts Doom on Leafa. Leafa strikes with her sword and casts magic in between her attacks. Valefor has no physical attacks, so it just focuses on Arcane and Wind magic.

Leafa avoids the waves of magic coming at her, then counterattacks. Valefor is pretty tough on her, but Leafa is just as hard against the Eidolon.

Kirito watches his sister's...cousin's fight with pride. He seems impressed, proud even. Like he knows that she'll win. Never a doubt moment that she'll lose, and he was right.

Leafa conquers Valefor. The Eidolon bows to her and vanishes. Once it's gone, Leafa shows her exhaustion.

"I don't know how you guys handled that. It's hard." Leafa says.

"A trial can indeed be hard. As long as we are victorious, live to fight another day, that is all that matters." Yeul says.

"Always the wise one." I tell Yeul.

Now Hope is the last one to battle his Eidolon. To be honest, I'm afraid for this one. Hope is going against a deathly trial right before my eyes and there's nothing I can to help or save him from certain doom.

I can't have doubts. I know he'll win. So far, we all have won our trials against the Eidolons.

Hope now faces the Light Eidolon, Seraph. I'm surprised by the appearance of it, or her I should say. It's a human girl, beautiful, with long brownish hair and angel wings. I've never seen or hear of anything like this.

Seraph offers Hope a smile and casts Doom on him. The smile is kind and gentle, nothing cruel or enjoying ones suffering. She's lucky it's not that or I'll be ticked that she's gonna play with Hope like a little toy.

This fight is different. No combat, but suffering. Dark magic shrouds Seraph and I can see her HP depleting significantly. Hope casts his healing magic to restore the Eidolon's HP, but it does not stop her suffering. I get what he has to do. Keep the Eidolon alive. If she dies, he's doomed. Hope is a good healer, he's got this in the bag.

But I spoke too soon. Overtime, Seraph's HP drops faster. Hope is starting to cast his healing spells faster, and using his holy shield to protect her. The shield only lasts a short time, but it gives him enough time to restore his lost MP.

45 seconds left, and Hope is going to none stop. Even so, the gap between the current and maximum HP is increasing. I'm pretty nervous. Hope can hardly keep up with his healing. Seraph's HP becomes closer to zero everytime when Hope finishes the spell, before the bar shoots up.

Finally, he collapses in exhaustion. I gasp, try to reach out for him. But I'm frozen as the rapidly dropping HP bar on Seraph.

20%. 10%. 5%.

This is bad. Very bad.

I look away, to worried see watch his failure. I expect to hear Hopes painful screams and the sounds of polygonal shattering. To my surprise, nothing happens. I look. To my surprise, Seraph's HP stops at 1%.

If this were a manga, the background behind me would be red with white lines reaching out from me to show how horrifiedly shocked I am.

Seraph bows before Hope and then vanishes. Once I know he's completely safe, I let out a relief from a breath I've been holding in.

"You seemed worried. That's unlikely." Kirito says.

I can tell from the tone and expression on his face he means it as some silly joke. I give him a hard shove. "Shut up, you."

We stay around for a while, both to restore our energy and to wait and see if anyone is going to come and take on Hades and Typhoon. Nobody else showed up.

I can feel Odin's power flowing through my veins. I have the power to summon an Eidolon. Is this the strength I need to conquer this death game? Whatever happens, every power I can obtain helps.