[Aincrad council room ]
"The next issue is regarding the trade the hidden sand village had with the smaller nations," Heathcliff says as he looks at the papers in front of him
"What's there to talk about, we can keep pt the regular trade they had by just teleporting to the san villages original location and taking it from there. I mean to use it as an intermediate point, you know to keep people away from Aincrad" Thinker answers Heathcliff, as he turns to look at the other councilors and the representatives behind them, no one seemed to object
"It's not just the trad, but also the funds, normally the people of the sand would have kept everything they made because it was only them involved"
"But it isn't just us anymore and we are apart of an even bigger group, meaning that the funds don't just go to us" Heathcliff began to explain only for one of the representatives to finish his explanation for him.
"Okay let me ask everyone a question," Asuna says as she stands up.
"Right now, all of our funds are being spent in redesigning or redecorating our parts of the town. We make enough coal\ gold by killing monsters or doing things like baking and so on inside Aincrad"
"So why would we argue about the funds coming in from the outside?" Asuna asks everyone in the council room who just keep quiet.
Asuna had brought up a good point, the money the sand villagers made was minuscule in comparison to the amount being spent every day inside the mountain, so arguing about it was pointless, especially since the players and the samurai dint have any reason to into the outside world for the moment being.
Normally the sand villagers would have considered this as an insult by Asuna who was looking down at them, but they already were making use of Aincrads financial system and buying and selling their own things using coal\ gold.
In reality, all of the money made from the outside would be converted into gold and that's where the problems came, who would manage the gold, made from all of the sand villager's work.
"It's easy to settle this, we include your people in our trade, if people like your products then all of you..."
"Let's say there are a bunch of coins, we each get a coin and we keep going that way until one coin is left, that coins put aside until it's needed for things like repairing the town or in case of war," one of the sand elders says before sitting back down
"What do you say?" Heathcliff asks the councilors who raise their hands giving their approval.
Iwache all of this happen as I look at Yui chasing after Gaara again, the two have really become friends, namely because everyone seems to stay away from Gaara because of the monster he controls.
"This is new," I say as I notice a pair of small figures running up to Yui and throwing balls of sand at her, before running away when Yui turns to chase after them.
I can't help but smile as I see a group of kids dressed as knights hiding behind a wall made of sand, with a bunch of other kids dressed like samurais and two ninjas.
"Oh, they don't know what they got themselves into," I say as Gaara tries to crus Yui, but she just burns all of the sand he's using and turns it into glass.
Time out!" I hear one of the kids scream as he walks out from behind the sand.
"No fire and no giant monsters!" the samurai kid says to both Gaara and Yui who just stand there looking at him
"Those aren't the rules" Gaara answers the kid as his giant monster turns to sand and Yui walks up to the kids, as she makes her sword disappear
"New rules, we can use everything but giant monsters and giant fire swords because everyone else can do everything else" the same kid answers Gaara, as the rest of the kids nod at his words.
"Okay," Yui says to the kid, making Gaara turn to look at her in surprise.
"Hey what you doing," Klein says to me as he looks at the group of kids playing in the dessert
"You know watching the kids play, and make sure they don't get into trouble while their parents are at work" I answer Klein as we look at the kids throwing wind, shooting fireballs, and somehow moving at a ridiculous speed.
"Excuse me for a sec' I say to Klein as I stop Yui from cutting off a kid's head with her sword, she doesn't bother saying anything she just looks at me and lowers her head, before chasing after the kid with her hands made into a pair of fists.
"Listen Kirito, a bunch of us were talking and we think we should start training the kids and all of our lower-level fighters," Klein says to me as we look at the somewhat peaceful sight in front of us
"I know what you mean, eventually whoever attacked the sand village is going to find us and we won't be able to negotiate with them"
"So how are you guys going to train the lower levels?" I ask him
"That's just the thing, we're not" Klein answers me and I immediately understand what he means.
I turn to look at him and I realize that he's being completely serious.
"No, that's too dangerous. We don't have to do that anymore" I say to my old friend
'That's just the thing Kirito, we do." Klein says to me with an expression that says he has seen things no one else should
"What I'm about to tell you stays between us and that girl listening to our conversation," Klein says as he points at the blond sand ninja hiding behind the door.
"The exploration team you were apart of wasn't the only one sent out."
"Yours was just a diplomatic party, the others were scouts. The main reason why the sand villagers were allowed into Aincrad wasn't just because of our peace treaty"
"More refugees are coming. Kirito, our scouts found entire villages being whipped out, those were the lucky ones"
"There are places where experiments were or are being conducted on people and from what the other scouting teams say. It's better just to leave this hellish place and never come back"
Klein finishes explaining to me as he sends me the images of everything he talked about through private messaging, by our help screens.
"So what is this training method you guys were talking about?" Temari asks us
"Going up the mountain" I answer her
"You probably noticed how we players seem to look at each other and treat some people with a little respect than everyone else."
"You see going up the mountain means challenging the floor bosses, each one of them is stronger than the last, but it's not just that the challengers have to kill, cook and do everything by themselves" Klein begins to explain to Temari
"The more floor bosses you beat, the stronger and more capable you are, but it's because the people on the first floor are inexperienced that most of the deaths happen on the first five floors" I finish Kleins explanation
"A method of separating those who can from those who can't all the while teaching them to both works together and deal with things on their own":
"I'll tell the elders about it," Temari says to us before vanishing