The clang of metal rang through the air, stirring those nearby who hadn't yet awakened. Awareness was missing entirely on one individual who woke to the sound. Eyelids hot and heavy from the sleep and brightness above, the lone individual instinctively raised a hand over their closed eyes and carefully opened them. Seeing a small, round hand above their eyes blocking out the sun above, this person felt confused.

The person pushed their self up to their butt and yawned, rubbing the sleep from their eyes. It took a minute to be able to move from the spot they woke up. As soon as they were able to get up and move, they stumbled to their feet, only to find that it was difficult to walk. There was a lack of balance, the feet felt incredibly unstable, and they ended up falling back on their butt. There was something between their skin and the ground, so it didn't feel too rough when they fell on their butt frequently.

It ended up taking quite a while to get stable on their feet. It were as if they didn't know how to move their body at all. There were many sounds the person didn't recognize around either. Eventually, something made them frightened. A person approached them, and not recognizing they were the same, they stumbled back afraid.

"Who are you?"

The person didn't understand the words.

"What are you doing here? You could get attacked this far from the village..."

The person wore a worried expression and the approaching individual moved closer slowly, and made contact gently. Like they were approaching an injured animal. The timid lone person accepted the contact, but trembled at the feeling of the touch.

"You're...will you let me carry you?"

The villager calmly went about picking up the lone person in a princess carry, taking them back to the village. It was interesting to see so many things along the way. Several animals, a great variety of lush trees, a town that had several large and small buildings, and a farm field in the distance. Some of those things felt somehow familiar, but in the end the lone person didn't know how to speak or any of the words the voices said.

"My lord, I found this child out in the direction of the village of the demon tree. They haven't said a word, have strange black hair so they might be one of those..."

"A lost child of Vector...thank you for bringing the child here. Please, return to your duties."

The child wore a more confused expression as they were looking up from the ground on unsteady feet at the tall man in front of them. The gentle person was gone before they knew it and they were alone with the taller person who was less gentle looking somehow.

"Well, let's get you acquainted with someone closer to your age first. And we'll have to get you cleaned up. Need to find out whether you're a boy or girl too. There's much work to be done to find the identity of a lost one."

The lord at first made the child unnerved, afraid even, but the whimsical and cheerful voice made them rethink the sounds they were hearing and the character of the person.

"Papa~ why was the guard captain back so soon?"

A girl with sparkling silver hair appeared, a genuinely curious expression on her face.

"Excellent timing. Would you mind helping me find out some information on this lost child?"

The girl shrugged.

"Quinella, please help with this. Your duties to the church and studying the sacred arts are less important than taking care of someone who is lost and scared. Remember that this is one of your duties while apprenticing with the church."

She nodded. She stared at the lost child and pinched her nose. She gave an expression that said she didn't want to be anywhere near them.

"So...stinky..."

"Could you help this child get cleaned up? I'll check with the weaver if they have some better clothes for the child to wear, otherwise they might have to wear spare clothes from the church."

Quinella nodded.

"I'll do it, but please return fast."

Her father nodded in return and hurried out to the middle of the town, past the well and the lost child's eyes went from following his movements to looking at the new girl around their size.

"Come on, let's get you cleaned up before my nose falls off."

She pulled the child along gently and they found their way to a room connected to the back of the building, the church and she grabbed the bucket. She looked at the lost child and frowned.

"Maybe I should use..."

She then spoke words in a language which struck a deeper familiarity to the the child.

[By the power of the goddess Stacia, channel through me and create a bind which will hold my target in place for three minutes.]

The lost child found their self unable to move even a little from where they stood. Quinella nodded with a happy smile.

"It worked! All that studying sure is paying off~ I'll be back shortly."

In a much better mood, she skipped away with the empty bucket and returned before the binding spell fell off. She looked more closely at the child and pinched her nose but stopping herself because it would just be more convenient to clean the child instead of needing to pinch her nose the whole time. It took her about twenty minutes to wipe down the body which had neither male or female identification where she knew one should be. No closer to figuring out the identity of the person in front of her. The face was cute though when clean, and the lightly wavy long hair was similar to hers. The colour of the hair was just different.

[Wh-who...?]

The lost child mustered up that sound from their mouth and Quinella stumbled back in surprise. She noticed that the voice of the child was accompanied by the glow emanated by those who spoke sacred arts. Did the child only speak in the language of the goddess, she thought?

"Wh-whoa...that caught me by surprise..."

She got up close again. She decided she needed to do another command. She made a shape with her fingertip and it revealed to her information on where she made the shape. The information she saw in the status for the person was filled with a lot of question marks. Again, no new information. She was stumped.

"Quinella~"

She responded to the sound of her father's raised voice.

"Back here papa~"

He hurried there and found them in the expected state. The lost child naked and Quinella as curious as ever. He was proud of that curiosity. She was achieving so much with researching sacred arts. Sometimes she did reckless things with what she learned however, so sometimes she forgot her common sense.

"I suppose no new information on this lost child of Vector?"

Quinella nodded.

"This one isn't a boy or girl. The only thing I can think of is that it tried to speak but I think it used the language of the goddess."

He furrowed his brow and sighed.

"That's even more confusing than being a lost one..."

She nodded.

"If you need me some more, let me know. I'm going to get back to my rounds now."

He let her go, hurriedly putting the long tunic he had retrieved over the child's head and pulled their head through cleanly. The child struggled against him when their head was covered, but as soon as their head was through again, the struggle stopped. Their curiosity at their attire got to them more than the confusion at having their vision blocked for a few seconds.

He gave the situation some thought, and ended up coming to the conclusion that he should start by trying to teach the child names, and what some things are. He knelt down and pointed to himself.

"Erulf."

The child tilted their head to the side in confusion, but nodded in understanding after a few seconds. Pointing at him, they repeated what he said.

"Erulf."

He smiled wide.

"You?"

He pointed to the child, ignoring that the child's voice was very much female, but many kids regardless of equipment they were born with tended to change voices a lot from that age to their adulthood, so it could just be the age of the child.

The child furrowed their brow, peering deep into their thoughts. After about a minute in silence between them, the child had a flash of memory glance across their eyes. They pointed to their self the same way and spoke a name which came out mumbled and confused. The child pouted and rubbed their cheeks, trying again. It took about ten tries before the child could get it out properly.

"Kirito!"

Erulf smiled, seeing the triumphant expression on the child's face.

"That's a wonderful name. It doesn't sound particularly male or female. It doesn't sound like a name from anywhere I've been before, so I wonder...is this child from...?"

Erulf shrugged and gave Kirito a comforting head pat. Kirito smiled cutely with a lot of happiness in the praise received.

"For the time being, I might just get Quinella to watch over you."

He summoned the status screen and noticed that the name and age had popped up as well as current conditions. Gender was listed as none. Kirito was nine years old, which was the same as Quinella. Kirito was on the verge of starvation, but otherwise health was good.

"Let's get you some food before you get a tummy ache."

He reached out his hand to Kirito and it was received with a loose grip. He led Kirito to the well in the middle of the town and then south to the building just south from there, one of the larger houses. They went inside and he sat Kirito down at a table in a dining room branched off from the entrance before going to the pantry and grabbing a piece of jerky and a tiny pouch of candied berries. He laid out the food on a small wooden bowl and encouraged Kirito to eat up.

"Please, eat."

Kirito just stared at the contents, gave Erulf a confused look and tilted their head to the side.

"Oh, you might not know it's food...this isn't as hard to explain at least, and you picked up on name quite quickly. Here, see this?"

Erulf pointed to the bowl.

"Bowl."

Kirito nodded in understanding. Erulf then pointed to the piece of jerky.

"Cattle jerky."

Kirito tilted their head to the side.

"Food, you eat this."

Erulf picked up the piece of jerky, pulled a tiny portion off and put it in his mouth. Followed by motioning for Kirito to do the same. Kirito followed his lead and began chewing at the extremely tough jerky. It was possible that she still had her baby teeth and was struggling with the chewiness of the jerky. She pouted with tears in her eyes, putting the jerky down.

"Aww, it's alright. It's alright. You did your best."

Erulf patted Kirito on the head a little more, moving on to the candied berries. Those at least weren't as tough. And they were small enough that a child Kirito's size could simply swallow the berries.

"Berries. Eat these."

Erulf pulled a berry out of the bowl and placed it in his mouth, chewing on it once before swallowing it. Kirito followed his lead and she perked up. The sweetness of the berries would make any child happy.

"I'll have the jerky and get you another small pouch of the berries. Eat the rest of what's in your bowl."

Kirito nodded and continued. They were piecing together the language in their head. They were adapting incredibly fast. Bits of language were breaking through, they were understanding what they were saying. They had to take things a little slower though, because their head hurt.

"Here."

Erulf poured the contents of another tiny pouch of candied berries in the bowl and knelt down face to face with Kirito.

"I will be right back. I will bring two others this time. Keep eating."

He left, and Kirito continued eating. It felt like he wasn't gone long at all because they had only eaten a couple more berries before he returned with two more children around Kirito's age. One was a boy, and one was a girl.

"Since our town operates on male and female roles, I need to figure out at least where you identify more so we can assign you work for the time being. Remi here is a girl, and she does housework and small handy jobs that don't require a lot of physical strength."

He motioned to the girl, and Kirito tilted their head to the side in confusion. They did understand what he was saying, but he said a lot so they wanted to keep up the idea that they were slowly learning. He sighed and slowly explained what he said in detail to Kirito and they nodded at the end in understanding. Then he introduced the boy.

Kirito noticed that the girl was shy and fidgeting, while the boy was restless, looking at the surroundings and unable to stand still for more than a few minutes.

"This is Ralph, he's training under his father as a guard. He practices swordplay, and helps with the farm fields and other work that requires a little more physical strength."

Kirito scrunched her face, thinking about what they heard and understood about the two kids in front of them. In the end, the response was a shrug.

"Thank you for coming, Remi and Ralph."

The two of them left, Remi giving a light bow before leaving while Ralph just left.

Kirito stood up and bowed to Remi. Remi giggled and ran out the door.

"Well, that could have been more conclusive...how about I take you to practice a few things?"

Kirito nodded and followed as Erulf led toward a group of boys of varying ages from a little younger to a few years older who were practicing swordsmanship together. Kirito smiled seeing the motions they were making.

"This seems to make you fairly excited. Here, let's have you match up with someone...does anyone want to practice with Kirito here?"

He got two of the boys to step up, both a little older than them.

"And here you go."

He handed Kirito a wooden sword, which was held naturally. As if Kirito had held a sword before. This led into Kirito lining up with the first practice partner. They set their swords to their sides, and Kirito mirrored as he bowed, drew the sword, and finally took a half step forward, readying a stance with the sword. Kirito used a different stance, one more natural and comfortable.

"Begin."

With that, Kirito's sparring partner dashed in swiftly and Kirito elegantly parried the incoming blade. Kirito was on the defense to start, parrying and countering when possible. Kirito was swift and skilled and measured, getting an understanding of how their opponent moved, and before the tenth slash, was able to disarm their opponent. The older boy gaped in surprise as Kirito leveled the tip of the wooden sword at his chest. The other boys stared in shock.

"How did that kid beat Itharn?!"

They became loud and Kirito put the sword down, covering their ears with their hands to muffle the shouting.

"Calm down boys, calm down...Kirito is a lost child of Vector, so please be patient. Kirito isn't a boy or girl so I'm checking now where Kirito's skills best lie. To be able to beat our best prospective swordsman among you, I think we might have our answer. But, I still want to check Kirito's abilities in other things before making the decision."

He knelt in front of Kirito again and gave some comfort in a gentle smile while putting his hands on their shoulders.

"You did amazing, Kirito. Now, let's go check in with the weaver. Let's check your ability in something a little less loud."

He took Kirito's hand and led them away from the group of boys.

"There's no way..."

"That kid must be a genius!"

"The kid's name is Kirito...anyway, Kirito is cute!"

The last kid to speak up among the boys was given glares.

Kirito and Erulf arrived at the weaver's workshop a few minutes after setting out from sparring with the boys. The inside of the workshop was a lot quieter than the outside, with cloth and leather muffling the movement of sound layered on the walls and all over the place.

"Welcome, my lord. You are back again so soon. This is the lost child of Vector?"

The head weaver looked over Kirito with much interest.

"This black hair is beautiful. I imagine tying it back making this child beautiful. Is this child a girl?"

Erulf shook his head.

"No, this child, Kirito, is neither male nor female so I'm finding out what Kirito is most skilled at. So far an extremely adept skill in swordsmanship has been displayed on the way here, now I would like you to assess Kirito's skill in weaving. I need to assign Kirito a sacred task, after all."

The weaver nodded in response. The weaver was an older woman, dull gray hair and wrinkles everywhere skin was visible. Including in the clothing she wore. She looked over Kirito and smiled.

"Indeed, I believe you will have very skilled hands. Let's have you demonstrate with a simple stitch."

She provided the materials and tools needed to do the simple stitch she requested and Kirito sniffed it, smiling lightly before moving their hands swiftly. Kirito found their self going until the material provided was gone, and a thin, loose underwear hung from the tools they still held.

Erulf and the head weaver stared in shock.

"I only asked you to do a simple stitch, not weave something so big. You were so fast though, deary. Your hands would be very appreciated here."

Kirito blushed and bowed in response.

Erulf sighed and waved before taking Kirito on to another location. The next was the town kitchen. Once again Kirito proved beyond the skill to be expected of a child. It was baffling. Finally, he decided to have Kirito try a couple of sacred arts.

"Well, it seems you are incredibly talented at everything I ask you to try. I can't decide on where your skills would fit the best. So for now, how about we try the last job you could work?"

Kirito nodded and Erulf turned away, facing the sky. He began speaking the words for the sacred art.

[By the power of the goddess Stacia, channel through me the strength to unleash a burst of fire a hundred steps above my location.]

As he finished speaking the sacred art into existence, he looked up and saw the satisfying result of his fireball shooting up into the sky and exploding into a harmless rain of fireworks. The twilight sky above them made it a little more difficult to see, but Kirito clapped in response to seeing the result of the sacred art.

"Now, let's have you try."

Kirito walked over to where Erulf had been standing when he launched the firework, raised a hand and silently mouthed the words for the command, but added more onto the end. The fireball which was summoned lacked temperature, but it was several times larger and seemed to melt off embers as it hovered above their hand. As Kirito closed their mouth, a smile brightening their face, the fireball launched much further up into the air and exploded into a burst of black and blue fireworks, a beautiful harmless rain of colours more visible in the twilight sky.

"...incredible. Your words weren't even audible to me...I might just have the job for you."

Kirito tilted their head once again in confusion.

"I'll have you research the sacred arts with Quinella. If you and her reach a snag in your research, you could always contribute to one of the other jobs for a day. I shouldn't add any more to your potential work, so I'll keep working for the church off of the list."

Kirito smiled and tilted their head again. Instead of the confused expression they were just being cute with that head tilt.

"It would certainly make things a little easier if you could speak a little more. Surprisingly we're able to get a good amount of communication through how you have been moving and expressing yourself."

Kirito frowned and took a deep breath, readying to try and speak. They remembered being able to say the lord's name and their own. Kirito tried reaching for the ability like with the reach for their name. Something overcame Kirito and as they reached an exhaustion overcame them.

"Ah, so she ended up doing something like this...I'm eager to have more company~"

Kirito trembled and began crying.

"S-s-sc-scared..."

Kirito was also feeling cold from hearing that voice which came from inside their own head. A sensation came over them and with a sudden lack of surrounding awareness pulled up the tunic to reveal a boyhood which hadn't been there before.

Erulf looked away, but not in time to not see it. He then knew that Kirito wasn't the same as the people around them.

"...help..."

Kirito passed out at that moment and as Erulf hurried Kirito into the church's additional sleeping quarters and laid him down. Kirito's mind faded out entirely.

"Siyu-san! Get away from the console now!"

The sound of one of the facility guards shouting loud enough to be heard from Kazu's location in the medicuboid. Confused as possible from suddenly waking up, Kazu heard the voice of the version of her from her nightmares ringing through her head. She also heard a familiar crying echoing through her head. She wanted to rub her head, try and force the headache and voices out.

"Kazu-chan! Are you okay?!"

Ela had a terrified expression on her face. There was something else mixed in there. Fury. She was the most angry Kazu had ever seen her and it made Kazu feel like all her meals and fluids she ingested over the last week were probably leaking out into the medicuboid.

"I'm so sorry about this Kazu-chan. That moron Siyu was a mole working with a Laughing Coffin member. You were only in for a few minutes, but in accelerated time that was easily 6 hours."

Kazu could remember all of it, and could hear the reverberating through her head as that male version of herself from her nightmares joined in and the crying from what she could unfortunately remember of the dive into the STL.

"No more ignoring me. I'm here. I'm not here to hurt you. I'm here to protect you."

Ela checked over Kazu's brain activity and she stared in horror as she noticed that too much of the brain was lit up. It were as if her whole brain was engaged in that moment and she could tell the fluctuations of the brain's movement were signifying clear, heated conversation between two people. In that short few minutes, Kazu had clearly developed symptoms of an identity disorder.

It might not have been an identity disorder though, it could have simply been that Kazu was experiencing extreme levels of dysphoria because of Siyu's interference. Ela didn't know, and no evidence was showing. She frantically went over Kazu's brain scan repeatedly. It wouldn't calm down.

Ela could hear the sound of two voices begin bickering in the augmented space around her, but there was no virtual avatar appearance making itself visible. She knew one of those voices belonged to Kazu. The other was hers but a little deeper and unrefined.

"You should have known something like this could happen! Why didn't you think of your dysphoria and the chance that you would come out male there?! And now you're reaping consequences! You're smarter than this!"

The male voice was aggressive and berating, full of expectation. Was it a conversation between a male conscience and her? Or was it another identity within her?

"You know Ela isn't the only one on the project! She said she can't control everyone and doesn't trust them, but you dove right in there not thinking about the potential someone scummy might mess with your perception! You need to be more cautious! Trust nobody but those who prove themselves to you!"

Kazu was crying. Before those statements, she was arguing back but at that point she was just crying and gradually folding into the fetal position. Ela needed to give Siyu a piece of her mind, but she was more concerned with Kazu's mental health.

"It's okay! It's my fault! I should have been more thorough. You trusted me, and I didn't follow through by having only trustworthy people on the team. I thought Siyu and Argo might have been friends, but I missed that Siyu was in a romantic relationship with a Laughing Coffin member. It's my fault..."

Ela admitting her fault in it struck her deep. That mistake might have been even worse had it developed more. She hated having to be so paranoid she would have to check deeply into every individual person, but as Kazu's voices calmed down, she realized aside Yanai, one who Seijirou definitely wanted on the team, nobody else was connected to crime but Siyu. Only Siyu had an interest in anyone related to crime. At least it was only the one. Ela was perplexed why Seijirou would keep Yanai on when she warned him before about Yanai. He was connected to Sugou Noboyuki after all, and was one of the heads of research for the human experimentation.

Ela wanted to remove Yanai from the project as well, and she hoped this would be enough leverage to convince Seijirou to remove him. She could say all she wanted about removing individuals from the project, but it was Seijirou's not hers. He had to make the final call. And for some reason, he trusted Yanai, or he had a plan regarding him. One or the other, either way it was dangerous to Kazu's health to let someone related to either Laughing Coffin or the human experimentation continue working on the project.

"If you're feeling a little better, please rest for a moment. I decelerated the STL project to .001 speed, so you should be able to go back in as if nothing happened. I need to deal with something first."

Kazu gave an affirmative mhm before Ela left to deal with Siyu. Ela marched out of the room and to the crowd where Siyu was detained by the on site security. She stared into Siyu's eyes and gave a disgusted expression.

"I hope they keep you in prison for the rest of your life."

Siyu spat in her face. Ela turned around to wipe the spit from her face with a tissue from her coat pocket, and turned around using a pin to make the tissue into a mask to cover Siyu's filthy mouth. She spoke against the filthy tissue with a totally misplaced anger at Kazu.

"That goody-goody ruined my life, ruined my boyfriend's life! It was just a game and she ruined our lives for playing it!"

Ela's fury simmered down a little but the menace in her voice didn't relent, only becoming more terrifying as she berated Siyu.

"You should realize your emotions are misplaced. Kazu only ever had good intentions. You call her a goody-goody sarcastically, but she really was. Your boyfriend really did commit murder. A murder there is still killing someone in real life. It was never "just a game". One life, snuffed out by your selfish boyfriend who wanted the thrill of fighting others. It went too far and he killed several people. Defending that even if you loved him is disgusting, and attacking the person who saved you and everyone else who was still trapped in there is irredeemable. If you can't understand that your boyfriend was wrong, then you need therapy."

Siyu thrashed, trying to get out of the hold of the security, who decided they weren't keeping her there any longer. Siyu was escorted out of the STL wing and the group who remained were all seething.

"I...apologize, Ela-san. I should have known..."

Ela walked up to Seijirou and mere inches from his face she continued her merciless onslaught brought on by her emotions.

"You had better have a damn good reason for keeping Yanai on the team against my recommendation. If you don't, then you had better hope your upper management take your side or I'll have you punished to the most severe extent I can. This is unacceptable. Kazu is suffering from either an identity disorder right now, or from extreme onset dysphoria and BOTH are absolute torture to someone not expecting it. And you, Yanai. If you do anything on this project to warrant punishment, I'm just escorting you in my vehicle straight to an abandoned prison island and you can suffer there until I have someone pick you up and take you to solitary confinement. I'm done with people betraying the expectations of the teams around them. Unacceptable. If you want me to be part of a team doing something to change the world so much, get people who can be trusted on it or you aren't worth my time anymore. This is my last warning to all of you."

The expressions on her face as she vocally let loose on them made everyone collectively feel like the end was near for them. Asuna ran up alongside Ela back to Kazu's medicuboid room and Yui ran to catch up to them, but Seijirou, Rinko, Yanai and the rest of the staff were sweating so profusely they might as well have just gotten out of a tub of water.

"That, is why you don't mess with work my mom is part of. Intentional sabotage is equal to the worst crime you could commit in her perspective. Just remember this. Now I need to go and try calm her down. I really hope you learned from this..."

Shii's words were a warning. That they need to learn or suffer consequences.

Ela agonized over Kazu's brain scan. It was definitely extreme onset dysphoria. Kazu's brain was going through a meltdown and she was nowhere near ready to go back in even if she thought she was ready.

"Kazu-chan, I'm going to have you rest in my vehicle for tonight to keep you safe. I'll have you accelerate while you're in there on my vehicle's private server so that you have ample time to recover. I'll join you in there soon to check on you. Going back in the STL right now will not work out. Your brain is in too dangerous a state to put you back in at the moment. I've given them all my final warning as far as having untrustworthy team members. I'm not risking you any further. If this has already caused you to have or further developed an identity disorder before it's over...I'm beyond sorry. I may never be able to make up for it...but I will do what I can."

Ela's words made Asuna, Yui and Shii feel better. She was no longer filled with the fury. Only the dread that Kazu suffered at the expense of a project she was working on.