Sword Art Online

After The Incident

Chapter 45 – Ares and Mercuria

~The mini boss room, Klein's POV~

As I had suspected, Yui didn't find a cure against my poison finishing blow skill, because frankly, there is none. It's one of the most powerful poison based sword skills I know of, and until now, I had had yet to find a situation I found it necessary to use it.

And she didn't manage to cure it in time. As her final hp depleted, she left out a scream, and we watched in victory as her avatar sent a rain of glass out on the battlefield, and the light illuminating the stones in the walls and the room, disappeared with her avatar.

We slayed her final pixies and slowly collapsed to the ground in tiredness.

"Whew… That was tough…" Lizbeth mumbled silently, leaning against her hammer.

I was just lying on the ground, exhausted, my breath deep and irregular.

"Yeah… No joke…" I mumbled, a drop of sweat running down my face "And that was just the miniboss… Kazuto and Asuna are both waiting for us, deeper inside"

"Nah, no need to worry" Kyouji chuckled as he wiped a bit of sweat off of his forehead "We can beat those two, no sweat"

"Dude, you're literally sweating from the mini boss" Lis said with a raised eyebrow "What makes you think the main boss will be any different?"

"Touché"

Eventually, we finally managed to catch our breath, and eventually made our way past the throne in the room, and moved towards the back, where a huge gate had appeared, the visage of rising fire breathing dragons having been carved into the thick metal.

"Hmph. Showoff" I mumbled silently "Alright, so this is the boss room. Everyone ready?"

"Barely able to catch our breath, and already facing the last bosses?" Scilica mumbled with a sigh "Pina, make sure to cast as much support magic as you can!"

Pina made a little cry and nuzzled Scilica's cheek before landing on her shoulder and readying her tiny claws.

"You're lucky to have a partner like that, Scilica" Kyouji said with a chuckle as he reached out to pet Pina's head.

Pina growled a bit and snapped at his fingers. I guess she didn't completely trust him yet.

"Pina! That's not nice!" Scilica scolded her, making Pina's head and wings droop in shame.

"No it's okay Scilica. I understand why she don't trust me yet"

As much as he told her that everything was okay, he really seemed to be down about the whole thing. I understood why Pina was so suspicious though. You don't go from kidnapping someone, to playing online games with them in two days' time. As much as the others had seemed to grow a liking to him, I knew that deep down, we still found reasons to find him suspicious.

"Let's just get this over with."

I finally said these last words and pushed open the massive gate, before stepping into the darkness.

~Two hours earlier, on the hills surrounding the cottage. Kazuto's POV~

A tingle ran up my spine, and a breath I hadn't realized I had been holding, escaped my mouth in a sigh as a wind ran over the area, thoroughly chilling me and my partner as we sat in the tall grass besides one another. Asuna shivered a little, and I smiled as I wrapped an arm around her shoulder, shielding her from the cold breeze. In response, she hummed softly and leaned her head onto my shoulder.

The sun was currently setting over the beautiful landscapes of floor 26, the floor of Aincrad that meant most to me in the entire game. Of course, this was only a replica, but Asuna didn't seem to mind since she hadn't exactly voiced out any complaints.

Somewhere in the distance, Yui was flying around excitedly, making sure to put the flying ability I had implemented into the system to good use. Apparently, Yui was very excited to fight the others, being the mini boss and all. At first I thought that it was just because she had taken a liking to fighting, but after talking with her I realized it was because she had never had to face them before, herself.

It almost felt like one of those which you call "A proud dad moment". I was about to watch my daughter go into her first battle as a mini-boss, and face off with my friends. It gave me a strange feeling of pride, one I was not used to.

"It's been one hell of a few years huh?" Asuna suddenly mumbled, and I looked over at her, surprised.

"What makes you think about that all of a sudden?"

"This sunset, the serenity of the surroundings…" Asuna mumbled, an insecure frown running over her features "It makes me think to enjoy them while we still can…"

"What do you mean, Asuna?"

I frowned quietly from hearing her say these words. How long had she been thinking like that? And did she often think about everything we had been through? It worried me a little.

"Well, it's just…" She mumbled, sighing as she lifted her head off my shoulder "We've been through so much together.. You and I, and our friends…"

I nodded quietly and waited for her to continue.

"I just feel…" She mumbled, hesitating "That we've made enemies that we can't escape from"

I frowned quietly. I did not understand at all.

"I mean, take The Laughing Coffin for example" She mumbled softly "We both faced them in battle before… Both of us have their blood on our hands… We killed people, Kazuto…"

I closed my eyes and nodded again. There was nothing else I could do at this point.

"I just think, with all this going on…" I widened my eyes as I realized a tear was appearing in the corner of her eye "I'm just afraid that we'll have to live in fear for the rest of our lives. That whenever we think we have a peaceful moment, it will be swooped away by some other crazy lunatic who will want revenge for something we did. Because we made enemies with the wrong people…"

I let go of her shoulder and instead took her hand in my own, squeezing tightly as I reached over and forced her to look at me. She looked at me, surprised by my sudden forcefulness, before I kissed her deeply, a shake running through her body before she settled into it, and began leaning into me as well.

After a short while I pulled away from her and leaned my forehead against hers, while staring deeply into her eyes.

"Listen to me Asuna." I mumbled as I stared into her eyes with a serious expression "I might be the one who usually worries about this kind of stuff, but I promise you, I PROMISE you, whoever comes; we'll be able to get through it together."

"Kazuto, that's not what I'm worried about!" She teared up even more and closed her eyes "I know we can take on anything as long as we're together… But our past will continue to haunt us!"

I frowned quietly and growled from frustration. It was true, there was a possibility that our old enemies would continue to hunt us down, time after time.

"Do you remember my dream, Kazuto?"

I nodded silently. This was her most important dream. She wanted to bring Yui into the real world, and eventually move into the country, getting to have an actual family together, just the three of us. Away from our past, away from everything. Maybe even from games and from our friends. It didn't matter as long as the three of us were together.

"Of course I do" I mumbled squeezing her hand again "What does that have to do with this though?"

"Imagine if we succeed in making that dream a reality" She mumbled softly "If our enemies keeps coming back… What kind of life would that be for Yui? How can you grow up through that!?"

She looked away from me as her tears began to trail down her cheeks, but before she could panic, I forced her to look at me again.

"Asuna, you're worrying about a situation that will happen maybe tens of years in the future!" I said, a little louder than I had wanted "You can't walk around and worry about it so much. You will go crazy eventually! I almost did!"

She looked at me shocked. I guess I had yelled even louder in the end. The tears had stopped rolling down her face, but was still quickly gathering in the corners of her eyes, so I quickly kissed them away, and wiped the tearstains with my thumbs.

"Asuna, I swear to whatever higher entity that might be out there…" I mumbled softly, trying to sound as genuine as possible without yelling at her again "I will always, ALWAYS, be there to protect you and Yui. And I swear, whoever wants to hurt you, will come to regret that they ever crossed swords with me. Do you understand?"

Her shocked expression softened and she nodded softly. A breeze picked up her hair, along with the beautiful flower petals flying up around us.

"Sorry, I just…" She mumbled as she leaned into my hand "I just feel like we've been through hell…"

"I know Asuna, of course I know" I quickly wrapped my arms around her body and squeezed her in a hug "I'll always be there for you, okay?"

"Okay…"

~Present moment, the boss room. Kyouji's POV~

I was pretty sure that I was more nervous than many of the people that were currently present in the boss room. They didn't have anything to prove, after all. But this final boss encounter would finally let me prove to Shino, that I was finally strong enough to protect her, from anyone, and anything.

"Hey, Kyouji?" I blushed a little as I realized Shino had taken my hand from behind "You okay? You've grown so silent all of a sudden"

"Yeah, I'm fine" I nodded a bit and smiled back at her "I guess I have a bit of a rivalry with Kirito… This time, I can finally prove I'm stronger than him"

"Kyouji, you know I already told you…" She looked up at me worried as she pulled me aside "You don't have to prove yourself to me…"

I blushed a little. Once again, she saw right through me. I hated when she did that. It pretty much secured her victory in whatever childish banter we were in.

"S-Sinon, I need to do this…" I mumbled, a frown forming on my brows "I don't only want to prove myself to you, but… I also want to prove myself to… Well, myself"

"Huh?" She frowned silently, apparently not understanding "I'm not sure I follow…"

"Well, I know I'm strong. I want to protect you. So, to prove that I'm strong enough, I need to win this…"

"That literally sound like every action main hero ever" She said with a giggle before shaking her head and letting go of my hand "If you're sure. Just don't do anything reckless okay?"

I nodded quietly and flashed her a confident smile, before she drew an arrow and readied it on her bow. We had completely forgotten that we had already stepped into the boss room, and I widened my eyes when I heard two sets of footsteps approaching.

"Here they come, guys!" Agil said as he drew his axe "Get ready for anything!"

I frowned quietly and drew my rapier. Having transferred my stats from GGO, I was still one of the fastest players around, so I trusted my rapier to at least do some damage to whatever Kirito and Asuna would turn into or summon.

Still, I was a bit nervous. But having Shino by my side definitely helped. Especially when she, when everyone didn't pay attention to us, leaned up and kissed my cheek softly, making me explode in red.

"For good luck" She said with a smile.

I blushed quietly and parted my lips to reply, but suddenly two shadows emerged from the darkness, and everyone stood on alert as they drew their weapons. Soon the two shadows stepped into the light. It was Kirito and Asuna, both wearing confident smiles as they held each other's hand. But they seemed different somehow.

They were both taller and seemed more mature in their facial features. Kazuto had a more serious look on his face and a few stubbles here and there, a wicked dark glow in his eyes as he glared us down. His hair had also grown considerably, reaching down to his shoulders and easily covering one of his glowing wicke eyes.

Asuna had also grown quite a bit, her legs a bit longer and god forbid I say this in front of Shino, but her chest was also a bit bigger and more developed than what it had been. She had also had colored a flame red color into most of the front of her hair.

"Welcome adventurers" Kirito said with a confident smirk "Good work on passing our daughter, the pixie queen. You must be very powerful indeed"

"Geez, what a showoff" Klein said with a wave of his hand "Why don't you stop being all dramatic so we can start fighting?"

Kirito had an annoyed expression as he glared at Klein.

"No, that would force me to go off script!" He hushed Klein before continuing "Ahem, but your journey stops here! Me and my empress will take you all down!"

"That's right!" Asuna nodded, despite having a blush on her cheeks "Prepare to face your downfall, pitiful mortals! Oh the fun I will have with torturing you!"

A wicked smile crept up on both of their faces before they jumped backwards and landed on each their own huge throne in the back of the boss room. Asuna raised her left hand, and armor began materializing over them, while before there had only been their normal everyday clothes.

Kirito's armor was jet black, just like his hair, with red streaks and patterns all over it, and he held his helmet under his left arm while drawing his two swords, the trusted Dark Repulser and Elucidator.

Asuna, while drawing her own rapier, The Lambent Light, a white armor, the same as Kirito's, materialized around her, having blue streaks and textures instead of red like Kirito's.

As I drew my own rapier and was about to dash forward for attack, several dark rays of light suddenly appeared on the ground around circles which could resemble something like teleport circles, and out of them crawled some of the most realistic skeleton and decaying zombie monsters I had ever seen. Each of the minions carried a sword or axe along with a metal shield, which was either rotten or covered with green moss or algae.

Not only that, but each of the minions bore a set of wings on their backs, much resembling the pixies Yui had used against us, but these wings were either visibly broken, or decaying from the inside, with see-through holes in them

"Damn, so not only Yui can summon minions huh?" I mumbled silently "What's wrong Kirito!? Too afraid to face us without an army!?"

"Silence mortal! You shall face my undead army of fairy corpses!" Kirito shouted in response to my taunt "You are now facing the rulers of this underground cave!"

Their names suddenly appeared in the air above them with great extravagance, and I frowned once I saw them.

"Corrupted King and Queen: Ares and Mercuria!"

A/N

Hey guys, so I finally updated again! Hope you guys didn't get too anxious from excitement xD

Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed this month's chapter. I don't quite know about the quality of this, but it is what it is when you're hit with writer's block.

So, thank you for reading my stories, and keep reading!