Mito
She couldn't say she agreed with Kirito's method of drawing Shivata out, but in the end, it worked.
After leaving the bath, Argo left the village of Shiyuya while Koharu and Asuna sought out the rest of their party. They only found Kirito and Mito resting by a tree; Jaymes is currently outside the village, following up on a piece of information Argo gave him on her arrival. In the meantime, the quartet discussed the best course of action for tonight, in which ALS will skip out on the New Year's Eve celebration and countdown to take on the floor boss by themselves.
The two guilds are currently in Mananarena, a village in the center of the floor not far from Shiyuya and on the other side of the underground passage they cleared days ago. The celebration will happen back in Karluin late in the evening, but Kibaou and ALS will either depart the party early or leave Mananarena and go straight to the labyrinth tower to take on the gigantic golem Kirito spoke of as the floor boss in the beta.
It's unlikely ALS has done any of the boss quests. This time, the Elf War Campaign did not relinquish any information on the boss; to Mito's knowledge, only Argo has gone through them and still is. There must be a reason Kibaou is willing to risk lives with no information other than the beta's to get ahead of the rest of the frontline, but that's not the most bothersome part. If ALS heads to the dungeon, Morte and his PK group will have succeeded in their plans. Kirito, Asuna, and Koharu couldn't allow that.
One option was leaking the news to DKB, which would mean canceling the party. The party is a proposal by the more peaceful members of ALS and DKB, like Shivata and Hafner, while trying to mend relations between the groups. Mito didn't believe they should leak the news, for if Morte's group are looking to cause a greater division between the guilds, disrupting the party by any means would aid in their endeavor.
The second option stems from a split of opinions. Kirito and Koharu believe that the party planner on ALS' side may be using their role as a front. Mito and Asuna believe that the moderate faction of ALS doesn't know of the raid plan and might be willing to talk to them and figure things out. But with no idea who's in that group, the four decide to use DKB to draw them out.
Arriving in the spiraling mining town of Mananarena, Mito and her party found DKB's top brass in a restaurant. Shivata, a tall, dark-haired guy, stood at the bar, ordering from the NPC server, separate from Lind and the others. Kirito sent him a quick message, and once Shivata saw them, he spoke to the other blues and headed out of the restaurant to the party's location at the adjacent building. However, he kept going up the spiral path for a couple of hundred feet until they entered an empty cabin.
That's where Mito is now. Just as Asuna shuts the door, a rageful voice echoes in the dark cabin interior from the figure leaning against the wall. "What are you playing at?"
"What kind of message did you send?" Asuna questions Kirito.
"Uh... I just asked which ALS member had been involved in planning the countdown party with them..."
"And that's why he's so angry? You didn't put anything else especially insulting in there?"
"I-I didn't! I think."
Mito sighs as she looks apologetically at Shivata, whose rage disappears as his brow turns from a V to a reverse V. "You...you didn't contact me because you knew about me and my partner?"
She shakes her head. "We don't know anything about a partner of yours. We wanted to ask about whoever in the ALS planned this party with you." Shivata's response is a look of guilt. He holds his hand over his mouth, looks around as if he said something he shouldn't have, and then starts clearing his throat. Mito has to hold back a knowing smirk.
Based on how he said "partner," it doesn't seem like it has the same connotation as when Jaymes or Koharu call each other partners. Well, almost not the same. She's teased them enough to know they're not romantically inclined to each other (yet, give it some time), but they care for each other like lovers. But Shivata...
"Oh-ho," Asuna softly gloats as she glances at Mito, possibly coming to the same conclusion. She steps past Kirito and reveals her face. "It's all right, Shivata. We just want to know how the party was put together. If you simply tell us that, we won't pry into anything else, and we won't tell anyone what we learned here."
He calms a bit, but he still has his suspicions. "How can I be sure of that?"
"We just want the party to happen as it was planned. Now, I'm just guessing, but...have you perhaps received a foreboding message from the planner on the ALS side?"
"H-how did you know?"
Asuna takes another step forward. "We'll help you solve the problem. So will you tell us in more detail? With your ALS counterpart if possible."
"...You're certain you'll keep our secrets?"
"Positive," Koharu says, a smile on her hooded features. "I know you and my partner are on good terms, so on that, I promise we'll say nothing to anyone...besides him, of course." Her smile is effective on Shivata, who opens his window and starts typing. Meanwhile, the girls look at each other, all bearing knowing expressions, while Kirito looks dumbfounded.
"What in the world just happened?"
"You really didn't catch on?"
"You'll find out soon."
"Jaymes will never believe this."
Three minutes later, a newcomer arrives in the cabin. A player completely in heavy metal armor from head to toe, wrapped by a green cloak, a mace slung across their shoulder, the helm's visor covering their face. Mito assumed Shivata's "partner" would be female, but without being able to see who was under the armor, it could be male or female. But one thing is sure; if this were the man accompanying Morte, he would have used that mace immediately. Mito can't see their face, but the person's stance indicates confusion as they look around the room before lingering on, most surprisingly, Koharu.
"K-Koharu? Why are you here? What's this about, Shiba?"
The helm distorts the voice, but the nickname confirms that Shivata and his partner are closer than friends. Shivata vaguely supports this himself as he says, "Sorry for calling you out like this. But they said they're going to help with the party. Plus...I think the girls' figured it out."
The person in the armor focuses on Koharu again. "Really? How could you tell?"
Koharu giggles. "I do have a partner of my own, you know. Um, not like that, but you get the idea... Plus Shivata reacted too easily and made it obvious."
"...I told you, you let too much show on your face, Shiba."
"I-I can't help it. The NerveGear just takes your emotions and puts them out there."
"Then you ought to wear a face-covering helmet, too."
"C-come on, you know I can't."
On one side of Mito, Kirito asks Asuna what's going on, though it's obvious. On the other side, Koharu steps forward to the person in armor. "Liten, we don't mean any harm, and we did not mean to...expose this. We can't wait for tonight's party, but there's a problem on ALS's side. We want to help. Do you know more about it?"
"...I do owe you on, Koharu. Okay." The armored person lifts their right hand and opens their window. Moments later, their helmet is removed from their equipment mannequin and avatar, revealing orange hair, bangs cut above the brow, and a face with girlish features. "We believe you. I... I already have a lot of respect for you, Koharu, and you too, Asuna. Plus, Shiba and I put a lot of work into this party, and we want it to succeed."
Shivata's passionate expression told the rest of the story. Somehow, a girl from ALS and a boy from DKB were more than strangers, partners, or party members.
"What the hell?" Kirito exclaims, holding his head in confusion.
Everyone seated in chairs, Koharu explains how she and Liten met two days ago in the catacombs before going to Asuna's rescue. This encounter, along with another girl named Mater, was omitted from the original tale, which Koharu apologized for. The dagger user also assured Liten that Mater had safely escaped the dungeon, though it was through means of her own.
What followed is the obvious question: a girl in ALS' ranks. Mito and the other girls allow Kirito to do the questioning. "So... Liten. How long have you been in the ALS?"
"December twenty-second."
"So the day after the fourth floor was opened. Did you enlist, or..."
"I was scouted. Because of this." Liten gestures to her armor, which fits the build for a tank. But given its look, the steel plates don't look like something dropped, looted, or bought from NPCs on the fourth floor. If Mito had to guess, Liten had her armor special-made by a crafter, but to commission a complete set of armor is complicated when thinking about the materials needed for it. Mining iron ores with a pickaxe from the walls of caves and off boulders, turning ores into planks or ingots (two ores per plank, six per ingot). Those iron ingots, in turn, need to be smelted into steel ingots, with four iron ingots making one steel ingot.
And if Mito's math is correct (she was a slightly better student than Asuna despite her hobbies), a full set of steel armor requires sixty steel ingots. Sixty times four times six is a whopping one thousand four hundred and forty ores needed to start the process.
"This armor was player made. Of course, I didn't make it myself."
"R-really? Which means you mined out a thousand plus iron ores? How long did that take you, if you don't mind me asking?"
Liten grins and shakes her head. "You don't have to be so polite with me, Kirito. You're my senior among the advanced group."
"Er, right." He looks to Shivata, who nods his head while bearing some unknown emotion on his face.
"Yeah, that's fine. You and I are on pretty equal terms, so it would feel weird for you to act formal around Liccha...around Liten."
"W-well, if you insist... So about the topic at hand."
Liten tightens her lips momentarily. "Well, this is something I only told Shiba, so I'd appreciate it if you kept it between us."
"Of course, as promised," Koharu intervenes. "It won't go outside this party, at the very least." Meaning Jaymes, wherever he is, will know, but Liten knows him. Satisfied, Liten begins her explanation.
"It was about a month ago that I left the Town of Beginnings. Of course, it was my first time playing a VRMMO, but I'd tried online games before, so I didn't want to just wait around in town for someone else to beat the game. I wanted to join the fight and help out. It was a late start compared to Shiba and Asuna, but I had chosen the Heavy Armor skill just after the game started, and it was a huge task to put together my armor."
"So you were always planning to be a tank?" Asuna asks.
"Yes. I usually played a defensive role in the other games, too. I hunted the boars and such outside the Town of Beginnings, and when I finally got a store-made Copper Mail, I thought I could finally proceed upward. But then I found that no parties would accept me. I know it's not something I can help, but I kept hearing that they couldn't trust a woman to be a tank."
"Even though it has nothing to do with your fighting abilities," adds an annoyed Asuna.
"I should have told them that...but instead, I got very stubborn and said I'd make the front lines as a solo tank and started mining ores for my armor and grinding levels."
"I know tanks have high strength and thus high carrying capacity, but mining a thousand ores is still incredible work," says an impressed Kirito.
Shivata immediately whispers something to Liten, probably to hold back if there's something she doesn't want to mention, but she shakes her head and continues. "Yes, I gathered all the ores to make this armor myself. As you said, I had to mine at least fifteen hundred iron ores. But...it's not something to be proud of at all."
"What do you mean?" Asuna asks in a calm, reassuring tone.
"I was grinding levels near the town of Marome on the second floor, I found a vein of ore in a little valley, so I switched my mace for a pickax and started chipping away like usual. Normally I would get seven or eight, and that would be it, but this spot just kept producing and producing without running out. At first, I just thought I had found a lucky spot and was very excited, but eventually, it got scary…By the time I had pulled out over a hundred, I finally figured it out. That it was…"
"An infinite bug?" Kirito asks, to which Liten confirms with a nod.
Seeing Koharu and Asuna's confusion, Mito explains it to them. "You know how resources in SAO are finite. An infinite bug is an error in the system that continuously produces monsters or items. It's an abnormality, so it should be fixed by the developers or whoever oversees the game."
"Oooh...so you could just keep mining the same vein for ores as long as you wanted. It's just like winning the lottery or something."
Everyone but Asuna and Koharu makes a face. Shivata counters Asuna by saying, "It's not that simple, Asuna. Taking advantage of such a bug is called glitching, and whether or not you take advantage of it in a single-player game is up to you. But in an MMO, if the management finds out about it, they can roll back your status or even ban you."
"So Liten…didn't give up on it? I mean, you have the armor, after all…"
"Yes...I was conflicted, but I couldn't stop myself. With an infinite supply of iron ore, I could skip right past iron armor and go to steel. It was all I could think about."
"I don't blame you. If I found a spot like that, I'd go crazy mining it." Kirito reassures.
"I'd do it too," replies Shivata with some competitiveness.
Mito nods in agreement. "I'll admit I would continue mining myself...but I can assume the bug no longer exists?"
Liten nods. "I mined it nonstop for about thirty minutes until, suddenly, the rock texture seemed to fail. It came back to normal right away, but no ores dropped from it anymore."
"So the devs noticed the bug and fixed it? I mean, if there even are any devs..."
"Well, the bug was fixed, so what other possibility is there?"
"But none of the Argus staff can tamper with the SAO server now, right? The only person with administrator privileges is Akihiko Kayaba..."
'Then Kayaba fixed it."
"Good point," Mito interrupts the boys, returning to the topic. "So you made your armor from the ores you mined...but that's a lot of ores to carry, even for a tank. You transported all that by yourself?"
"No, I didn't transport it all myself. In fact, even after I brought it to the village, it wouldn't all fit into the storage at the inn." Inn rooms came with a chest for external storage, but the storage size depended on how luxurious the inn was. Budget inns have smaller sizes, so while the chest would be suitable for extra gear, food, or small items, hundreds of ores would be impractical to store.
"In that case, what if you brought a portable forge to the mining spot and melted them all down? You can carry way more as ingots. And if that wasn't possible, you could go straight to an NPC smith to do the job."
Asuna makes a good point, but Kirito flat-out counters her. "Unfortunately, you can only use a portable forger to craft gear and upgrade it. Ingots have to be cast at a large, fixed forge. You could take them to a blacksmith, but that could lead to trouble if other players saw you. A combat-centric player hauling in tons of ore to melt down is practically advertising that there's a huge stack of it outside town."
"I was afraid of that, too. It was right around the time of the big fuss about the upgrade scam on the second floor, so I was worried about dangerous people following me around."
"Licchan," Shivata says in concern, "there was a lot of stuff that went on behind the scenes with that scam, and I can't go into specifics, but the people who did it weren't just plain bad people. They apologized to the victims and compensated them for the loss, so there are no bad guys anymore."
"Oh...thanks for letting me know, Shiba."
Mito almost gags at the affection emanating from Shivata and Liten, but holds it in while mentally patting Shivata on the shoulder. He doesn't know (or doesn't want Liten to know) that there are still bad people in SAO, people far worse than what she heard of the Legend Braves. The PK gang right now is the greatest threat to Sword Art Online, but to reveal that right now may be more harmful than good.
"Then...how did you move the ore?" Kirito asks though Mito detects something strange in his voice.
"Ah…well, before the physical transportation even entered into it, I wasn't sure if I should use the ore. As a tank, I was desperate for it, but it was obviously an infinite supply bug…so I wasn't sure if I should use armor I got through a glitch because I was afraid of what would happen if I got banned…So I decided to ask a friend who was helping repair my gear on the first floor for advice."
"Repair…? So your friend was a blacksmith?"
"Yes. She's not really a smith—not with her own shop—she just was putting a bit of work into the weapon- and armor-crafting skills. We got along, both being girls, and so I started asking her for help with maintenance and crafting a bit."
"Oooh, a female blacksmith…"
"Wait," Koharu, who's been quiet for so long, perks up. "You know Lisbeth?"
Liten raises her eyebrows. "You know Lisbeth?"
"Yes, Jaymes and I met her on the fourth floor. She performed maintainence on our gear before we started questing there. She... She helped make your armor?"
"Yes. I sent her a friend message about the ores, and she immediately replied. She hadn't had much MMO experience before SAO, but she was absolutely decisive. She said I shouldn't hesitate, that the most important thing in this world was to survive, then to beat the game, in that order, so you should use whatever bugs you need to in order to get stronger. And that even if I got banned, it would mean getting out of here, so I shouldn't be afraid in the least…I realized it was totally true, so I asked her to help me carry the ore, and we got the blacksmith at Marome to turn all of them into steel ingots without being detected by any other players."
"So it wasn't an NPC that made your armor, but a friend of yours?" Asuna inquires.
"Yes! It was just barely within her skill level, and she said I should pay an NPC for it, but I insisted she try…She failed over and over, turning it back to ingots, then pounded away again, throughout the night, until she had made me all five pieces: torso, legs, gauntlets, boots, and helm."
Koharu, seeing Liten's smile, drops her head. "Wow...she is incredible. No wonder she was confident she could do the same again." Mito narrows her eyes as a slight frown engages on Koharu's face. It was so slight that it would be missed if one weren't watching her.