Date posted: 10th August 2021

Sorry for the lateness, I was running an organ harvesting raider cult on some abandoned planet in the other end of the galaxy, collecting skulls for my skull throne and bending the population to my whim, ruling over them as a mad tyrant.

In unrelated news, I've also been playing the new RimWorld DLC.

Are you interested in cool sci-fi SAO fics? Do you like big ships? Then you should check out Schoolsenpai's StarNought Online! Or maybe you prefer romance? Then flamelordytheking's Caring for a Rat has got you covered. Not enough KiriArgo around these parts honestly.

But enough advertising, onto the story.

Thanks to Tigercry for catching all the errors with a ballistic shield!

Chapter 3: The KFotoSvsF

There was nothing particularly outstanding about this ruin. It was a rectangular sized building, all grey, broken windows, with rusty chain link fence that couldn't keep out a child. The once formerly proud sign that displayed the company's name had long faded. Kirito surveyed the facility atop a nearby hill with Sinon's rifle while the cat herself was looking through her binoculars. Neither knew exactly what to look for, but the intel they acquired said they'll know it when they find it.

The Wasteland was littered with such ruins. Some of them may have fancier architecture, but years of decay and nuclear warfare tended to erase all forms of art. Despite the destruction of the planet, its defenders still patrol the area, warding off any and all trespassers even after their own masters were long dead.

Blood machines were what the denizens of Earth called them - ancient automata that attacked villages and towns, perhaps driven mad without any sense of purpose; software needing a hundred years of updates, glitches in the system. As a programmer, Kirito cringed at the very concept of it. It took them half a day to reach this part of Syria, some twenty hours of travel time and had to stop at a bedouin camp to stock up on fuel.

The area encompassing GGO included landmasses from Eastern Europe, to Asia Minor, to parts of the Middle East but only one third of its size. Budapest was the westernmost city and Ulanbataar the easternmost, Surgust being the northernmost and Kabul the southernmost. Yet even with geography being compressed, it was still some three to four thousand kilometres long. The ruins were placed there a long time ago, but its contents were randomly generated save for ones for specific quests.

"Menhirs," said Sinon.

"I see them. Ten, I think." Kirito zoomed into one of the robots.

The menhir was an armored robot, a meter and a half tall, with turrets utilising different caliber rounds and moved with a set of wheels at their base. They were dubbed lovingly by the community as Gun Roombas and they were a common sight back in Glocken. From his vantage point, they looked to be packing 5.56, the ammo box and CPU core was snuggled deep within the base of the mehnir where their armour was thickest.

"Eleven," she corrected. "There's one right behind that security booth."

"Good thing we brought EMPs," said Kirito, patting a nearby box. A scavenger at the inn they stayed sold them at a discount, a popular armament in these machine infested ruins.

"You are not charging down there and engaging in melee."

"Fine, I guess I'll do the right thing by taking cover and engaging safely and all that."

"Remember your lessons."

Kirito leaned into the rifle and made minute adjustments into the scope. He aimed at the largest one there was and opened fire. The .300 Wichester Magnum blew a neat hole at one fifth from the bottom of the base where the CPU should be. The menhir buzzed and whirred before finally it stopped moving altogether.

He cycled the bolt and moved onto the next target.

It wasn't exactly shooting ducks in a barrel but being seven hundred meters away on a hill meant that the fearsome blood machines weren't all so fearsome. The death roombas were slow moving and did not have the capability to find him with their short range sensors. He finished the last of the menhirs, not even missing once.

"Huh, would you look at that."

"What?"

"If you use your eyes, you can aim after all!"

"Be careful Sinon; you are very tiny, and I am not." He put away the rifle in the pannier of the bike.

The cat sauntered after him. "Yes, but I am also very cute."

"If only you were this cute in human form. Ow! Hey! No biting!"

"Nya."

The duo rode down the hill to the entrance of the building. They passed the security booth where the skeletal remains of a security guard remained at his post. There were few cars around but Kirito methodically took cover, scanning the area of any hostiles he may have missed. The coast so far was clear. Kirito parked his bike near the entrance.

They headed to the main entrance, double glass doors dusty and still standing, a quick wipe and peak showed the doors were chained up. Kirito prepared to break it with the butt of his AR -

"Wait! You'll alert the entire building that way!"

"Oh yeah, I totally knew that," he said sheepishly, lowering his rifle.

"Don't they have traps back in SAO?"

Kirito opened his mouth and Sinon realised her mistake. "Nevermind, you can complain about SAO later."

"I don't complain that much about SAO… do I?"

"Well we did go for breakfast that one time and you complained about SAO non-stop." Sinon timed it: one hour, twenty-two minutes.

"Right, I'll complain less then. I'll talk more about bikes next time!"

Ugh. "I'll try to find a way in, sit tight."

Sinon didn't even blame him, who hasn't complained about SAO? There were entire channels on the Internet with hours long video picking the game apart. Good on them, but she wasn't going to watch a four hour video on SAO's combat alone; Kirito did that enough for him.

Sinon circled the building and found a high broken window which she could slip in. She found herself in a dusty storeroom. There was a still functioning camera in the corner and yet the system triggered no alarms; it likely did not consider a simple house cat to be any sort of threat.

One upside to being a cat was that she also had enhanced sight, smell and hearing. Even from here, she could hear the whirring menhirs better than her human avatar ever would.

She made a wide sweep around the ground floor of the dungeon. There were, as expected, turrets mounted on the ceiling and smaller menhirs patrolling the deserted hallways. She kept a headcount of all available enemies; being a cat had its advantages she supposed. She even found the console that controlled the security but she could only disable the turrets on the first floor.

Sinon spied a employee card on the skeleton of a secretary, nabbed it with her teeth, and went straight to the entrance where she swiped it on a nearby card reader. She exited the building to find Kirito watching a show on his HUD. "Hey, stay focussed!"

"Right, right." He dusted off his pants as he stood up. "Any opposition?"

"No, just some mehnirs. Not even all that tough." Most of them Sinon noted were using .22 rounds and a good chunk of them had stun guns. They would pose little threat to Kirito as long he wasn't getting directly headshotted.

"Ah, I see. So I should conserve ammo."

"Of course. 5.56 doesn't hit as hard as my rifle does, but they shouldn't pose much trouble." That and unlike the last mission, they had enough ammo to that being frugal wasn't needed.

"I see." Kirito slung his rifle back and pulled out his sword.

"Kirito please."

"Look if they're low to mid-level bots, then that means they're perfectly within the Kirito Formula of Swordsmanship."

"Oh God, not this again."

The Kirito Formula of the Engagement of Swords versus Firearms (the full title, also abbreviated to The KFotoSvsF) was a variant of the Twenty-One Feet Rule.

The original rule, also referred to as the Tueller Drill, was a measure of distance related to time it would take a police officer to recognise a threat, draw their weapon and shoot. If the attacker was within twenty-one feet of an officer (or 6.4 meters for the rest of the civilised world, America) armed with a knife or other melee weapon, they could take out the shooter without being gunned down.

As Kirito found out, 6.4 meters was in fact, not enough time to charge at an enemy with a knife. He and Sinon practiced this one time while sparring, and he created a new rule, one that was born from his experiences in kendo, SAO and GGO's own game system.

The average knife blade was about forty centimetres (fifteen inches). His sword blade was a respectable eighty centimetres (thirty inches). He was also quite fast for his level, and he could cover a hundred meters in fourteen seconds. Therefore, the Kirito Formula of Swordsmanship was more something akin to a Ten Feet Rule. It was foolproof.

As long as he didn't fight a player with a Gunslinger build anyway. They were like Iaido practitioners, but with a gun.

"How many?" he asked.

Sinon knew that arguing against him was futile. "Eight - two in the lobby, six patrolling the hallways. Be careful of the turrets."

"Excellent!" He slung his rifle bang and checked his arming sword; a broad heavy blade forged in good plasteel. "Let's have some fun, eh?"

"Just don't die, idiot."

Kirito snuck into the entrance where there were the two of the robots in the lobby's corner, ready to tase anyone who looked at them the wrong way, sword in hand, his other reaching for his belt. There was also another addendum to the Kirito Formula of Swordsmanship.

The average officer, also, did not have access to grenades.

Sinon perched herself on the seat of the dirtbike when there was a sudden hissing sound of smoke followed soon by clashing steel and mad laughter. She got comfy and summoned her HUD and started watching a video from her favorite airsoft reviewer.

They were on the western outskirts of SBC Glocken in the eponymous Range District. A row of warehouses and fields were set up where players could practice their marksmanship and their toys. Further westward was where certain guilds made their home, the big leagues with armour and artillery. Sure, it was entirely possible to keep an entire company of tanks in a drawer - it was all lines of code, but players like to flex on their peers with their cool toys, thus the warehouses.

Sinon considered herself frugal with money - but even she had an apartment in the game. Completely useless, but it's where she kept her guns and showed them off to her peers.

Sinon found herself standing on a raised platform, an array of screens and knick-knacks before her. In front of her was Kirito clad in basic fatigues and flak, a borrowed AR-15 in her arms. It took Kirito a lot of convincing not to drag her huge ballistic shield around and not just run out into the Waste to engage in melee with the mutated fauna.

"Alright, you know what to do."

Kirito triple-checked her weapon with the slowness of a rookie, but her actions were firm and deliberate. She had soaked all the basic stuff like the sponge. "I'm ready." Sinon tapped a few buttons on a console.

The first target appeared. Kirito shot the first one, then the second, and continued to do so until all the targets were hit. She reloaded her rifle awkwardly, accidentally dropping a magazine onto the floor. She ignored it and continued for a few more rounds until the gun clicked empty and she fumbled to reach for another magazine. There was still a paper target out there.

"Remember, switching to your sidearm is faster than reloading!" the sniper called out.

Heeding her advice, Kirito dropped her rifle and switched to her M9, took a moment to ready her stance and popped the paper target.

Sinon kept track of her score and found she had an average accuracy of 72%. Shooting a gun in GGO was no different from shooting in real life; the weight, recoil, and awkwardness of remembering where you put your magazines, all of that mattered. Sometimes it was too real and she needed to retreat to her gaming PC and go slay demons on Mars with a double-barrel shotgun.

"Second course, go go!" she called out.

Smiling, Kirito took off to the next course. Pistol in hand, she moved towards the watermelons, and instead of shooting, she whisked out her combat knife with her left hand and buried the blade into the offending fruit, then moved onto the next two with the grace of a trained martial artist. Even the boxers at her workplace would be impressed.

The timer rang. She returned to Sinon, munching on a slice of watermelon. "How'd I do?"

"Your fruit killing skills are remarkable."

She bowed, her long hair slipping off her shoulders. "I had a great sensei. So what now?"

"You ever want to visit Istanbul?"

For the next few months, the two sought adventure.

They started off easy and Sinon, being the senior and higher levelled partner, downlevelled to Kirito's level. They dove into the ruins of Istanbul and battled the horrors laid within; fought on wheel and hoof against the techno-tribals in the open Wastes; plundered long forgotten military complexes deep in the earth and experiments of fallen governments.

She also sold off her ballistic shield, thank God.

Sinon found her new comrade in arms a delightful person; easy going and a quick learner. She knew three main things about Kirito: that she had an encyclopedic knowledge on medieval weaponry, had a motorcycle that she always fine tuned to pornographic levels, and had a great resentment against Sword Art Online.

When the subject first came up, they were hiding behind a large rock as machine gun fire rained down from atop the hill. The guild that was holding the hill went by Ashigaru Corp and they had about five men on the hill while one of their specialists hacked a terminal to complete the objective. The three dozen or so players were trying, and failing, to take the hill and get the data themselves, the duo included.

It was a simple battlefield scenario and most players were around Kirito's level.

"Back in SAO," she said as she reloaded her rifle, "we never had stuff like this."

Sinon and Vulkan had gotten it right: Kirito was an SAO refugee. "You mean machine guns?"

"No, I mean, tactical stuff like this." Kirito poked her head out only to snap back as the edge exploded in a cloud of dust. "Breakable terrain, taking objectives, PvP. Real interesting stuff."

"Did SAO not have these things?" As she understood it, SAO never was designed as a PvP thing. One would think that after eight years of running, the devs would have added something like that in.

Kirito rolled her eyes. "SAO doesn't even have bows."

Sinon's blue eyes widened. "What?"

"SAO. Does. Not. Have. Archery."

The sniper was stunned. Nearby, a mortar shell dropped into a group of four. Their bodies flew into each cardinal direction.

"It has these …" She measured an invisible thing with two fingers, "throwing picks."

"Sooo, like javelins?"

"No, like." She scrunched her face trying to think of an equivalent. "Think weaponised pencils. We have no javelins."

"B-but … the javelin is one of humanity's oldest weapons. Everyone used javelins."

Kirito shook her head. "Range combat is a no go. It's called Sword Art Online after all. God, I hate that stupid meme."

"The idea of a medieval combat game with neither magic nor ranged weapons is extremely … short sighted."

She shrugged. "That's Kayaba for you. Don't get me started on cavalry. Wait, no, let me tell you about …"

Kirito went on and on, a torrent of complaints flooded out. So great was her fury they didn't realise that the mortar had recalculated and exploded them both to kingdom come.

They respawned back at the FOB's cloning bay. "Sorry about that," said Kirito. "Where was I?"

"Something about the UI?" said Sinon. They approached the counter to insta-retrieve their fallen gear. Her fee was higher considering that she was higher level than everyone at the battle.

"Right! So, you can only have one weapon on you. You can't wear a dagger or any other weapon! You have to open your HUD and scroll down to retrieve it!"

It was a mystery then how SAO still had any players at all. "So how long have you played SAO?"

"Since day one."

The sniper blinked. "Kirito, SAO was released eight years ago."

"I know."

"You played a game you don't like for eight years."

"I know."

Sinon turned to look into her violet eyes. "Why?"

She opened her mouth to answer then closed it, before finally answering.

"I have no idea."

Days later, Kirito sent Sinon a message. She was at work at her desk when she got it.

"Yo, S. I can't make it today, I'm apartment hunting. Maybe next time?"

They had planned to go bounty hunting and she had completely forgotten about it, not that she told her. She tapped out a quick reply. "Don't worry about it. That's a funny coincidence, my roommate moved out a month ago and I'm going to meet my new roomie when I get back home."

"Hope they aren't a dick! Good luck!"

As she made her way home at the end of the day, she did mental math in her head. Business was fine and she had funds for a rainy day. But she had expensive hobbies in her airsoft guns plus the subscription rate to GGO. She couldn't afford cutting down meals unless she wanted to be a burden to her comrades in the field.

Her last roommate, Kyouji, had been a high school friend. After a series of failed jobs and a year of unemployment, he returned home to his parents. Shino understood his situation, but it did mean she had to find a potential roommate as soon as she could. He had been asking for his parents' money for the longest time for paying rent, and the landlord was merciless and cruel (like all landlords); it was unfortunate then he bailed before paying rent for the month.

She went home, tidied up the apartment, and made it presentable. It was six in the evening when there came a ring at the door.

Shino opened the door to see a familiar face. "Hey, so is this room 7-B for one Shino Asada? The one looking for a room … mate ..."

They pointed at each other accusingly and said simultaneously, "YOU!"

It was the crazy guy from the bakery!

Shino took in the newcomer. Instead of kendo gear, he had a stack of plastic containers in hand. A motorcycle helmet sat neatly on said containers and he had a duffel bag slung over one shoulder. He was clad in typical motorcylist gear - leather jacket, baggy pants, and high boots. He had come prepared.

"What are you doing here, you cheesecake stealing bastard?!"

"Oh my God, are you still on that?!" He put down his stuff and swept a hand through his long hair. "I can't believe I'm stuck with Miss Can't Shoot Straight."

"Excuse me?" Out of everyone at work, Shino was the best damn shot outside of the chief himself. "At least I'm not Mister I-Can-Cut-Bullets-Out-of-the-Air-Because-I-Think-I'm-an-Anime-Protagonist."

"What do you have against anime, lady? Anime is art."

"Anime is dumb and for otaku."

He gasped. "You take that back!"

They continued back and forth, arguing, like completely civilised adults with topics ranging about weapons to food types. Neither were sure why they were doing this aside from plain anger. This lasted for a good ten minutes until her phone beeped.

She whipped it out, "Hold on, jackass, I need to read this."

"Whatever. I need some fresh air." He left his stuff by her doorstep and went to the lift.

Shino cursed. "Wait!"

"What?!"

"Can you pay now? Landlord's hounding me to pay."

"How much was the rate again?"

She told him. He cursed. "I hate the housing market. But yes, I can."

Shino gritted her teeth. "Fine. You. Can. Stay."

A silence befell them. The awkwardness was so thick, you could cut it with a knife.

"So," he said. "Got any food?"

She relaxed tense shoulders. "I just got back from work."

"Oh. Is pizza good?"

"Pizza is fine."

"I'm Kazuto Kirigaya." His hand moved hesitantly, towards her. She sighed and shook it.

"Shino Asada. Start over?"

"Start over," he smiled, flashing teeth, and Shino realised that he wasn't that bad looking.

Shino found her roommate to be pretty standard as roommates went. She knew he was a programmer of sorts. He brought the rest of his stuff via a moving company later, most of which consisted of high end computing equipment. He either holed himself in his room or went out for errands, which was fine by her. In that sense, he wasn't too different from Kyouji except Kyouji played different VR games than her.

He would usually go out, leather jacket over his kendo gear, shinai strapped to his back. He offhandedly mentioned that his sister owned a dojo and he was a part time employee.

"Maybe you should join us, it's fun," he said while lounging on the couch, watching a video on his phone. She was at her bench, a little corner of the room where she was doing maintenance on her Glock. When he first saw it, he didn't even comment.

"Nah, I get enough of a workout at work."

"What do you do anyway, Asada-san?"

"I work at a security firm; bodyguard, surveillance, that sort of thing."

"Oh." He slurped on his ramen noisily. "Explains the gun. You're kinda small for a bodyguard."

She didn't look up from her gun. "My boss tells me it's an asset. Makes people underestimate me." She was 5'3, which was not short and was an inch higher than the average height of a Japanese man, thank you very much.

"Maybe I should apply at your firm too. What's the requirements?"

"Four years of military or law enforcement training. I have the latter. That or IT, which is what 50% of the workforce consists of."

He finished his bowl. "Just give me a sword and I'll cut bullets out of the air."

"You don't know anything about bodyguarding, do you?"

"When someone pulls a gun on the VIP, you jump in front of your ward and yell nooooo all dramatic like."

She didn't laugh, but she did snort.

She logged back into GGO a few days later and found that Kirito was online too. She found her at the Caravan Market where NPCs and players alike traveled the wastes, finding salvaged gear and selling it to interested customers. It wasn't hard to find Kirito, she was browsing the blades section.

"You know, you really need to upgrade your guns over your blades."

The swordswoman was in her standard black gear, save for her new flak vest which was an olive green. She also had a tendency to spend her credits on black dye too. It gave out a silhouette but she somehow made it work. Already, she was spinning and playing with a bright pink kerambit. She did not turn to face Sinon.

"Back in SAO …" Here she goes again. "We had to rely on these Sword Skills right? We go into a stance, get locked in and have to do it without cancelling. They're powerful and were one the main selling points of the game."

"Why don't they call them Sword Arts?"

"Who knows what goes into the mad mind of Akihiko Kayaba. Anyway, the problem is that they're like, easily avoidable when it comes to PvP. Like, laughably so."

She unsheathed an imaginary sword. "So when people go into a stance, other players can see you a mile away, and you can dodge it really easy-like." Kirito took a sidestep to emphasise her point.

"You mentioned SAO wasn't a PvP game."

"It wasn't. PvP was an afterthought. Didn't stop people doing it anyway. There's only so much to do after finishing the main questline and doing the expansions. Remember, no magic, no ranged weapons, no classes. Not much in the way of build variety.

"I joined this guild called Laughing Coffin, we just ran around killing players. Sword Skills were fine for mobs, but most of the guild were martial artists, and whenever a player pulled off a Sword Skill, they would miss and we'd go in with our actual martial arts training. Not to say it was impossible, but most players just weren't able to commit. They never stood a chance."

She spun and held her invisible sword in a high guard at Sinon. "I practice kendo."

"Huh, my new roommate practices kendo."

"Maybe you should invite him then, three's a party."

She shrugged. "Nah, my roommate's kinda uh … weird. You know how some roommates are."

"Tell me about it!" She replaced the kerambit back onto the tray. "My new roommate is cold as ice. She's got a small hill of airsoft guns on her, like a weirdo."

"Hey, there's nothing wrong with airsoft guns. I collect them too."

Kirito chuckled. "You would get along with Asada-san."

"... A … sada-san?"

"Yeah. She's some sort of bodyguard. Pretty small for one. She even owns a gun. She's pretty cute though."

"C-cute?"

Suddenly, the gears went in place. It was as if Sinon was slapped in the face or drenched in cold water.

"K-Kazuto?"

Her eyes widened at the mention of her name, mouth agape. No, his name.

"... Shino?"

Silence. Then, simultaneously, they summoned their HUD and logged out.

Shino detached the cord from her Amusphere and reached her door. At the same time, she saw Kazuto emerging from his room, a first generation NerveGear strapped to his head.

Then they pointed at each other, shouted "You!", and were smitten with a sense of deja vu.

"I can't believe this. I trusted you, Kirito! I thought you were a girl but you were in fact a G.I.R.L all along!"

"Hey, hey, I wanted to get into the game super quick and just sped through character creation. It's not my fault you assumed my gender!"

"YOU LITERALLY DIDN'T CORRECT ME, ASS!"

"I DIDN'T WANT TO MAKE IT AWKWARD, OKAY!"

They argued, and argued for what seemed to be hours. It was tiring, their voices became hoarse, and Sinon felt like she was going to lose her mind in sheer irritation.

"Look, I thought we were friends!" said Kazuto. "Does it matter what my gender is?"

"It's not about that, it's -" Shino struggled to find the words. "I don't know, I'm just angry!"

"But why are you angry? It's not like we were exchanging numbers or anything! We barely even talked about our real lives."

Shino rubbed her temple, a habit of hers whenever tension was high. She reached for her purse and coat by the door.

"Where are you going?"

"Getting drunk!" she said as she put on her coat and slammed the apartment door.

Kazuto let out a long string of curses. Why does he always had so much bad luck with girls?

Gunfire boomed in the top floor of the dungeon. A figure shoulder slammed into the door and threw himself down the stairway as bullets made a hole in the wall where his head was.

The twin .50 caliber turrets that emerged from the marble pillars of the CEO's office proved to be the single hardest challenge in the entire dungeon; there was no terminal for either mercenaries to hack and shut them off. The awesome power of the cannons proved effective against concrete, rebar and steel. Not even Kirito's strong pitcher arm could lob an EMP grenade close enough to disable the ancient security.

Swordsman and cat retreated to the lower floor, taking a breather in the employee's lounge. Nearby was a smoking shell of a mehnir, neatly cut in twine with a plasteel blade.

"Why the hell does a freaking pharmacy office have .50 caliber machine guns?!"

"CEO's are already paranoid people, pharmaceutical CEOs more so."

He leaned back in the plastic chair, running a hand through his long hair. "So, got any other ideas?"

"Have you considered hitting them with your sword? Or perhaps slicing the bullets out of the air?"

"Har-har, very funny. Ugh, I need a drink."

He approached one of the many ancient vending machines, still somehow working over all these years. He fished his pocket for a couple of liras; the coin and cash of the ancient world could still be used to exchange for credits and players still go through old cash registers for them. "Want one?"

"I haven't figured out how to … consume with this body."

"C'mon, it can't be that hard."

Two cans of cola plonked into the box. Kirito retrieved a bowl from a cupboard and poured the contents into it. He reclined in his chair, thinking of a way to solve their turret problem.

Sinon placed her two front paws in the bow, nearly tipping it over. The fizzy drink splashed onto her, splashing her with cold and wetness. Instinctively, she shoved her face into the bowl and meowed angrily.

Kirito snorted. "Enjoying being a cat too much, huh?"

"I will bite you," she threatened.

As Sinon tried (and failed) to drink the cola (how do cats drink anyway?) Kirito became deep in thought. GGO was far more of a tactical game than SAO ever was, and as tough as SAO was with its boss fights, the sheer lethality of GGO ensured that even top level players kept their heads down.

He did an inventory check: he still had his hand-me-down AR-15, his TMP was running low on ammo, and his plasteel sword was still in good shape. He had run out of smoke grenades and flashbangs but still had his EMPs. He still had some climbing rope on him, a habit he brought from SAO.

He gazed out of the window, the sun was setting and bathed the city in an orange glow. Night would come soon. Sinon finally got around to learning how to use that tongue of hers, and was drinking the cola contently.

She looked up from her bowl, her face with cola. "I got it!"

"Congrats, Sinonon. Truly you are a mighty warrior." He reached his hand towards her and stopped. Seeing no resistance, he scritched her under the chin and the blue cat purred in content.

"Don't get used to it." Hesitantly, he retracted his hand. Oh to carry the cat in his arms and snuggle her and give her kisses.

A sudden mental image intruded upon Kirito's mind, as he travelled back to the real world, Shino in his arms as he showered her face with kisses. He banished the thought immediately and coughed. "So uh, got any ideas?"

"The MO for this sort of thing is to plant explosives under the turrets and blow it from below, but even if we do have them, there's a chance that the entire dungeon would collapse on us or destroy the objective."

"Can't you sneak in? I thought turrets don't recognise you as a threat."

"These must be more advanced models. They 100% tried to shoot me."

"Well it's a good thing you have nine lives then."

"Kirito please." She glanced at his own equipment. "Maybe you can climb up with rope?"

"You mean throw a grappling hook from this floor and scale to the top floor? I thought of that, but from a quick glance, I'd still be vulnerable to turret fire and even lobbing an EMP while dangling outside doesn't fully guarantee their destruction."

"We could find another nearby building and shoot them from safety? No, that won't work. .300 Winchester Magnum isn't designed for such heavy armour, and you couldn't make the shot either."

"Hey!"

The two brainstormed further. Brute force may have worked if it wasn't the fact that it was a one man/one cat job. Explosives they don't have and they were in danger of killing themselves with Kirito's nonexistent demolitions skill or Sinon's toebeans. Neither Kirito's assault rifle nor Sinon's MSR could dent the thing. Their only recourse was the EMPs.

He had a good dozen of them, soda cans shaped and twice the weight of a standard hand grenade. Absolutely non-ergonomic, a gameplay design decision. Most players tended to roll them like bowling balls and even then, that would require standing in the open and Kirito was in no hurry to turn into Swiss cheese.

"What's the toughest fight in SAO?" Sinon asked suddenly.

"Hrm? Why the interest?"

"Maybe it'll give us ideas? I don't know, I'm stumped."

Kirito racked his mind for the answer. He hadn't played SAO in a good two years now and he more or less dropped VR gaming for an entire year to focus on his work.

"The toughest fight was … a boss called «Fatal Scythe»."

"Is it some sort of Grim Reaper mob?"

"Actually yes. Not very creative, but then again, a lot of SAO's monster design was pretty lame. Killer soundtrack though."

"Why was it tough?"

"He was a filter of sorts for SAO's first expansion «Underworld». You know how SAO has 100 floors? Well the first expansion were players going under Aincrad. It was a pretty mediocre and long winded, still the best expansion SAO got.

"Anyway, the boss was a floating Grim Reaper skeleton with a big scythe, as the name implies. He was really floaty and players more or less required using «Sword Skills» to launch themselves up. There are flying enemies in SAO, and we had specific «Sword Skills» to battle them, but they were uncommon and most players didn't acquire them. That or you used a pike because -"

"Ranged weapons don't exist in SAO."

Kirito slammed his head on the table dramatically. "Eight years. Eight years and no bows, no crossbows, no javelins, just … goddamn throwing picks."

"Can't you use … throw your sword at it?"

"Because of a quirk in programming and coding, and SAO's No Ranged Weapons Allowed Ever policy, throwing your weapons, even really, really good ones, did no damage. At all."

"So the boss was hard … because it was too high up?"

"I was there, Shino. I was there when the forums exploded in anger. People wrote essays upon essays why it was badly design. They even had a petition to fix it. But Akihiko Kayaba, that uncaring, uncreative god, looked upon the complaints and said "it just works.""

He slammed a fist on the table. "IT DIDN'T!"

"He sounds like an ass."

"He is. BUT, because every single VR game uses SEED to run them, he's also rich enough to ignore every complaint and keep SAO running even despite being review-bombed into oblivion."

The cat tilted her head as she absorbed all the info. She took a drink from her bowl before continuing, "So how did you beat it?"

He looked up and smirked, purple eyes shining. "Rope."

"Rope?"

"Rope," he repeated. "You see, most weapons can't reach him. Even throwing our swords meant jack all. You need your weapon, in your hand, to do the damage."

"So you tied rope to your sword …"

"And used it like a Chinese rope-dart." He leaned back and folded his arms. "Guess who's the genius who figured it out?"

She rolled her big blue eyes. "Was it y-"

"IT WAS ME!" he exclaimed with childlike glee. "You should have been there! People tying rope to their big axes and huge swords; dozens of players swinging their weapons around trying to kill the boss except they all just killed each other half the time. It was great. It pissed the devteam off so much, the entire team had to force Kayaba to put the boss a few meters down."

He leaned back, a smug look on his pretty face. "Rope, never leave home without it," he said, patting the cord hanging off his belt.

Kirito stood up suddenly, his chair falling to the ground. Sinon jumped a foot into the air.

"I know how to beat the turrets!" He grabbed his rope and thrusted it into the air, as if pulling Excalibur out of the stone.

He didn't explain himself, but Sinon had a good guess.

A black-clad figure stalked slowly up the stairs of the eight floor. Using a hand mirror as a periscope, he peaked out of the door of the emergency staircase, and saw the turrets still humming and turning, their barrels long cooled after the first burst of fire. The polished stone floor was littered with countless brass casings. Nearby were the ancient rusted doors of the lift, long out of commission.

Half of floor eight was the secretary's and the other half was the CEO's. The thin wooden wall of the reception had long been shredded and it was really a miracle that Kirito had stumbled into the office, tripped the alarm, and escaped alive. Just a single burst from the turrets and he would be dead, spawning back at the last inn he rested at. The door to the emergency stairway creaked under his combat boots. In his hand was his makeshift sling, three EMP grenades taped together snuggly.

He had practiced lobbing the grenades for a good fifteen minutes, all the while his feline companion critiqued his technique.

"Look Sinon, my skill with the sling rivals that of the famed Baeleric slingers."

"Never heard of em'."

Kirito made a face. In reality, Sinon knew quite a bit about ancient mercenaries, she just liked to tease him.

"Remind me to send you a PDF later."

"Nya."

He went prone and crawled through the debris, bits of furniture digging into his body. Agility and speed was of the essence, and he had put away his rifle and armour for this task. The turrets' sensor did not detect him and only would when he emerged from his position. He made his way to the secretary's expansive desk, the few pieces of cover left on the floor.

He took a breath and calmed his nerves. Here goes nothing.

There had to be at least a hundred meters between him and the turrets. Behind said turret was the CEO's terminal, it should be far away enough from the grenade's blast radius. Kirito's record was sixty meters, owing to his STR attribute. With the sling, he was able to hit a hundred twenty.

He took a knee and his head was exposed. The turrets' barrels whirred to life as his own sling twirled. One round, two rounds, and he pulled the pins and let loose the grenades, dropping to the floor again.

He didn't see what happened, can barely even hear. There was the thunder of gunfire and the destruction of the environment, followed by the crackling of electricity. It was pandemonium, the roar of battle, the chaos of the battlefield, the stress that marked the souls of men and -

Kirito felt a soft paw tapped onto his head. He looked up to see Sinon looking at him. "It's disabled."

He raised his hand carefully and realising his hand had not become a stump, he stood up. "Maybe I've Baeleric blood in me after all."

After he whacked the turrets apart with his sword (just in case), Kirito approached the CEO's desk. The back of the office was mostly intact save for the general decay, a few photos hung on the wall. A single dusty computer lay upon the cocobolo desk. He sat himself in the creaky leather chair and using his "l33t haxor skillz" (his words), plugged in his PDA, and got to work unlocking the computer. The sun had set and stars were becoming visible.

Sinon jumped onto the desk and surveyed the photos. They looked like stock images of important people in suits. Very corporate, very boring. The biggest frame seemed to be that of the entire staff, scientists in lab coats and board members in suits, with a single man sitting in the chair. The CEO himself?

Hold on. There was something … familiar, about the CEO. "Kirito, can you please grab this picture?"

Kirito did so without breaking contact from the screen and placed the frame on the table. As he complained about the lack of realistic hacking (why are IT people always like that?), Sinon inspected the photo in more detail.

"Kirito, this is -"

A beep. "I got it!" He skimmed the info on the screen. "Okay, so, the antidote to return to your human form isn't actually here, but there is a formula to synthesise one."

Sinon meowed-cursed. She was hoping for some sort of medicine in a safe, not a longer quest-chain. "What does it say?"

"Well I don't recognise all this medical chemistry mumbo-jumbo, but it looks like we need to bring it to some chemist to make sense of it."

"I know a guy."

"Great!" He unplugged his PDA from the computer and replaced it in his pocket. "So what was it you wanted to say before?"

"The picture. It's -" her ears perked up. "Someone's coming."

"What do you mean?"

The answer came in the form of two grenades being thrown into the office. Kirito grabbed Sinon in his arms and ducked. The room exploded with light and thunder.

Footsteps approaching, rifles readied, green lasers danced around the room. Someone shouted, "Hands up, you're surrounded!"

Kirito didn't answer. He looked through a hole in the desk and saw four men in Russian Ratnik armour with raised Kalashnikovs. Another man entered, a massive AA-12 automatic shotgun in his arms, a military cap on his crown, the only one unmasked; the others wore balaclavas - the ideal picture of a kill team.

"Ho, adventurer!" said the shotgun man, "I know you're hiding behind that desk. Give us the info you got from that terminal and I'll save you the revival fee from waking up at the nearest cloning vat. Refuse us and we'll take it off your corpse!"

Kirito kept quiet. Sinon looked distressed. "Freaking quest stealers. They're gonna make way with our prize!"

"They look serious, they don't seem to be with those bandits we ran into earlier," he whispered. A dozen plans ran through his head, none of them good. "What do we do now?"

"I'm thinking!"

"I'm gonna give you to the count of five to get out of here or my boys will fill you with holes. One!"

"We should just surrender."

"No way! After all the effort we went through?!"

"Two! Three!"

"There's only one thing to do." He grabbed Sinon and hugged her close to his body.

"What are you doing?!"

"Saving our asses."

"Four -"

Kirito made for a running sprint, blue cat in hand, rope in the other, and ran straight to the windows. Gunfire followed after him.

He crashed through the ancient glass and fell from the sky.

Question to y'all, are you enjoying the romance? Admittedly, I've been pretty mediocre at it, I like the slow burn of friends to lovers. Is it too fast? Too slow? Would you pet Sinon on her fuzzy little head?

As for the combat, I think it's one of my stronger suits, and as much as I have a problem with gunfights, I think I'm getting a handle on it. That being said, I'm always down for more critique on those.

The series has, for the most part, still lacking in some good ol' gun porn. Describe the most atrocious, Escape from Tarkov abomination you want and put them in a review, and I promise I'll try to put them in. Til next time.

Patch notes:

14 Sept 2021 - Tidied up more stuff.