A/N: Hello All! Yes, I know, two chapters in just over a month!? I must be insane. Well, as I said before, I have tons of this story written in advance so all I need to do is copy and paste, chuck in an author's notes then BAM! new chapter.

Anyway, that's not why I'm here. There a couple of things I wish to bring to your attention;

One, my fanfic is just about to reach 6,000 views and, while that may not seem like much to some of you, it just amazes me that there are 6,000 people out there in the world that have at least attempted my story and I genuinely can't thank each and every one of you enough. Plus, to all you who have favorited/followed/reviewed this story, you especially have my thanks! (Now that I think about it, maybe all the readers of my story are the SAO survivors :)

Two, regarding the poll I created the last chapter, I really need some input on this because I don't want to write a story that the majority of you don't want to see so PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE take part in the pole. I know it's harsh but I won't be posting another chapter until I have enough results so I'm begging you to please take part in the poll!

This A/N is getting pretty long so I'll talk about that other stuff at the bottom, 'till then.

I DON'T OWN SWORD ART ONLINE OR IT'S CHARACTERS!

After blinking a couple of times to let his eyes get used to the lights on the ceiling of the hospital/control room that Kikuoka had set up for the mission, Kirito slowly sat up and took his NerveGear off his head. He looked around to find that there were only two people in the room, one female, and one male. After his eyes had completely readjusted to reality, he noticed that none of them were Doctor Kurahashi.

"Ah Kir-*ahem*-Kazuto, you're up! How are you doing?" Kazuto was greeted by the familiar voice of Natsuki Aki, the nurse who took care of him during the old SAO as well as the Death Gun incident. He was happy to at least have a familiar face there but was still interested in Kurahashi's whereabouts.

"Where's Doctor Kurahashi?" He asked with a throaty rasp to his voice. Natsuki pouted a bit at how he ignored her greeting but she could understand his confusion.

"Me and Doctor Kawahara here were assigned to take care of the night shift for Doctor Kurahashi," She said as she got closer to Kazuto in order to take off the wires connecting to his body. "Speaking of the doctor, he told us about your situation. I can't imagine how hard it must've been to make a decision like that."

"It doesn't matter now, it's already started so there's no point in complaining over spilled milk," Natsuki was slightly taken aback at how mature Kazuto had gotten since she last saw him.

"Oh? Since when did you become such a man?" She teased as she took off the last of Kazuto's wires. He attempted to frown at her teasing but she could see a faint bit of red come across those cheeks. She thought about teasing him even more but was startled by a noise coming from the other doctor's direction, which reminded her of something. "Oh, by the way, Kirito, I want to show you something that you'll definitely like," She said as she pulled him over to Doctor Kawahara. Kazuto came very close to berating her about using his in-game name but the interest of what Doctor Kawahara had on his computer made him overlook it just this once.

"What do you want me to see?" Kazuto asked as they reached the computer that Doctor Kawahara sat at.

"Doctor Kawahara here is an absolute magician when it comes to technology, especially data-mining and hacking. It's no wonder that Kikuoka made him the head of the Japanese Defense Force's Tech Department," Natsuki rested an arm on the top of the male doctor's chair, indicating it was his turn to start explaining.

"Well, Mr. Seijirou told us about the predicament revolving around your friends being unable to log out," The male doctor explained as his fingers darted around the keyboard at light speed. "So to fix this, what I've done is used a code emulator to make the game seed think that this code I've artificialized is part of it and in turn, it'll access its data and adjust accordingly," The computer doctor used a couple of words that Kazuto barely understood but he was at least able to grasp the general idea of what the doctor had done. "To put it simply, as long as this emulator is online and active, the log out feature will be enabled to everyone. " After a few more button presses and mouse clicks, the computer doctor firmly pressed the enter key and after a moment of silence, the emulator connected to the computer burst into life and successfully altered the game seed.

"I suggest you hop back in the game and reveal the good news to your friends," Natsuki recommended as she twirled around in one of those spinning chairs you see in offices.

"No need, we can just send them a message through the computer via the ExoLinker, right?" Kazuto asked, looking back to Doctor Kawahara for confirmation.

"That we can," He said cheerfully as he minimized the emulator window and pulled up the message board before wheeling his chair away from the desk and inviting Kazuto to the keyboard. "You want to write it?" Kazuto walked to the desk as per the doctor's request and typed the news in the text box.

'Hey guys, it's Kirito.

Doctor Kurahashi's team have found a way to enable all your log out buttons.

Please try to log out as soon as you see this message, let's hope it works.'

After he was done typing, Kazuto added all his friends as recipients to the message so that they would all receive it. Before he sent the message though, he attempted to add Toran as a recipient as well but the computer claimed there was no user by that name. He hoped that one of his friends would notify him instead and pressed the enter key to send the message. It only took a couple of seconds before they heard a noise come from somewhere across the room. After closer inspection, Kazuto found that the first of his group to log out was in fact Agil.

"Andrew, you made it!" Kazuto beamed happily. He was never the kind of person to get seriously happy over things but he just couldn't help but feel extremely relieved about this turn of events.

"Ugh, man do I feel stiff," Andrew groaned as he slowly sat up. "Thank the lord my wife is out of town for a few days, otherwise she'd have had my head on a pike for this," Kazuto helped the café owner to his feet and then watched as he stretched his arms and legs with very satisfied sounding moans. Natsuki brought him a glass of water which he devoured in an instant. "Water's nice and all but I tell ya, I could really go for a coffee right about now."

"Is that so? I'll see what I can do then," Natsuki said as she sprung up from her spinning chair. "Anything for you, Mr. Kirigaya?" She asked with the smile of a waitress. Kazuto was momentarily confused at the sudden formalities she used with him but quickly brushed it aside.

"I'll have some iced tea if that's possible," he replied. Natsuki nodded and walked out of the room in search of their requested refreshments. Allowing Kazuto to talk a little more privately. "Hey Andrew, were you around anyone else when you got the message?" He asked, hoping that his friend knew what he meant by 'anyone else'.

"Nope," Andrew replied disappointingly. "About three or four minutes before I got that message, I went on a walk around Urbus by myself. When I left the house, everyone present was fast asleep," He explained, to which made Kazuto even more curious.

"So, there was someone not there?" He asked.

"Yeah, Toran and Sinon were gone when I checked before I went on my walk. Otherwise, everyone else was out cold," Andrew answered before pulling out his phone and messaging his wife. Part of Kazuto wanted to think that it was a little weird for those two to have gone off somewhere, but it was highly possible that they weren't actually together so he ignored that thought and instead pondered something else.

"If that's the case then I wonder why Sinon hasn't tried logging out yet, maybe she hasn't seen the message," Kazuto wondered aloud as he looked over towards the row of sleeping people that he called his friends. "Oh well, the rest of them will know when they wake up," Kirito said as he lay back down on his bed, not to dive back into the game, but to just rest and stretch once again. A few minutes later, Natsuki came back into the room with drinks in either hand.

"One coffee and one iced tea coming up." She announced and gave the two of them their refreshments. Kazuto heaved a sigh as he gulped his first sip of the freezing cold iced tea. The iciness of the liquid soothed his throat and before he knew it, he was drifting off to sleep.

Tonight had not necessarily turned out as Toran thought it would. What was suppose to be a midnight stroll around the outskirts of Urbus had turned into a full-on quest that Sinon had gotten him involved in. The way he recalled it was that while he was walking around the southeastern area of Urbus, Sinon had happened upon him and invited him on a quest. Upon explanation, Sinon had told him that it was a two-player only quest and so she asked his help. Normally she would've gone to the experienced Asuna or the knowledgable Lisbeth for help, but since he was awake and they were asleep, it was easier to ask him instead. Part of him wanted to take that as an insult of sorts but to be fair, she had only just met him so it wasn't hard to see why he would be her last resort.

Anyway, the objective of said quest was to hunt and slay the Nightmare Ox, an enemy that resembles a Trembling Ox except its body is that of a shadow and it only spawns between 11 pm and 1 am which means the time limit to kill it is two hours. According to the information that Sinon had been given, there were only two ways to make it's body attackable. One, shine a light of some form on it which will cause its body to take physical form for a short period of time. Or two, have one person be bait for the monster while the other attacks right as the monster goes to hit the baited player. This was possible because if the monster tried to attack in shadow form, it would just pass right through so it needed to take physical form to attack. The second option involved much more risk because of the possibility of death to the baited player. However, this was where Sinon's plan came in.

"Kirito said that you were a sword and shield user, right?" She asked the slightly nervous Toran.

"Uh, yeah. Though I don't have much experience in this field," Toran replied honestly. This would actually be his first battle using his new sword and shield so he was a bit worried that he wouldn't be much help, but he needed to be confident for his own sake. He really didn't want to look bad in front of his new friend's comrades.

"Well it's too late to turn back now, we're either doing this or we'll die trying!" Sinon exclaimed with confidence. Toran borrowed some the confidence that beamed off the neon blue haired female to his side and made a silent vow that he would not let her down. For the rest of the walk to gates at the crater's edge, not much talking happened. Toran didn't know how it made Sinon feel but the silence made him feel kind of awkward.

"So how long have you known Kirito for?" He asked after gaining enough courage to try small talk.

"Just over six months roughly," She replied after giving it a moment of thought. "We met in a game called Gun Gale Online, ever played it?"

"Uh no, can't say I've heard of it," Toran replied awkwardly. Now probably wasn't the best time to be remembering what happened to him before this sudden restart of SAO so he was relieved when Sinon continued talking.

"He annoyingly got himself involved in my personal business but as a result, he helped me recover from my past and also saved me from an IRL attack." Toran could tell from the look on her face as she spoke that it was a memory that she was both hated and cherished.

"Well I've barely known him for days but I can already tell that he seems like the kind of guy who'll do that," Toran stated, blissfully unaware that he was actually maintaining a normal conversation for the first time in ages. Their conversation actually continued for a few minutes until the growl of a nearby Trembling Ox abruptly ended their talk.

"Be on your guard," Sinon whispered to Toran as they both entered battle-ready mode. According to the quest information, they had to travel a decent distance from Urbus in order to enter the spawning zone for the Nightmare Ox and they both decided that this was a clear indication of just that. They split apart to a certain extent but maintained a maximum distance of ten meters from each other so that rushing in and helping the other wasn't an issue. It was a relatively open field they were in save for a few rocks and boulders here and there, and it wasn't until Toran passed by a decently sized rock that he heard a strange growl.

"It's around here, get ready," Toran suggested as he pulled his sword and shield from their resting places on his back.

Any second now, they would be attacked and the battle would begin. Toran gestured to Sinon that they should just wait in this vicinity for it to come to them so he cautiously checked around the nearby rock while Sinon readied her first arrow. While Toran was on the opposite side of the rock to Sinon, he heard that same unusual growl a second time, except this one sounded louder and slightly closer to a roar.

Toran went to look behind him in case of a surprise attack but felt a couple of tiny rocks fall from above and hit his shoulder. Dreading the worst, he looked up towards the top of the rock and before he could signal a warning to Sinon, the terrifying red-eyed Nightmare Ox lunged at him from above. Through seemingly sheer willpower alone, he barely dodge-rolled out of the way of the AOE attack but caught a whiff of the splash damage, to which 5% of his health was cut away.

The commotion led Sinon to their location but was unaware of the speed of the enemy, she tried to ready her bow but the Ox charged at her with a running attack and knocked her a few feet away which carved away at her health by 15%.

Toran leaped up from his prone position and swung unsuccessfully at the shadow-like enemy to draw it's attention away from the bow user. The Ox attempted to swing around and headbutt Toran away but his knowledge of the enemy allowed him to counter. Toran side-stepped backward just enough to avoid the swinging headbutt attack and used the moment of his turn to slash downward at the Ox's neck.

He felt his attack land for a brief moment before the Ox turned shadow again and made the rest of the attack. The Ox retreated a few feet after it had lost a fraction of its health and readied a second assault on the duo. In the short moment they had before the Ox attacked again, Toran revised the plan.

"Sinon, get to high ground. I'll act as bait for the enemy as use my shield to block its charges. As soon as it makes contact, fire your arrows. This is the only way we'll defeat it." Sinon nodded in reply to his words and retreated to the nearest boulder before climbing on top of it and using it as an archer tower. As soon as she had done this, the Ox lunged at Toran for a charge but instead of dodging, Toran stood his ground and readied his shield in front of him.

The Ox made contact with the shield and the impact caused a massive noise to resonate throughout the entire area. To Toran, the noise and impact together were almost enough to knock him off his feet, but without missing a beat, Sinon launched an Iron arrow from her bow and watched it impale itself in the Ox's shoulder which made it's health go down a further 10%. The Ox roared in pain as it withdrew itself from Toran's range and laid eyes on Sinon. Not wanting this to happen, Toran once again slashed at the Ox to no avail as to try and regain its attention. Eventually, he succeeded and the Ox made another attempt to swing it's head around and knock Toran over.

Toran managed to quickly get his shield up in front of him again and the Ox's horn made contact with it. The attack didn't damage Toran but it sent him flying back a few meters. Toran had barely recovered from the knock before the Ox pointed it's horns at him and charged with all it's might yet again. There wasn't enough time for Toran to get his shield fully back up in front of him before the Ox reached him but he tried anyway and managed to stop most of the attack from hitting him. However, one of the horns found it's way into his right shoulder and the penetration made him drop his shield.

Had it not been for Sinon's perfect timing in hitting the Ox in the rear with an arrow as it attacked him, he would've been hurt a lot more.

At this point, both Toran and the Ox had lost around 20% of their health, but since all the damage to the Ox had been from Sinon, it turned it's focus to her and despite Toran's best efforts to keep its focus on him, it ignored him and made a beeline for Sinon. Startled by the Ox's sudden charge on her, Sinon fumbled for another arrow but lost her grip on it and it fell to the floor. No sooner had she taken her eyes off the Ox had it rammed the boulder she was on and made her lose her balance and fall. The hard impact of landing flat on her back caused her to lose a further 5% of her health.

As she looked back up at the Ox, she saw that it was about to trample on her, which would surely damage her health by an insane amount, maybe even almost kill her. Not only that but the awkward position she had landed in made it impossible for her to roll out of the way in time. So she could do nothing but watch in horror as the hooves of the Ox started to descend on her.

But at that very moment, a blinding blue light shone brilliantly from behind the Ox, causing it to take physical form, and smashed it from the rear, sending it tumbling a few meters away.

Sinon had barely realized what had just happened before Toran kicked off the ground from his position and bolted like a beam of light towards the prone Ox. The Ox had only just started to get back up before Toran raised his sword in the sky and slashed downwards with all his might, carving an insanely deep cut right in the Ox's stomach. But that was only the start of it, he captured the momentum of his first attacked and sliced again sideways, then again upwards, then downwards once more. Toran was merciless in his endless attacks.

The Ox's health bar hopelessly dropped from 50%, 40, 30, 20, 10 in the blink of an eye, and then to finish it off, Sinon, now recovered, launched an arrow from her bow which pierced the Ox right between the eyes.

The Ox flinched shook for a few moments before it rag-dolled lifelessly on the ground. A few seconds later, it exploded in the usual crystallized fashion and its rewards and contents were split evenly between the two. But since Sinon was the one who started the quest, she received the Nightmare Ox's tail which was the main item of the quest. Now all they needed to do was deliver the tail to the quest giver. Both Toran and Sinon heaved long sighs of relief as this was both their second ever major quest completion in this new game. The XP they gained allowed both of them to achieve Level 7. But that wasn't what interested Sinon the most.

"Toran, what the heck was that blue light you used?" She asked curiously.

"It's a skill called Shield Bash, it unlocked it when I first bought the weapon. If I level it up more, I can knock over much bigger and heavier things than just Ox's though," Toran explained. He then became curious about something himself. "By the way Sinon, why didn't you use your shock magic? I feel like that would've counted as a light source." Toran pondered, causing Sinon herself to realize her mistake.

"Shit, I forgot about it in the heat of the moment," She pouted in annoyance to her own stupidity. "You're right, that would've made things a lot easier." Sinon continued complaining briefly before they started to walk back to Urbus together. To keep the conversation moving, Toran reminisced about the battle.

"That fight was pretty rough, but considering how hard it was, I'm glad we were able to finish it as quickly as we did," Toran thought back to his actions during the battle and wondered if there was a way they could've fought without any damage on their end. Sinon however, thought about something different.

"Speaking of which, you seem pretty competent when it comes to fighting. You experienced in other fighting games?" She asked. A fair question indeed, but Toran wasn't necessarily ready to answer that. So he lied through his teeth.

"Yeah, I guess you could say I'm experienced in a few other games. I don't really do much else, to be honest," Toran claimed, but honesty was far from what he was doing, he internally cringed at how both true and false that answer was at the same time. If he was ever going to tell anyone the truth, it would be Kirito, and even then he wanted to keep it to himself as long as possible.

After a while, he and Sinon reached the gates at the edge of the crater that surrounded Urbus. The casual banter he was able to throw around with Sinon had got his mind off his predicament and he could feel himself getting more comfortable with being around Kirito's friends. Upon giving the Ox's tail to the quest giver in Urbus, Toran and Sinon received another batch of XP that allowed them both to level up to level 8. As they left the quest givers house, the faintest hints of sunrise started to show itself over the distant horizon.

"That was a lot of fun, all things considered," Sinon smiled with the self-joy of completing her first quest without the help of Kirito or Asuna.

"For sure, I could definitely get used to this," Toran said in agreement to her statement as he momentarily thought about what other adventures were in store for this unusual group of people.

"Then why don't we do something like this again some time," Sinon asked happily, though it was less of a question, more of a statement. "We make a pretty good team, you and me." Her words made all sorts of emotions run through his head, but above all, it was something that he really enjoyed the thought of.

"Can't wait," He smiled back. The two ten proceeded back towards the small house belonging to Kirito in the faint light of the morning. On their way back though, Sinon opened her menu to see if she had unlocked anything new through her leveling up but found something even more interesting.

"Huh? I got a message from Kirito?" She said curiously as she opened the notification. Upon reading it, her expression heavily changed. "No way, we can log out now? I'm really sorry Toran but I have to try something quickly, I'll see you back at this house," Her words were rushed as she quickly opened her settings menu and pressed the log out button.

"Uh, sure," Toran spoke with confusion as he watched Sinon fade from existence in a flash of blue. Of course, he knew what she was doing, but seeing it happen made him want to cry. In fact, after the particle effects of Sinon logging out had dispersed completely, he did nothing but cry. He ran to a nearby corner, put his head against the wall and, despite his best efforts, started crying his eyes out.

Alas, another fight scene has finally appeared in my story! I would like to hear your thoughts on it. However, keep in mind that I purposefully toned the action down a tad as I don't want to accidentally write my best fight scene early on then not be able to top it in the later floors.

Also, this chapter provides small hints here and there about the past of Toran. He's a mysterious one indeed. Brownie points to whoever can guess what happened to him ;) (speaking of which, tell me you're thoughts on switching perspective to Toran for a bit. I enjoyed writing via my OC for once)

Anyway, back to what I was saying up top;

Three, just so you're all aware, we're going to be staying on the first two floors for quite some time. As you all know I've written very far ahead and I will say honestly that we spend quite a lot of time on the first two floors. So as a result of this, when we finally do a skip, it'll have to be a relatively big one as, while I do want to make this story long, I don't want to still be writing it ten years from now. But, I promise it will be the ONLY big skip and every other one after it will be small.

Lastly, this isn't necessarily important but, I may POSSIBLY be starting another fanfic about Darling in the FRANXX (Say what you will about the ending, the first half of that show was amazing) and if I do decide to go through with it, it will be replacing my other fanfic, High School LxL and will hinder the progress of this one for a small while. BUT, that's only if I decide to go through with writing it. It's not likely, but it's possible.

Damn, these A/N's of mine are really getting long, I need to start shortening them at some point. Oh well, until next time and PLEASE TAKE PART IN THE POLLS FROM THE LAST CHAPTER, I WON'T BE UPDATING THIS STORY UNTIL I GET ENOUGH RESULTS. K, bye.

pls excuse all spelling and grammar mistakes, proofreading ain't my strong suit,