Galahad looked up at the sky and wondered if he was finally free of SAO. They had fought hard and managed to beat Kayaba...mostly thanks to the teamwork of Kirito and Galahad after Asuna sacrificed herself to save her boyfriend.

Then he saw the loading bar and grimaced.

"Dammit, so we're still stuck here."

"For at least another thirty minutes, yes," said a familiar voice.

Kayaba was there and from the looks of it Kirito and Asuna were starting to wake up.

Galahad was in disbelief when he heard the reason WHY the bug was added in the first place.

"So you did all this, and added the bug that would kill us...because you were sleep deprived?"

"And here I thought Yui's story about why Eri was in the game was bad," said Kirito.

Kayaba's expression hearing those names was interesting.

"Wait, what does Eri have to do with this?" asked Asuna.

"Apparently someone thought it was a brilliant idea to strike a deal with the yakuza, and in exchange put a four year old in the game in exchange for money," said Galahad.

"Seriously? The Yakuza are still a thing?" said Asuna. "And how does Yui know about this?"

"Yui's quirk. It allowed her to log into SAO without the NerveGear, but thanks to this idiot she got stuck. There's a high chance she was mistaken for dead because of it," said Galahad annoyed.

Kayaba understood what Galahad was really doing. He was giving his creation a story that she could feed the heroes to explain why she didn't have a body, and why there were no records of her on paper. Quirks were so varied that it was entirely possible that someone COULD possess an ability that would allow them to log onto SAO, only to get trapped. And with how young Yui looked, it was also possible that she could have a quirk that was mis-registered.

In a way he was grateful...it meant there was a chance Yui could experience and learn what it was like to be a 'human' before someone found out she was a digital life form created by him.

"That reminds me...how much time do we have until this thing completely logs us out?" asked Galahad.

"About five minutes, give or take," said Kayaba promptly.

"Can you summon Bakugo...I mean Nitroburst here?"

"Why?" asked Kayaba. He could barely tolerate that brat on a good day.

"You've spent at least a year or more with him, right?" said Galahad.

"Try close to twenty long months," said Kayaba annoyed.

"So wouldn't you like to be there when he hears exactly what condition his real body's in and the fact that he's under quirk suppressing drugs with his parent's permission, and that because of it his ability to use his explosions are going to be shot to hell and his body won't be able to handle the bigger ones he can make until long after the deadline to enter UA has passed?" said Galahad.

Kayaba shared a Look with Galahad...it wasn't a nasty one, but more of commiseration and empathy on what a pain in the ass "Nitroburst" could be on a good day.

"I'll make sure he's still paralyzed until the very last second," said Kayaba. "I want to see this."

Galahad was all sparkles and sunshine. It was time for some long overdue payback.

Bakugo looked confused, then royally pissed when he saw Izuku there.

"You...isn't it enough that you had to ruin my glory, shitty Deku?!"

"Nope," said Izuku, who glanced at Kayaba who held up three fingers. "I just wanted to let you know exactly what's waiting for you when we log out."

"What."

"You see since our bodies were immobile for two years, your muscles have atrophied and your fat stores have dropped to dangerously low levels...not only that, but due to the nature of your quirk, your parents authorized the use of a long term quirk suppressant drug, which means when you wake up you're not going to be able to use your quirk at all," said Izuku with far too much glee.

"WHAT?!" said Bakugo furious.

"Not only that, but thanks to the fact you've been stuck in here for two years, your ability to use the larger explosions has dropped down considerably, because your body isn't able to handle the shock from the blasts anymore. Isn't that nice?" said Izuku.

"You bastard!" said Bakugo.

"Oh, and it gets even better! Your mother was less than impressed that you never made any attempts to contact her, while I've been regularly chatting with my mother since I figured out that we could use the forums to do so!" said Izuku, with far too much glee. "I'm sure she's going to have a lot to say about that, once she gets over the fact you're free again."

Bakugo was livid. Kayaba was enjoying the brat who gave him the most headaches while he was acting as a guild master learning exactly how fucked he was once he was out of the game.

Before Bakugo could react to this information, Izuku had a rather wicked expression...right as they logged out.

Payback was his.

Izuku waited until he heard his mother come back from lunch... before he nearly gave her a heart attack by squeezing her hand.

"Hi mom...I'm back."

"IZUKU!"

Alerted by the cry of a relieved mother, the doctors came in...and to the shock of everyone Izuku was slowly removing the Nervegear for the first time in two years.

"Ugh...I feel disgusting..." he said. Which was understandable...it wasn't like they could properly wash him while he had a helmet on his head.

The noise level at the hospital went up by a considerable amount as other players were released from their prisons and started waking up.

The Nightmare of Sword Art Online was finally over.

Izuku wondered if this was a side effect of having the NerveGear on and being in SAO for so long, or if it was because he had told Yui to use his device to save her data to.

Either way it didn't feel like he was out of SAO at all.

The only reason he knew he wasn't in SAO was because he had run into a very pissed off Bakugo who looked emaciated and was spitting fire over the fact his quirk wasn't working. The doctors had to sedate him before they could remove some of the tubes he had on and did more damage to himself.

(Case in point, the catheter or the IV line that lead to the vein in his body.)

The thing was...Izuku was in good condition despite being immobile for two years. There was no mistaking the warmth or scent of his mother, or the feel of her tears of relief. Or, and this still made him scrunch his nose in disgust...the feel of dirt, grime and gods knew what else that had accumulated for months without end in his hair.

He felt absolutely filthy, and once the needles were out he immediately hit the first shower he could find.

The fact he didn't see the 'blur' effect around his body when he took the shower was more evidence he was finally out. His privacy filter in the game was set to keep anything "adult" rated from showing up in his NerveGear.

The reason for his confusion was pretty simple really.

He could still see the same display he saw in SAO. Only now it read "Midoriya Izuku" and not Galahad.

As he laid down in his new bed, he decided to play around with it on a whim.

Sure enough, the controls were identical to what he was already used to.

Finally, he found a log of events.

"Here we go..." he said to himself.

He skimmed most of it, as it was all things he was aware of, until he found something that made him sit up.

"'Awakening of Quirk?'" he whispered in shock. There was no way. He immediately expanded the 'event' to get more details...then he had to chuckle. "That little imp. I'm going to have to spoil her rotten for this."

The 'event' coincided with the day Yui uploaded her data into his NerveGear. "Galahad" had been designated the primary caretaker of her data. He had to wonder if it was a side effect of having Yui uploaded to his NerveGear, or if she had done something to fulfill his long lost desire to be a hero in the real world.

Either way, he planned to fully enjoy this unexpected surprise to the fullest.

Which was why his inner troll all but demanded that he contact the one person in his party that would likely meet up with him.

Barely withholding a cackle, Izuku contacted Kazuto...aka Kirito.

"Yo Kirito, guess what happened after I logged out?" he said in a sing-song voice. "We really need to spoil Yui rotten."

Izuku let out his cackle when Kirito's yelp made it through the chat window, along with some rather impressive swearing. Fortunately his mother was out getting ingredients so she didn't hear it.

"Galahad? What the fuck...I thought we were out of the game!" said Kirito.

"We are. But apparently there were side effects to letting Yui upload her data to our NerveGear. Either that or because most of her data was on mine anyway," said Izuku cheerfully.

"Actually you might have a point. My body is in way too good a shape for someone who's been in a coma-like state for two years," said Kirito. Izuku could hear the game menu opening. "And this is still available."

Izuku waited for Kirito to go through his stats page.

"This is surreal...it even gives an accurate description of my quirk!"

Kirito's quirk was called "Codex". It gave him the ability to memorize and alter code directly using any electronic device he could get his hands on that was connected to the internet. The second he figured out the extent of his quirk, he became quite the hacker and it was the reason he fell in love with video games.

He still wouldn't confirm or deny whether he used his quirk to get into the Beta of SAO or not though.

"We seriously need to meet IRL," said Izuku.

"Absolutely," agreed Kirito without hesitation.

The two made plans for next week, once their families got over the shock of them being out. Besides, they needed time to adjust too.

"Galahad! Man, it is weird seeing you IRL, in normal clothes," said Kirito.

"Hey Kirito. So how's Asuna?" asked Izuku, clasping his friend's hand. He even had his hair cut to match the one he had in SAO.

Kirito went silent.

"What happened."

"She never logged out. I finally tracked her down using my quirk, but according to what the doctor's said, she's still trapped. Apparently there's a few others who couldn't log out either...something about a malfunction of the servers. They're still alive, but..."

"But they're still playing," finished Izuku. "Did you try asking Yui?"

Kirito blinked. He hadn't thought of that.

"Wait...you can still talk to Yui?"

Izuku grinned.

"Yui, how would you like to say hi to your uncle IRL?"

Kirito heard his phone buzz. Thanks to his 'niece', he had enough money to buy the most high end, advanced model he could get his hands on.

To see Yui grinning and waving at him caused tears to well up in his eyes. He was glad to see she was alright.

"Mind putting her on speakerphone?" said Izuku.

"Yeah," said Kirito.

"Hi uncle Kirito! I know why Asuna is still inside the servers. It seems that the company who took over the SAO servers after Kayaba's announcement have strong ties with her father. In fact there's already legal proceedings to marry her to the CEO of the company by her father. It's going to take a while for it to go through the courts, but considering the money involved..." said Yui.

Kirito grimaced...she didn't need to say more than that.

"What can we do? I mean the legal age to get married in Japan is sixteen for girls and I'm guessing this asshole is already way past eighteen."

"There is one account holding her hostage. If that player is taken out, however temporarily, I can hack into it and release the players still trapped," said Yui. "From what I can tell, he's apparently found out about the glitch that allowed real-world changes through the NerveGear...he's been focused on raising his Charisma stat in the game."

"Oh hell..." said Izuku, face-palming.

"Why do I have the feeling I won't like what you're about to say?"

"Because you're not an idiot? If he's raising his charisma, he must have figured out the more useful applications of that particular stat," said Izuku.

"I don't get it," said Kirito.

"Ever heard of the term 'charismatic bastard'?" said Izuku deadpan.

"Oh. OHHH...Oh hell, that's bad," said Kirito. "That is really, really bad."

"My point exactly. Depending on what the guy is like, we need to put a stop to this as fast as possible before it gets too high to reverse."

Charisma was a very strange thing. It could make people follow a complete moron without a second thought.

If someone was trying to artificially raise their natural levels of charisma, then they could do a lot of damage even if it wasn't directly.

Izuku had only raised his to provide a buffer from something like that. Well, that and because he wanted to have a character with roughly even traits until he took up the name "Elven King Galahad".

"So, any idea where she's trapped?" asked Izuku.

"The players still trapped in the servers were switched automatically to the game servers of ALfiem Online, which is collectively called ALO by current players," reported Yui. "Coincidentally Eri is with Asuna's character, as the person who made the switch made a deal with the people who have her hostage."

Izuku looked up the game...then a slow grin filled his face.

"What?" said Kirito.

"The game is fairy based...which makes sense because Alfiem was where the Light Elves lived in Norse mythology."

"Huh...Oh. I get it now," grinned Kirito.

"I already reserved the name King_Galahad on the server for you daddy!" chirped Yui. "I knew you'd be interested considering your character."

"What about me?"

"I reserved the name Lord_Kirito for you," said Yui. "Since the ending of SAO, the names have skyrocketed in popularity... everyone knows who ended the game for good, but only the players are aware of what you look like in real life."

"Lord Kirito...has a nice ring to it."

"Coincidentally our guild name is Lothlorien. Someone reserved the name of Imladris before I could," said Yui apologetically.

"Eh, if that was taken I would have gone with 'Grey Havens'," said Izuku.

"Well that's a depressing name."

"Better than Mordor," deadpanned Izuku.

"True."