While acquiring ALO was easy, trying to find where Asuna and Eri were was difficult. Whoever had them put their avatars in a sealed room, which only high level players could access and even then it was heavily restricted.
The problem came in the real world. Izuku eventually registered his quirk as "a passive visual quirk that allowed one to observe real world growth aspects similar to a game". Which was all technically true but didn't go into specifics. He called it "Gamer" and left it at that, claiming that his time in SAO had allowed his quirk to finally mature enough that it could be used and had the side effect of preventing his body from deteriorating like the other players.
Eventually someone would notice the fact it did more than allow him to read status effects.
But considering he was still too weak, he was willing to leave it at that to prevent Villains from targeting him specifically.
Kirito, in the spirit of a true gamer, insisted on leveling up both in the game and real life. The fact Yui could join them in real world dungeons came as an unexpected surprise...but a nice bonus as well.
Izuku theorized that the 'dungeons' they found were sub-dimensions and that Yui was able to use some sort of weird aspect of his Gamer quirk to manifest via their phones which were linked to the NerveGear.
After the mess with SAO, someone found a way to link normal technology to the VR headsets to allow people to contact those using it from outside. It was still pretty glitchy, but the peace of mind it provided to those still trapped was immeasurable.
Still, at least it wasn't boring.
"Remind me again why we're compulsively leveling ourselves in the real world?" groaned Kirito.
"Because if we want to beat the high level dungeon Eri is trapped in and free her once and for all, we need to grind our asses off. At least we managed to get the base up and running."
"Don't remind me. I never knew building something was such a pain in the ass..." said Kirito.
Because neither of them had the "hero" job class, they couldn't exactly build a base in the city. So they had to buy some land outside it and create a "secret base" for their future guild, though it was considered an 'illegal' one because of what they planned to do with it.
Personally Izuku felt that the world could benefit from introducing a proper guild system. The way the heroes ran around dealing with issues was half-assed at best, and left no room for the weaker heroes to make a proper living without sponsorship. And that only lead to the rise of people who believed all you needed to be a hero was to have an impressive quirk.
Case in point, Bakugo and Endeavor.
Neither of them noticed at first the fact they were being watched cleaning the beach, but Izuku took notice when he stood up.
He blinked.
"Who are you?" he asked. Kirito started at that.
"I never thought a pair of young aspiring heroes would be here cleaning up the beach," he said.
The man was gaunt, almost skeletal in fact. His eyes were sunken in, but blazed like blue coals. His hair was like a yellow sunflower and he wore clothes that hung loosely from his frame. In short, he didn't look impressive at all at first glance.
But Izuku had the gamer quirk, and the man's basic stats read something far different than his image presented.
Yagi Toshinori
Job Class: Pro Hero
Level: 75
Popularity in Hero Form: 100%
Alignment: Lawful Good
Kirito, who was pretty much a permanent team member, took one look at the man's stats and had wide eyes.
"To be honest I'd rather be a pro gamer than a pro hero. Less work for a lot more fun," said Kirito.
"What's your handle?" he asked. Seeing their looks, he became a tad sheepish. "I play the pre-quirk games on my days off, and I'm pretty regular on the forums for the classics."
Izuku had a good feeling about this guy. Plus this felt a lot like a one-time random event that might lead to something really good.
It didn't hurt that having a pro hero sponsor you at UA raised the chances of actually getting in. Izuku had used his quirk to check the school out, since they did answer questions online about prospective students.
Recommendation students were decided years in advance, but there were certain methods to raise your chances at getting into the school the other way. Like the little known clause allowing pro heroes to join via an apprenticeship to one of the pro hero teachers.
"I'm Galahad," said Izuku.
"Kirito."
The man's eyes widened incredulous.
"You mean the Elven King Galahad who freed the players early because he figured out Kayaba's ruse?" he said in shock. "Then you must be the same black swordsman who dealt the final blow."
Izuku flushed. People were still talking about that, and it was embarrassing as hell. Fortunately the player data from the game was never officially released, but the survivors had spoken out about who freed them.
"I have to ask, what was it that tipped you off about his character? That's the one thing I never got when I asked around before."
"Well there is a player who tragically lost her real body thanks to SAO's trap who told us about a glitch buff called 'immortal object' in the game. Basically no matter what happened, you wouldn't die in SAO," said Izuku. "Her quirk allowed her to access the game without a NerveGear, but when she was trapped people mistook her body for dead because she lived in a relatively rural area, so it was cremated before anyone could figure out what happened."
Izuku had, in a bit of boredom, expanded on Yui's "official" backstory. As she could digitally alter any records online, it kept things nice and tidy and made it easier for her to blend in as a regular girl offline.
"It didn't help that her dad was Kayaba, and he was so protective of her that he kept her off official records. He even went and deleted her birth records and moved her out of the bigger cities," added Kirito.
"Anyway I thought it weird Heathcliff didn't solo the bosses himself and clear SAO since he couldn't die, so I thought I'd test whether his so called skill was a real thing. Turns out it was just a disguise for the glitch buff," said Izuku.
"Good thing Yui uploaded her data to our NerveGear, or else she'd be in real trouble," said Kirito.
"And the fact that the SAO game code had an unusual additive that looked remarkably similar to recent attempts to create an artificial intelligence...?" said the hero amused.
Izuku looked at him oddly.
"There is no way a normal pro hero would know about that. Only the top five were ever cleared to know that information, or those actively working to try and release the players from the game outside. And even then the full details were so heavily restricted that only a select few were given the information. Exactly who are you?" said Izuku suspiciously.
"How about a fair trade then...tell me the real reason you appear to be grinding your skills in real life and managed to maintain a decent physical shape despite being trapped for two years, and I'll tell you my hero identity."
Izuku looked at Kirito.
"What do you think?"
"This feels like a special one-time event, and we haven't had any of those yet. Besides, our leveling has been hitting a brick wall recently...especially since we can't use our special skills outside the dungeons without the pro heroes getting on our ass," said Kirito.
Izuku grimaced at the reminder. That had been very annoying, and for two high level players to be restricted from properly grinding their skills, their levels had stagnated.
"There's a high level one-time dungeon we need to clear, in order to rescue a player that was deliberately trapped in SAO. It's also part of a hidden storyline and the real reason people were killed when their characters died in the game," said Izuku honestly.
"You make it sound like the game is still going on."
"For us, it is," said Kirito. "Izuku either woke up some sort of weird quirk or it was triggered when Yui uploaded her primary data into his NerveGear. Either way both of us have the ability to treat real life as a game, but as far as we can tell what it can do is heavily restricted to games Izuku has played on his NerveGear. Since I was still part of his party when we were logged out, my body kept it's condition despite being in a coma for two years."
"The problem is that it's a passive ability, and our stats are barely acceptable for someone at level ten playing SAO. That's why we're trying to level up, so we can deal with that dungeon."
"So there's a special one-time downloadable dungeon in the real world that has a player still trapped inside, and you want to clear it?"
"It doesn't help that Izuku's youngest daughter is the one trapped," said Kirito, grinning.
"You're what, fourteen, maybe fifteen?" said the hero dubious.
"Fourteen and a half, and in SAO players over the age of fifteen were allowed to marry," deadpanned Izuku. "Eri's quirk accidentally killed her father, and her mother called her curse. So when she meet a player willing to dote on her like the child she is, she latched onto me and called me her real daddy instead of brother. It's not like it matters anyway...she's still family."
"And Yui, once she meet him, followed suit and became the big sister of the two," grinned Kirito.
Accepting that explanation, the hero had only one thing to ask. Izuku had the distinct impression this would lead to a special event that would grant "apprentice" status or something similar.
"This girl Eri. How old is she in real life?"
"She was only five and a half when we logged out, and Yui would be about eight or nine physically. Eri has no idea what her quirk does since she was put into SAO shortly after being given to someone else, but she knows it's dangerous if used incorrectly," said Izuku flatly.
"A pair of aspiring heroes, desperately leveling up their own skills for the sole purpose of rescuing a young princess in distress is something I simply can't ignore," said the hero, smiling broadly. "To top it all off, they aren't doing it for the fame, the glory or even for the money, but for the simple act of saving an innocent from a bad situation and to give them a better life. Tell me, Galahad was it? Why do you want to be a hero?"
Izuku grinned and Kirito groaned.
"I want to be like All Might! I've always been inspired by the way he first came onto the scene and made people feel safe by saying 'I am Here!' without showing any fear about dangerous situations or villains! Even before my quirk awoke and I was told it was useless, I always kept that dream alive!" said Izuku enthusiastically. "A hero needs to protect people because it's the right thing to do, not because it'll make them famous or rich."
"You just had to get the number one All Might fanboy going, didn't you?" groaned Kirito. "Seriously, he saves every video he gets his hands on that has All Might in it, and he watches all the interviews and appearances with the girls the first chance he gets. I swear he had a terabyte hard drive dedicated to the videos alone."
The blond blushed a bit, though it quickly became obvious why after he transformed. The last thing either boy expected was for the gaunt, almost skeletal blond to turn into the number one hero himself...All Might.
Izuku's jaw dropped, and Kirito about died...just not for the reasons All Might would have anticipated.
"Oh my god... of course you'd end up with a special event where you attract your absolute favorite hero's attention!" howled Kirito.
"Shut up!" said Izuku, his brain rebooting.
Izuku saw the pop-up for a long-term quest series from All Might. The reward was a full apprenticeship and a hidden bonus if he completed all the objectives before the UA entrance exam.
Well, there was no way he was saying no to a special event quest like this. He'd be kicking himself forever if he did.
All Might, in his civilian form, had Izuku and Kirito sit down for a serious talk about the real story behind Yui. He included someone who had the ability to help create a proper identity for her once she obtained a body. Considering the nature of Izuku's quirk, there was every possibility that they might stumble on a way to let her interact properly in the real world.
Nezu, the principal of UA.
"So boys, who is Yui really?" asked Nezu.
"She's an AI designed by Kayaba himself. He implanted her data into SAO as a sort of enclosed environment so she could learn human behavior without anyone knowing. But he started to run out of funding because it was delaying the game, so he found an external source...from the defunct Yakuza groups. They agreed to fund him in exchange for putting Eri into the game and using SAO as a testing ground for a bug they developed that would cause players to die for real if their avatars did," said Izuku.
"How do you know this?" asked Nezu.
"Yui told us. And I've looked at the code itself...it's too crude to be Kayaba's work," said Kirito seriously.
"Actually, it might be easier if she explains herself," said Izuku.
"Oh? So this Yui is still around outside the NerveGear?" asked Nezu with open interest.
"If I might borrow this?" asked Izuku. Nezu nodded with permission, openly fascinated. Izuku pulled out his phone and synced it with the TV using the Bluetooth controls.
The screen had a loading image, before Yui popped onto it with her usual gear.
"Hi daddy!" she chirped.
"Yui, how's one of my favorite girls doing?" said Izuku warmly. Yui giggled. "Yui, why don't you explain to them the real reason Kayaba trapped us in SAO. No one outside our group heard the full story from someone involved in this mess."
"Okay daddy!" said Yui cheerfully.
Yui became slightly more serious, and expanded on the full story of why Kayaba trapped ten thousand people in the game.
"Kayaba originally planned to let players into the game normally and allow them to log out without any issues. But his company was getting angry because the game was taking so long and refused to increase his budget so he could implant my data into it. So during one of his many episodes of sleep-deprived 'genius', he reached out to...external...sources for funding," said Yui. "This group is part of a collective of former Yakuza, who are angry that the current climate has robbed them of so much power...especially the pro hero class. Not everyone in the group agrees with them, but the current leader is determined to remove quirks from the equation and bring their power back to what it once was."
"What does Izuku's adopted daughter Eri have to do with this?"asked Toshinori.
"She awakened a very rare Time-type quirk called Rewind. Essentially, her power allows her to reverse time in living matter," said Yui. "The problem is that her blood can also act as a catalyst, and when the villains discovered this they decided to come up with an anti-quirk drug. On SAO's initial launch date, they had only just found a way to catalyze the ability present in her blood, but to my knowledge they only have a prototype that has a sixty-percent success rate of draining a quirk from it's victims. They placed Eri in SAO to keep her docile and to minimize her upkeep, as Kayaba required a great deal of funding to add my programming into the game."
The pro heroes were understandably alarmed by this information.
"And what about the bug that killed the players? What part does that have to play?" asked Nezu seriously.
"The bug was not Kayaba's idea. It was the original demand of the yakuza so that they might be able to perform a series of selective assassinations on certain players. SAO was insanely popular and no one would have looked twice if 'accidents' happened during the initial launch. They planned to refine it for as long as the game was being played...then they found a way to catalyze Eri's blood and use her quirk without the girl herself, and altered the original plan."
"How do you know all this?" asked Toshinori. This was grim news indeed...and the sad thing was he believed it.
Nothing about Kayaba's actions had made any sense until this point.
"Their servers might be protected from outside intrusion, but upon uploading my data to Eri's NerveGear I was able to infiltrate it. Unfortunately I cannot pinpoint where they are right now, as they are on a closed circuit system and they always raise the system's protections every time I enter their servers from her NerveGear. If they realize her device is the source of the intrusion they might act rashly, and the bug is still in her device," said Yui apologetically.
"That is unfortunate. And what about you, Ms. Midoriya? What are your intentions once you are able to interact with the physical world?"
Yui blinked, before she beamed broadly at Nezu who made it clear he acknowledged her relationship with her daddy.
"I want to help Daddy in his hero work! He needs a good secretary, because he was absolutely terrible at keeping things together for the guild!" chirped Yui.
"Hey!" said Izuku, mock protesting. "I wasn't that bad at it!"
"Daddy you were always too busy helping out the Assault team or testing new quests to see what their level was for the guild to deal with administrative work. And I liked working as the face of the guild!"
"Assault team?" repeated Nezu.
"It's what we called the stronger members who cleared the boss floors and opened up the next level in SAO. Asuna, Galahad and I were considered the top three players in the entire game," said Kirito. "Considering Kayaba set the release condition as clearing the absolute final boss on floor one hundred...well...we were fairly motivated to get through it as quickly as possible."
"So what happens to Yui once she gets her own body?" asked Izuku. He was more concerned with that.
"I believe we'll be properly expanding your backstory for her existence and keep her true nature to a very limited number of people," said Nezu. "Your explanation of her having a quirk that allowed her to log onto SAO without a NerveGear is very effective at curtailing why she doesn't have a body and why she can act on the internet so freely."
They had already established a backstory... Nezu had the connections to make it look real enough to pass inspection from all those cleared to know of her existence. So long as she gave them no reason to look further, no one would discover her true nature anytime soon.