I'm back bitches! All jokes aside, while I love the world Reki Kawahara created, the man can't write dialogue worth shit, and focuses too much on the details of game mechanics rather than character interaction. This makes it super difficult to read through the books because frankly his Kirito? Never getting laid, ever, unless the exchange of money was involved.

Seriously, most of my friends are women, and they would never put up with his downright creepy behavior, so the harem fics that tend to pop up around him are almost hilarious in scope, if they weren't downright sad.

That being said, having Keiko, the incredibly demisexual girl she is have to deal with the shit Reki threw male Kirito into to form his not/harem is kind of hilarious. I feel bad for her, but my god am I not going to do anything to save her from it.

Anyway, I once again throw out a salute to my co-author and partner in crime Lady Lily Anne, and cordially request a read and review!

Asuna took a knee as King Asterios, the third, final, and completely unexpected Minotaur, taurus, whatever the hell this game wanted to call bipedal cows, exploded in a cascade of glittering polygons. Kirito was much less subtle about her exhaustion as she simply fell on her back limbs spread eagle, breathing heavily she extended one hand to the ceiling displaying a rather rude gesture while grinning impishly.

Asuna couldn't help laughing as she toppled over causing Kirito to grunt when her head landed on her friends stomach, the two young women just laid their huffing while they tried to recover from the exertion of the second floor boss fight. A few moments later Asuna finally registered the cheers of the surrounding raid but ignored them as she focused on how close she and Keiko had come to dying, again.

After thinking on it for a scant few seconds she decided that it was probably a bad idea to do that, best not to dwell, just be happy that she had made it. Twisting so she was on her back, but still using Kirito as a pillow Asuna glanced up at her loot box.

"Huh...last attack bonus again...cool..." Yeah, she was still exhausted, she would dance about in excitement over her new +50 Attack Speed ring later.

Keiko let out a sardonic laugh as she lifted her head to meet Asuna's questioning gaze, "You too eh? My loot is a +50 Dodge ring, which all told makes a lot of sense since I've already commented on my glass cannon status. Though it seems to be an ongoing trend with us to score the last hit...ah well" Both girls glanced up as several shadows fell across them, then there was a clang as their group leaders crashed to the ground around the pair, all grinning widely.

"Well," Klein began, "You two did get the last hit in again, although their was a lot less...grace in it then there was against Illfang." Before either of them could respond there was a rustle of wind as Argo suddenly appeared sitting on the ground opposite of Asuna, and promptly fell backwards using Kirito's other side as a pillow as well. Huffing Kirito glared at her friend a moment but decided not to comment on it, she was too tired, and just let her head hit the ground once again.

"Ki-chan and A-chan weren't doing their normal little dance routine, that was manic rage and panic at work there!" Argo chirped out happily, neither of them deigned it necessary to correct the information broker, so it was Diavel who spoke up next.

"Yeah, that third boss was...completely unexpected, thankfully its mechanics weren't all that different, just buffed up to the point where he nearly overpowered us."

Lind huffed at that as he leaned back, bracing himself with his hands behind him, "Yeah...about that, you guys sure that bastard wasn't in the beta?"

"Positive," Kirito, Argo, and Diavel stated as one, Lind grimaced and glanced to Thinker who only nodded in return.

"Well... We know what that means then don't we?"

Thinker sighed while pinching the bridge of his nose, "It means that we can safely assume every boss has been altered in some way. So any advantage we had from the beta testers is slowly being made null and void. What do we do to counter this?"

Still on the floor, and having no intention of moving in the foreseeable future, Kirito quickly spoke up.

"Well, we're going to have to do the quests around the dungeon to get the local lore on the bosses, we kinda skipped past it since we have been stuck on this floor for ten days and we all wanted to just get it over with. That...may have been an error on my part, I thought we could handle most obstacles that would pop up in this fight, I honestly never expected a third mob."

Klein snorted at that, "How could you have anticipated that, and lets be fair here the quests on this floor were boring as hell. Nearly all of them involved-"

"Cows," Asuna groaned out in frustration, "Everything involved freaking cows in one way or another. It got tedious after the second day."

"On the plus side," Argo chirped out, "The third floor is where SAO really begins, the first two floors were like tutorials in a way. Now we get epic sword battles against humanoid NPCs while involving ourselves in a generations long war between the Dark and Forest Elves, so we'll all be more inclined to do the quests."

Kirito froze a moment, then a sly grin slipped across her face as she reached up and flicked the noses of both the girls currently using her as a pillow, the pair making cute noises of discomfort as they sat up and glared at their friend. In one smooth motion Kirito kicked her legs out and landed on her feet, brushing herself off she offered a hand to her companions and pulled them off the ground.

"Well, now that you mention it we should probably get moving on that, why don't you boys head to the next town and open the gate for everyone else, let 'em know we're finally building some momentum."

Klein blinked a couple times in confusion while Lind just cocked his head to the side asking, "Wait, don't you wanna do it?"

Walking to the stairs leading to the third floor Kirito waved him off casually, "Nah, Argo and I got our fill in the beta and Asuna got to open the second floor, you guys did just as much as us so one of you gets the honor this time." This made several of the players exchange glances before the raid moved almost as one rushing past the girls and up the stairs, in the end it was only the trio and Diavel remaining.

The blue haired man stared at them a few moments before smirking knowingly, "You're starting off the elf quest before the rest of them can, aren't you?"

Kirito smiled coyly while giving him an exaggerated shrug, "Maaaaybe," she drawled out, earning snickers from the other girls, Diavel grinned in return.

"Dark or Forest?"

"Dark," the trio echoed.

"Cool, mind if I tag along?"

Kirito eyed him a moment, glanced to her companions who simply shrugged in turn, and then nodded to the man, "Come along then, lets get this rolling before the unwashed masses flood this floor."

Leaving the cleared boss room the quartet made their way up the stairs and soon passed through the open doors leading to the third floor, and once sighted they all gasped a bit at the beauty presented before them.

The surrounding area looked like an actual fantasy forest, ancient towering trees, loamy earth, speckles of sunlight bleeding through the leafy canopy as birds chirped in the distance. After ten days of the cow floor, it was an appreciated change.

Taking in the ferns slightly swaying in the breeze, the distant sound of animals, and the various and varied in color butterflies dancing about the enchanted forest, well, none of them could help but smile a bit. That is until their resident information broker ruined the entire premise, as was her wont.

"Anyone else feel like they are in a Miyazaki film?" Argo asked while scratching the side of her nose, Diavel shrugged lightly at that while looking back and forth at their surroundings.

"Eh, I was kinda thinking Lothlórien, what with the elves and all."

"Personally I was thinking Endor, but your ideas sound better," Kirito threw in, Asuna cocked her head to the side for a moment then turned to address Kirito.

"Wait...that's the one with the cannibal teddy bears, right?"

Kirito's eyes widened slightly as a happy smile graced her lips, "Wait you've seen the original Star Wars trilogy?! That's awesome! Which was your favorite?"

Asuna sputtered at her partners enthused reaction a moment but quickly regained her composure, tapping a finger against her lower lip a few times she eventually nodded and met Kirito's gaze evenly.

"The one with the robot walker thingies on the ice world, it was significantly less campy then the other two. Plus Han and Leia are kind of cute together, the whole 'I know' thing before he was frozen was romantic. My brother preferred the last one though, he liked seeing the fighter planes and ships blowing each other up."

Grinning, Keiko grabbed Asuna's hand and began swinging their arms back and forth happily earning a confused, if not pleased smile from the auburn haired girl, "Ah...I knew you had taste! So, did you like the third trilogy? It was kinda 'meh' in my opinion, and don't get Klein started on it, but at least it wasn't as bad as the prequel trilogy."

"I...I only saw the original trilogy and the Rey ones, Kou, my big brother told me I wasn't allowed to see the prequels. That I'd live a happier, more fulfilling life if I just ignored them, it was kind of confusing honestly..."

Diavel of all people spoke up at that, "Oh you sweet innocent child, your brother obviously loves you..."

Argo and Kirito snickered at that but before Asuna could respond they heard the clashing of blades and soon found themselves before a pair of heavily armored and armed elves. Kirito perked up and released Asuna's hand as she took a step forward and pointed at the duel in progress.

"And here we are! Since we're siding with the Dark Elves we have to attack the Forest Elf, midway through the battle he'll start monologuing and he'll get rushed by the Dark Elf and kill her. We finish him off, take the key and return it to her village and that begins the quest chain."

Asuna smirked grimly at this announcement, "So she dies no matter what huh?"

Kirito exchanged a look with Diavel and Argo before turning back to Asuna, "Err...yeah, how it worked in the beta at least."

Smirk turning into a grin Asuna drew her rapier and twirled it quickly as she stepped forward, "Challenge accepted."

What followed was an unmitigated beat down, the Forest Elf in the beta had been buffed against group attacks but either that hadn't been carried over, or he had never been intended to be the target of four over leveled and over geared players.

As he cried out in defeat and shattered into technicolor pixels Asuna rushed forward and addressed the Dark Elf NPC with worry obvious in her tone.

"Are you ok? Can I help you?" Shakily taking to her feet the elf accepted Asuna's hand to steady herself before shaking her head and gasping as her eyes widened in worry. She released Asuna's hand and rushed over to a woven leaf sack that lay on the ground, rummaging through it she pulled out a key that looked like it was carved from jade and sighed in relief.

"At the very least the Sanctuary is safe...thank you, your Majesties, thank you for helping me protect my people."

OK...this was so off script she wasn't even going to try and make sense of this shit, what should have happened didn't, and they got this mess instead.

Awesome.

Keiko rubbed the heels of her hands into her temples a few times before turning back to Argo and Diavel, who for their part were watching Asuna interact with the NPC as if it were a real person in honest confusion. Albeit a person with stiff speech patterns, but still, it was freaking interacting with her and calling both young women by their unwanted titles!

After a moment she eventually sighed, dropped her hands to her sides and turned to leave, "The quest is done, the next branch of the chain is open, lets head to town and get a room for the night and just forget this happened ok? At the very least we need to upgrade our weapons and sell our trash loot from the raid."

Argo nodded in agreement, and gently grabbed Asuna's arm dragging her away from the Dark Elf, feeling a bit rushed she waved to the NPC wishing it well and soon followed the group deeper into the forest. A few moments later the NPC rushed to Keiko's side while nodding once in recognition.

"For aiding me in my quest I shall escort you to your next destination. I am Kizmel, Royal Guard to the Dark Elf Court, it is a pleasure to meet you Kirito, the Black Queen of Aincrad."

Coming to a dead stop Kirito slowly turned her head to meet the visage of the bowing Kizmel, who had her right fist crossed over her heart in salute. A moment later a clash of swords was heard behind them, turning around the group witnessed the quest initiation had reset, and the respawned Forest Elf was now dueling with his Dark Elf counterpart once again.

A Dark Elf that was not Kizmel.

"Oh...fuck my life..."

It was a bit of a trek to Zumfet, the primary neutral city of the third floor, but they reached it easily enough what with all of them being over leveled and having a level fifteen NPC tagging along. It didn't take much time to find an inn in the city carved into and around the massive local trees, seeing as most players were scoping out the area for quests and treasure at the moment. So the girls managed to bag themselves a rather posh room while Diavel did the same for himself.

A few celebratory drinks later the group dispersed, and after a game of rock paper scissors with Asuna, Kirito won the right to take the first bath in their extravagant bathroom, much to her partners dismay.

Turning on the water Keiko opened the menus that allowed her to remove all her garments, and once naked approached the mirror above the sink. Taking in the visage before her she couldn't help scoffing even as the gathering steam clouded the image with condensation and whisps of fog.

"None of the scars...to think that one day that would actually bother me...well...whatever..." Sighing she turned to the tub, sticking one foot into the scalding water she shuddered a bit before it was soon followed by the other, a moment later she slipped beneath the surface, losing herself for the time being.

Reflecting on the days events Keiko seriously didn't know what to make of them really, nearly dying to a trio of Minotaur wannabes and ditching her followers to pursue her own interests? Eh...business as usual honestly. This elf situation? So not something she anticipated, which annoyed her, a lot. Seriously what the hell was going on with...Kizmel? That was her name right? Ugh...Sinking further below the near boiling water she considered the days oddities and was quite simply coming up with a blank, really she couldn't make heads or tails of it.

While Argo blamed Asuna for breaking the NPC, and she would admit that Asuna's vehement denials were rather adorable, Keiko herself blamed Kayaba for this one. The crafty bastard was up to something...

Before she could delve any further into these thoughts she felt the bath water shift as someone slipped into the tub. Assuming it was Asuna she resurfaced to see none other then the...rather well endowed elf she had been trying to categorize stretch her long bare legs out into the hot bathwater.

Rubbing her hands down her exposed chest while deftly tweaking her taut nipples the elf turned to Keiko and smiled, "Would you like me to wash your back?"

Asuna was reading through the...hell..dozens of emails she had received in the past few hours and sighed in exasperation, no wonder Keiko wanted nothing to do with leadership. With said swordswoman soaking in the bath, and Argo disappearing with Diavel, she was really the only one to answer the call so to speak.

Before she could get too far into the inbox the bathroom door slammed open and a deeply blushing, soaked through, and towel clad Keiko prowled past her, and paused for a moment.

Taking in a deep breath she finally stated, "I need no more proof that the primary design team for this game were all to the last, male," and with that she stomped off to her room. Blinking owlishly Asuna turned back to the bathroom then blushed brightly as a very naked Dark Elf stepped out of the steam wreathed doorway.

"Was it something I said?"

If you're wondering, yes, Kayaba is laughing his ass off at the moment. Oh, and don't worry about the live thing/nudity, while an asshole Kayaba isn't going to embarrass his protege like that. Regardless, review!