Finally got over the writers block on this one, time to step back into this, enjoy!
The hunt was honestly slightly disappointing for XaXa, the Moon cats or whatever they called themselves may have been trained by his Prince's Queen but they were honestly beginners at best when it came to covering their trail. Or, more disappointing they weren't even trying which was just vexing, what was the point of hunting incompetent prey? Really the entire focus of this exercise was to force the Black Queen to reach her threshold and if these morons died before she showed up it would be a failure all around.
Really it took what, three months for her to actually become interested in players low enough for them to poach? If they accidently killed them all she probably wouldn't bother with it again which would annoy the PoH and an annoyed PoH tended to kill those who displeased him.
Not that he or Johnny were in any worry of that, it was just the simple fact that when idiots got themselves executed they had to train replacement idiots which was just fucking tedious. Deciding to just get this thing moving he motioned for his men to move forward and they soon approached the guild of pussy cats from behind and he soon slashed one of them in the back.
As he screamed the others turned around in surprise and then shocked horror as they took in their attackers red icon. They grabbed their friend and began running as XaXa grinned widely.
"Run rabbits run, and call upon our Queen to descend and mete out her divine justice."
His giggling freaked out the newbies, Johnny just rolled his eyes, regardless, the hunt was on.
Keiko was looking through her inventory trying to figure out what the hell to do with what ended up being three fourths of her inventory when she realized practically all of it was cooking and tailoring mats.
Letting out a vexed sigh she dropped her head back and shot a glance at Asuna before speaking up in a drawling tone, "You know we should just get married at this point."
Asuna and Argo froze as the turned to face Kirito with wide eyes as they both shot out a quick, "What!?"
Kirito didn't notice their distress as she leaned back in her chair and began spinning slowly while silently wondering why office chairs were a thing in this game when archery wasn't.
"I mean I'm technically flagged as male since I never wanted anyone to know I was a girl and with the marriage system we can share all inventory items so I could just let you take whatever you needed to grind your crafting."
She met Asuna's gaze evenly while shrugging, "It's just practical after all."
Asuna for her part deflated while Argo shot her a sympathetic look when Keiko continued, "Plus I could do a lot worse, I mean really, getting to tell everyone that Asuna the Flash was my wife? Street cred there."
That caused both older girls to freeze up, then break out laughing which caused the unobserving Keiko to smirk slightly. Oblivious she may be, but she knew how to inflate her friends sense of self respect.
A moment later she received a call from Sachi, clicking it open she began drawling out, "My young padawan for what do I earn the ple-"
"We're being attacked by players! They have red icons by their names and they nearly killed Keita, what do we do?!"
"What floor are you on!?" She spat out eyes wide in worry.
"31, please hurry, oh my god no , DUCKER NO!" Then the window closed.
Keiko was moving before her friends could even process what was happening, her armor was equipped in a matter of seconds and she hesitated only a moment before a pair of swords appeared over her shoulders.
Before either woman could say anything she turned towards Argo and snarled out, "Call the banners, we go to war."
With that she stormed out of the room, Asuna running after a moment later while Argo opened her menu, silently wondering where the hell Keiko had picked up Dual Wielding.
Sachi was terrified, only she and Keita were left alive, she was down to half health and had no healing items left. Keita was worse off, suffering partial paralysis and only with a few health points left. They were surrounded and one of the men stepped forward to finish her guild leader off when a shout paused him mid motion.
"Hey asshole, why don't you pick on someone your own level," standing there, in the rising suns light, was the Black Queen.
"Ah so her majesty decided to show herself, splendid!" Keita's would be executioner stated as he turned to face Kirito, "And why, may I ask would I do as you say?"
Kirito froze as her brow furrowed in confusion, "Because I'll stop you from hurting anyone else?"
He laughed and without even looking he swept his blade behind him and took off Keita's head, and in an explosion of pixels, he was gone.
Sachi fell to her knees and sobbed as she realized all of her friends were dead, it was only her left now, and as she raised her head she met Kirito's horrified, wide eyed gaze as the man stepped away from her while gesturing towards another member of his murder team.
"How delightfully childish, Fernier, kill her."
She couldn't move, her spear fell from her hands as the grinning man swung his axe down towards her when... his head fell from his shoulders.
As he exploded into a spray of pixels she stared directly into Kirito's shocked eyes as what she had just done hit her, she looked panicked a moment, then neutral, then cocky as her mask fully slid into place before she turned back to the man who ordered her friend's execution.
She looked upon the gathered player killers before drawing out her second sword, spinning her blades she grinned mercilessly.
"Next?"
Lily and I are back, rejoice my lovelies for terrible things are about to happen!