My(Virtual) Reality Chapter 6: 'It became your partner, right?'

I narrowed my eyes, and lashed out with my Anneal blade.

The two-hit sword skill I'd used-Vertical arc-cut a V shaped pattern into the back of the wind wasp I was currently fighting. But even though I'd reached level thirteen in the two weeks since I got the martial arts skill, it did not die. I grunted in frustration and charged a martial arts skill with my other hand, then sunk my fist into the wind wasp's body. It crashed to the floor and shattered, finally expiring.

Unfortunately for me, it was far from the only wind wasp around. "Dammit. This is what I get for losing my temper," I muttered, forced to bat away the stinger of another wasp. I took my time dealing with the rest of the wind wasp, even though it tried my patience. After nearly twenty minutes, I'd cleared the area of all mobs and was given a chance to take a break. One which I immediately capitalized on by collapsing to the ground.

The constant fighting had really worn me down, and to add insult to injury I hadn't even gotten the drops I wanted. The reason I'd been out on the western side of the second floor hunting wind wasps was to acquire a rare material they dropped: their stingers. I needed at least ten of them to upgrade my Anneal blade, but personally I was hoping to grab twenty and increase my odds.

See, in SAO, whenever a weapon is upgraded, there's always a chance of failure. In order to mitigate that chance, excess materials could be added to the process. For example: upgrading my now +5 Anneal blade to plus six could be done with ten wind wasp stingers with an eighty percent chance of success, but with twenty stingers those odds shot up to ninety-five percent. Seeing as how my Anneal blade only had three upgrade opportunities left on it, I desperately wanted each of them to be successes so I could hold a coveted Anneal blade +8.

But of course, fate had placed a couple roadblocks in my way. For one thing, the damn stingers simply hadn't been spawning for me as frequently as they should have. The whole thing reminded me too much of the incident with Coper, and left me in a bad mood. Even more depressing, however, was that my precious Anneal blade had been failing to perform as it should. This was no fault of my own-as arrogant as that might sound to say-but simply a case of my weapon being insufficiently scaled for the enemies I was facing.

It was disheartening to see my faithful companion failing to compete. Even my martial arts skill, which wasn't anywhere near as high as my one-handed longsword proficiency, was starting to outperform my Anneal blade when it came to damage. It was far too tragic a fate for the sword I'd nearly died to acquire.

But… that was the point of this little excursion.

I refused to let my weapon fall behind. I knew it was more than strong enough to last me through this floor, and even the next one. I just had to take proper care of it, and I would start by getting the damn stingers I needed to upgrade it. With a surge of determination, I shot to my feet and raised my blade to the heavens.

"Alright, you damn wind wasps! Come hell or high water, I'm gonna get those stingers of yours!"

000

When I finally returned to town a little later in the afternoon, I moved like a zombie.

My hands hung low by my side, and I dragged my feet while constantly groaning and moaning from exhaustion. In order to keep myself from being recognized as 'Kirito the beater', I'd started tucking my long hair into the coat of midnight. Also, I'd finally bitten the bullet and gotten a skirt. In truth, I'd been wanting to grab one ever since I first met Asuna, and I thought I looked really good in it. Though I did feel a little anxious about showing off so much of my legs.

Once I'd realized I was trans, I'd started to develop a bit more of an interest in fashion. I still rarely went out of my way to shop, but it felt nice to find something that made me look good.

My fit aside, Urbus-the first town on the second floor-was bustling with activity while I walked through its streets. My journey was far from aimless, however. Despite everything, I had managed to acquire the twenty wind wasp stingers for the upgrade, and was now trying to find a blacksmith.

It would've been nice if I could bring it to a player blacksmith, but those didn't exist this early in the game. Or at least, I hadn't come across any. So I started to make my way toward the best NPC blacksmith in town, but my attention was pulled away by a sudden scream.

"S-screw you!"

The shout came from the east plaza of Urbus. I looked around in a panic for a moment, thinking someone might have recognized me, but quickly calmed down when I realized it was something unrelated. Curious what the commotion was about, I walked over to the east plaza and snuck my way into the crowd.

They were gathered around two players. One had a horned helmet and a full suit of metal armor, while the other player was short and meek looking. He wore leather armor and had short, scraggly hair. If he had a full beard to go along with it, he would've looked remarkably like a dwarf.

Anyway, the dwarf-looking guy was bowing repeatedly to mr. horned helmet. In front of him was a rolled out carpet; I recognized it as an item merchant's would often use to display and sell their wares. In fact, it looked like the bowing player was using it for that very reason. When I looked off to the side, I saw a small sign which read 'Nezha's smith shop' followed by a list of prices for various services, and the percentage change for their success.

"C-change it back! You rotten third-tier black smith; that was a plus four sword!"

As soon as the other player shouted that, I had a pretty decent grasp on what had happened, and proceeded to wince in sympathy. Mr. horned helmet had likely approached Nezha in order to upgrade his sword, and had experienced that unfortunate twenty percent chance of failure. That failure would've reduced his sword to +3, and in a panic, he'd asked Nezha to perform another upgrade to restore it to its previous state.

Rinse and repeat three more times, and the result was a +0 sword with all of it's upgrade opportunities spent. In other words, a totally worthless blade. As someone who had nearly died to acquire a sword, I could relate with the player's frustration and hysteria. If my precious Anneal blade had failed to upgrade even once, I could imagine myself reacting similarly.

Granted, Nezha had the chances of success for upgrade's posted on his sign, so it wasn't as if he was being deceitful. There was a slight caveat to all this, however; all together, the percentage chance for four failures in a row was less than one percent. The whole situation left me with a bad feeling, even though the logic part of my brain knew it was possible for this to happen.

I clutched the handle of my Anneal blade, as if to reaffirm it's worth. Nezha hung his head low and said, "I-I'm so sorry. I never thought this would happen." He sounded genuinely remorseful, and I found my sympathy ratio had tilted sixty-forty in his favor.

His apology seemed to have reached the other player as well, because he limply hung his head and muttered out, "It's fine."

Two other players who I could only assume were his friends came up from behind to support him. "Don't worry man. With the three of us, It'll only take a week to get another one. It sucks, but there isn't much we can do, Rufiol…"

Rufiol and his party slowly started to exit the plaza, but before they could make it too far, Nezha hurried after them. He bowed once more and said, "P-please wait just a moment. I know it's not much, but if you're willing, I'll gladly buy that blade from you for eight-thousand col!"

I wasn't the only one surprised by his declaration. Since Rufiol was a front liner, even his plus zero sword would probably be valuable to someone, but that was a far higher price than he could ever hope to sell it for. It was an extremely generous offer on Nezha's part, and Rufiol's gang seemed to agree as, after a few minutes deliberating, they agreed to it.

With everything now resolved, the crowd quickly dispersed and Nezha went back to working his smithy. I hung around the eastern plaza, torn. I'd come into town specifically to have my Anneal blade upgraded, and as a player blacksmith, I'd have a much greater chance of success with Nezha than an NPC.

But… that bad feeling still hadn't left my mind.

Even though it made no sense, this horror scenario kept playing over and over in my head. In it, I would ask Nezha to upgrade my precious Anneal blade, only to see it irrevocably damaged. I wasn't sure I could bear to see that, especially after everything me and this blade had gone through.

After way too much deliberation, I finally decided to leave the plaza. With the excess materials improving my odds of success to ninety five percent, I was probably still fine going to an NPC blacksmith. Who knows; maybe my unease would fade entirely once I went there and I'd feel like a massive idiot. All things considered that was probably the best outcome.

Right as I started to walk through the streets of Urbus, however, my stomach decided to remind me that I hadn't eaten anything for a few hours. In SAO, it wasn't possible for me to hear my stomach grumbling, but I could still feel it, and that was more than enough for me. I promptly turned on a dime and started walking toward a nearby restaurant. Before long, though, I was startled when a familiar voice sounded off to my right.

"I see you've returned to the land of the living."

I whirled in it's direction, and was met by a familiar maroon cloak. "Ah, Asuna?! Where did you-er… I mean, have we met somewhere before?" My pathetic attempt at deflection made me shudder from distaste, and I desperately wished there was a skill or item that could turn back time so I could do it over. Even so, I was very technically 'in disguise', meaning that I wasn't meant to speak to Asuna as if I were 'Kirito the filthy beater'.

Of course, Asuna saw through my paper-thin excuse with a raised brow and a, "Seriously? You're already way too arrogant if you think anyone here's gonna be paying enough attention to notice you, but if you plan on sneaking in at least make a proper attempt! You didn't even ditch the coat you got from Illfang."

I winced at her brutal evaluation. In terms of a legitimate disguise, I actually had a blue and yellow striped bandana that I could've worn on my head, but the clashing colors with the rest of my outfit was so atrocious I was sure I'd take damage over time if I wore it. Regardless, I lifted one of my legs slightly and said, "Well, I did change it up a little bit…"

"Oh, I hadn't noticed. That skirt looks good on you, Kirito."

I laughed weakly, still not great at dealing with compliments. "You look nice too, Asuna," I told her, completely dropping the stranger's act. "Anyway, what are you doing here?"

Asuna rested a hand on her rapier and said, "I would say 'the same as you', but after watching you stand in front of that blacksmith for a solid three minutes I'm not so sure."

"Oh, well… were you there to see what happened before?" Asuna shook her head, so I gave her a brief rundown of what had happened, and why I was now going to an NPC's shop instead. "I know I'm being an idiot, but, well… that's how it is," I finished lamely.

Asuna and I were now sitting opposite each other in a diner, as she'd followed me to get some lunch herself. She took a sip of her tea and said, "You definitely are an idiot, but this is still a problem."

I ignored her jab to ask, "Problem? What do you mean?"

"Well, it's not a problem for me specifically, and it's not like I blame Nezha for what happened. Thing is, I have a friend who's a blacksmith like Nezha. She does great work-even upgraded my wind fleuret-but her sales are kind of lacking. It looks like that other blacksmith's failures has put some of the players on edge, like you, and she's taking the fall for it."

"If her work is as good as you say, though, how come she's not as popular as Nezha?"

Asuna shook her head. "It's not so simple. Nezha came first, and that allowed him to set up in the place with the most foot traffic."

"The east plaza, right. Couldn't your friend set up there as well, though?"

"I tried to tell her that myself, but she told me she'd feel bad if she ended up taking customers away from Nezha."

I frowned. "That's dumb," I blurted out thoughtlessly. Not even a second later, I was trying to backpedal my words. "Wait, um, what I meant to say was, uh-"

Asuna interrupted me with a laugh, and I quickly shut up. "It's fine, I get it. It totally doesn't make sense, right? Thing is, when we were talking about it, she told me 'I don't want to take the feeling of smithing away from somebody'. And after that I just… stopped asking about it."

She shrugged, and it was clear that marked the end of the conversation. Even though they were words being repeated by another person, I found myself repeating what this mystery blacksmith had said in my mind. That way of thinking… It made me feel like this person wasn't just a blacksmith because it was an easy way to make money. Rather, it sounded like this was something she was genuinely passionate about.

After considering that for a couple more seconds, I turned to her and asked, "Hey, Asuna? This blacksmith you know, what's her name?"

000

I sighed heavily while I overlooked the south entrance of Urbus.

Players milled about the space in front of me like tourists. Then again, it's entirely possible that they were tourists. I remember being one of the many awestruck players looking around the town when it'd first been unlocked. That moment felt like watching a miracle unfold right before my very eyes. After an entire month with nothing but despair staring us in the face, we'd finally managed to emerge victorious over the first floor.

I sighed again. Business was moving slowly-as usual-which was probably the only reason I was able to have these flights of fancy. I'd thought setting up shop at one of the entrances to town would be a good way to get customers, but so far I hadn't experienced any increase in productivity.

Still, I didn't feel too down about it. The players who had come to me were impressed by my skills, so I'm sure they'll come back whenever they need more service. I let out a yawn and set my smithing hammer to the side. It was close to sunset now; I liked to keep my shop open till eight most of the time, but I think the slow, monotonous workday was starting to catch up with me.

I was tired, and though missing out on the seven o'clock rush hurt my merchant's soul just a bit, I started to pack up all my items onto the vendor's carpet I'd purchased. I didn't get very far, however, before a soft, feminine voice interrupted me. "Hey, are you still doing business?" they asked.

I looked up and met eyes with one of the most beautiful women I'd ever seen. Her long, lustrous black hair was tucked into the midnight black coat she wore. Onyx eyes and puckered, cherry red lips regarded me curiously. Her skin was pale, but beautiful in an almost ethereal way, and the long legs that were shown off by her skirt had surely turned the heads of many men.

Seeing her bent over slightly so she could talk to me easier from my seated position, I could only really think: Is every girl in this stupid game secretly a model or something?! Seriously, first Asuna, and now this?! They seriously weren't leaving much room for me, huh?

Either way, I smiled brightly at her and said, "Yeah! Do you need enhancement or repairs?"

The woman sat down in front of me and said, "Enhancement. Sharpness for the stat." She reached up to her back, drawing forth the sword there, and then handed it to me. The blade was a one-handed longsword a rich black in color, and had a jagged edge near the hilt. My eyes widened in surprise and awe once I got a proper look at the sword. The woman in front of me-who I'm just gonna call Blackie from now on due to her bland color scheme-was in possession of an Anneal Blade.

I'd heard of this sword from the strategy guide written by Argo the rat. Supposedly, it was one of if not the best sword in the game right now. The player in front of me had to have some serious skills in order to have this as a weapon. But that's just the thing, I'd heard whispers-not even proper rumors; more the leavings of them-about a beautiful swordswoman in possession of such a blade who had ruined the first floor boss fight.

Could the player in those rumors be the same one sitting before me? The illusive beater? The answer was… something I couldn't care less about, in all honesty.

I was happy as long as I got a chance to improve my blacksmithing, so I asked, "Alright, as for the materials-"

"I brought my own," she told me, and proceeded to open a trade window.

I accepted the twenty wind wasp stingers with a low whistle. "Ninety-five percent chance for success; you really want this thing to be upgraded, huh?"

Blackie smiled at me and said, "Yeah, well, I'm sure you're the only one who can do it." I felt my cheeks redden at her frank compliment. Even though I haven't gotten any complaints about my work, this was the first time I'd heard someone place such faith in my ability. It made me want to succeed.

I dutifully lit up my forge and stuck the Anneal blade inside. The flames bellowed and changed into a bright red color. It was all part of the process; the flames of the forge would change color depending on the stat being upgraded. It served as a fine spectacle for those watching, though-regrettably-none of the players present made to crowd around. After a few seconds, I withdrew the sword from the flames.

Obviously, I wasn't a blacksmith in real life, and the virtual recreation provided by SAO was incredibly simplified; but when I laid the red hot Anneal blade onto my portable anvil and raised my hammer, I got the impression that what I was feeling was probably pretty close to what those who'd actually perfected the craft did. A cocktail of nerves, pride, and faith overcame me as I brought my hammer down once.

When it met the sword, virtual sparks flew, and I heard the satisfying tink noise accompanied by metal striking metal. I raised my hammer and brought it down again. Twice, thrice, four times; on the tenth and final swing of my hammer, I felt satisfied and relieved. Even though the sword was still fluctuating in brightness-a visual cue meant to build tension while the system decided whether I'd succeeded or not-I was sure the Anneal blade sitting before me would upgrade.

And, sure enough, the sword shined brightly one last time before finally simmering down; a little jingle letting me know that the enhancement was a success. With a beaming smile, I returned the now plus six Anneal blade to Blackie. She took the sword with a weirdly uneasy expression, almost like she expected the blade to disintegrate in her hands. I pouted at her attitude. "It's rude to leave me in suspense like that. C'mon; tell me what you think!"

Blackie started before rubbing a hand on the back of her head, mumbling a 'sorry, sorry'. I didn't lessen my pout in the slightest, even as she took proper hold of the blade and gave it a couple practice swings. Then, her face lit up, and I was slightly taken aback by the sudden shift in this moody swordswoman. "It's incredible. It doesn't just feel like an upgrade. No, it fits into my hand like it was remade just for me!"

Blackie turned her exuberance to me, completely ignorant of how crazy what she'd just said sounded. "Do you figure out some secret technique for the weapon creation skill?!"

Once again, my face turned pink in the face of such earnest praise. I patted the air with my hands in a panic and stammered, "N-no, no, it's nothing like that! I just… that sword's so cool looking, I didn't want to let it down by failing the upgrade." After a second, I realized that I'd responded to Blackie's nonsense with nonsense of my own. More embarrassed than ever before, I turned away from her entirely. Great job, Liz; the first customer I've gotten in hours, and I'm gonna scare her away with my weirdness.

"How much would it cost for you to do that again? Same odds, but this time for durability."

I turned back to Blackie in confusion. She wasn't bothered by the strange stuff I'd said? Well, I guess she seemed kind of off herself, and business is business. "Um, fourteen-thousand." I told her.

Blackie winced but relented. I retrieved the necessary stingers from my inventory and repeated the process. After seeing her enthusiasm, I made extra sure to put my passion into my blacksmithing. Thankfully, my effort paid off, and the sword was upgraded to plus seven. Blackie took it back while looking like a kid on Christmas day. It was kind of cute, honestly.

After a quick affirmation of the quality of her Anneal blade, she turned back to me. It seemed like whatever mood had overcome her earlier was now gone, because she looked incredibly sheepish. "Uh… ahem, thanks for that."

I smiled honestly. I found that my own embarrassment was quickly fading as well. "No problem. I only provide the best quality here at Lisbeth's smith shop!" I announced proudly.

"Yeah, I can't believe you're being overshadowed by that Nezha guy."

"How do you know about that?" I asked, my eyes narrowing in suspicion.

Blackie froze, but then shrugged and said, "I know Asuna; she sent me your way."

I blinked, my concern instantly washing away. "Oh… well, if you're that bothered by it, make sure to come back anytime you need your equipment upgraded!"

Blackie smirked. "You know I will. I'll try to make sure your name gets around, too. With your skills, you ought to be the front line's premier blacksmith."

A blush overcame me once more. Geez, this girl was seriously dangerous if she could deliver compliments like that so easily! "O-oh, well, you know… it's nice to not be super busy," I said.

"Okay, well, is it cool if I friend you? Then I can send you a message whenever I need your help."

"Huh, oh that's fine." This wouldn't be the first time I'd friended a client for convenience. I'd friended Asuna for that very reason, though we'd grown to be genuine friends. "The name's Lisbeth," I informed her.

"I figured. It's kinda written on the sign."

"Don't be a smartass," I grumbled with hands on my hips. I didn't know if she'd read it, after all.

"Sorry, sorry. Anyway, my name's Kirito."

"Isn't that-"

"A guy's name, yes," Kirito sighed, and I got the impression she'd heard that a lot. I silently accepted her friend request and gave her a small smile. Kirito returned it with one of her own, before looking upward. I followed her gazed and noticed-somewhat belatedly-that the sky was swiftly turning blue. The sun was going down, so I swiftly gathered up all my tools onto the vendor's carpet before accessing it's menu.

With the press of a button, the carpet rolled itself up, with all of my miscellaneous tools being taken with it. That was something nice about the convenience of SAO's system; it allowed me to carry an entire portable forge in a rolled-up rug. I need to tell Asuna to thank Argo the rat for telling me about it. Anyway, I shouldered the rug before turning to Kirito.

"Well, I'm closing for today. Make sure to message me if you need anything," I told her.

"Hm? Oh yeah, no problem," she told me with a nonchalant wave. I started walking westward, before stopping after a few steps once I realized Kirito was following me. I was starting to feel a little creeped out by her, but that quickly faded away once I saw her uncomfortable expression. "Um, I guess our inns are in the same direction, huh? Funny coincidence…"

This was a little awkward, but I felt kinda bad leaving her to flail about like this, so I smiled and said, "Alright, then you can play the role of bodyguard till we part ways!"

"Why does this keep happening to me?" Kirito grumbled to herself, and I couldn't stop myself from laughing at her sour expression. With that settled, Kirito and I began walking again. The Inn where I was staying was on the east sign of Urbus, so we started heading in that direction. As we did, Kirito kept her eyes moving. She never looked at anything for longer than a second, and the way she constantly scanned the crowds with unease made me feel anxious.

Just who had I gotten involved with? She seemed like she was constantly expecting one of the people we passed by to stone her; it was really unnerving. "Why do I always have the worst luck?" I mumbled under my breath. With how long Kirito and I had been walking now, I was starting to wonder if we-by some terribly convenient coincidence-were actually both staying at the same Inn.

I was getting ready to ask Kirito that question when something up ahead stole my attention. I hadn't realized because I was too wrapped up in my own head, but we were standing in the east plaza of Urbus now. Ya know, where that other blacksmith operated. And sure enough, when I turned to my left I saw him. Nezha. The player who'd been inadvertently giving me a bad name.

My feelings on him were mixed but ultimately resolved. What threw me for a loop, then, was the player standing in front of him. It was Asuna, of all people; she handed Nezha her prized wind fleuret-the one I'd upgraded not three days ago-as well as the necessary materials. Seeing that, I felt weirdly… betrayed. Asuna was the one who'd been most supportive of me. She was my friend, so why was she getting her weapon upgraded by someone else?

I jogged over to her position listlessly. "Hey, Asuna!" I called. She froze and turned in my direction, looking exceptionally guilty. Once I was next to her, I suddenly realized I had no idea what to say. Did I want to shout at her, and demand an explanation? Or was it that I wanted her to stop with the upgrade? I wasn't sure, all I knew was that seeing her asking Nezha to upgrade her weapon opened up a pit in my stomach.

"Oh, Liz! I didn't know you'd closed up early… What are you doing here with Kirito?"

I started at her question and realized that, yes, Kirito was still with me. I'd been so overcome with emotion that I'd forgotten she was here. That's a little embarrassing… "I'm being forced to be a bodyguard again. Better question is what you're doing. You're already friends with an awesome blacksmith."

"T-that's-"

"Um, pardon me," says Nezha, entering into the conversation. "T-the mood here is a little awkward… Do you still want me to upgrade the wind fleuret?" He looked absolutely miserable as he asked this, and I winced. He probably felt super uncomfortable being in the middle of all this drama, and I felt a little bad about my lack of self-awareness.

All three of us fell eerily silent, and I was ready to just walk away when Asuna cleared her throat. I met her eyes, and she gave me this look that I think was supposed to mean 'I'll tell you everything later' before she turned back to Nezha and said, "I do. Please continue."

With the same pitiful look on his face, Nezha went through the necessary steps for upgrading a weapon, albeit with an almost deliberate slowness. As he did, I tried to figure out the puzzle Asuna had presented me with. I got this feeling that she had some kind of ulterior motive for seeing Nezha, but I had no way of knowing what it is. Actually, I have no idea if she even has some kind of secret reason for being here. I wasn't a detective or anything, so it could be something as simple as not wanting to walk all the way to see me.

Either way, Nezha soon pulled out the wind fleuret and rested it on his mini anvil. He brought the tool up and down just as I had when working on Kirito's sword, but something was off about it. As I watched him, I was overcome with this pervasive wrongness that I couldn't quite place. There was just something inside my mind screaming at me that something bad was about to happen.

That feeling was realized with horrifying clarity when, on the tenth and final swing of his hammer, Asuna's rapier shattered. No, shattered wasn't the right word to describe it. The beloved wind fleuret of my friend turned into dust and disintegrated right before our eyes. I felt like my head had been dunked into a bucket of cold water, and couldn't even bring myself to speak as Nezha stared brokenly at the remains of the sword.

"I… I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'll return all of your money… I'm so, so sorry!"

Asuna and I couldn't bring ourselves to speak; We were too floored by the deletion of Asuna's sword from the system to respond. Kirito, however, seemed to gather her voice. She said, "Look, um… before we talk about money, I'd like an explanation. I thought that weapon destruction wasn't a possible failure state of upgrading in SAO. How did this happen?"

Kirito's reasonable question lit a lightbulb in my mind. That terrible feeling I'd had when Nezha was working on Asuna's rapier began to take form. Kirito was right; in all the weapons that I'd worked on, not a single one had been broken under my hammer. Whenever I failed at an upgrade or repair, there were only three possible outcomes. The first: the materials disappeared but everything about the weapon remained the same. Second: the properties of the bonus were switched around, so an upgrade to accuracy could become an upgrade to speed instead. And finally, the weapon's value decreased by one.

Those were the only possible outcomes whenever an attempted upgrade failed; I knew that better than anymore. But of course, that only led one to asking a different question. What the hell had just happened to Asuna's sword?

Looking at Nezha's constantly apologetic face, I started to become annoyed. Since this wasn't a result of pure bad luck, that meant Nezha had to have done something to make this happen. But what? And why? I didn't know, but I really wanted to for Asuna's sake.

"Kirito's right. I'm a blacksmith and this has never happened to me, so what's going on?"

Nezha's face remained extremely guilty, and I almost felt bad about grilling him like this. "T-this has happened to me before once… I think it's a new possible failure state they added for the launch…"

That made me pause. Suddenly, I wasn't so sure if there was any malicious intent here. It's true that I'd never had this happen to me, but I also hadn't worked on as many weapons as Nezha, and I'd only failed a handful of times. I had no way of proving or disproving if weapon destruction was some super rare failure state, and I didn't wanna harass someone just because of an assumption.

I turned away from Nezha to Asuna, who still looked near catatonic. With a sigh, I turned to Kirito and weakly murmured, "We should get out of here…"

Kirito looked at the distraught blacksmith one last time before nodding. I grabbed Asuna's hand, and the three of us began to listlessly wander the streets of Urbus. Asuna tightened her grip on my hand and said, "I'm sorry…"

"Sorry? About what?"

Asuna raised her head slightly. "I didn't like how Nezha was taking the spotlight from you. I thought something was off about that guy, so I went to have my sword upgraded to see if I was just being paranoid or not, but… I ended up destroying that beautiful sword you upgraded for me…"

I wasn't sure, but I thought I could see tears building at the corners of her eyes. I didn't want to have her walking around while she was hurting like that, so I brought us over to a nearby bench and sat down. While soothingly rubbing her back, I said, "Asuna… you didn't have to do all that. But thanks; it means a lot that you care about me that much."

"Listen, there's an even better rapier than the wind fleuret in the town of Marome. I know it won't make up for what's lost, but… I could help you get it, if you want."

I nodded enthusiastically at Kirito's words. "Yeah! And I'll make you an even better wind fleuret in the meantime!"

Asuna wasn't moved by my and Kirito's optimism, however. "Another…? I-I can't take that. For the longest time, I thought that sword was just a tool. A piece of polygonal data. But then…"

"It became your partner, right?"

She looked surprised at Kirito's observation, but ultimately nodded. "We fought together, and survived together. I told myself that I'd take her with me to the end of the game, to make up for all those swords I destroyed."

We fell silent after that. It would've been so easy to tell Asuna that it was just a rapier-a collections of ones and zeros created by this virtual world-and that she was being stupid for treating it so seriously. But if that were true, then… What was I even doing as a blacksmith? When I was working with another player's weapon, and I saw the unease in their eyes from the possibility of failure, it made me want to do everything I could to make sure I succeeded. I wanted to pay my respects to those players' feelings, and the beautiful swords which embodied them.

Because in this game of death, whenever the only thing standing between you and losing everything was a piece of steel, how could you not develop an attachment?

"There's a way to preserve the soul of a weapon after it's already gone."

Asuna and I turned our attention back to Kirito after she said this. "Two ways, really. The first is to melt your previous sword down into an ingot; that way you can forge it into your new blade as a part of it. The second is to keep the weapon in your inventory forever. It'll constantly take up a space in your storage, so it's not very practical, but…"

Kirito trailed off at the end, so I decided to throw in my two cents. "If you have that weapon in your storage, you'll carry all the experiences you made with it. So even if you're using another weapon, it'll never be left in the dust!"

Asuna looked between me and Kirito before turning her head upward. I was worried about what her reaction was gonna be, but calmed down once I saw the beginnings of a smile on her face. "Never left behind, huh?" she murmured, and I wasn't sure if I was supposed to hear that or not. Standing up and facing us with a proper smile, Asuna said, "Thanks for that. If it's all the same to you, I'm gonna head back to my Inn room. I'm… pretty exhausted, after everything."

"Oh, um, sure! Good night, Asuna. I'll swing by in the morning to come see you."

She offered me a weak wave in response before walking away, leaving Kirito and me by ourselves. I felt awful; Asuna didn't deserve to have something like that happen to her. Worse still, she'd done it all for me. Did that make what happened my fault? Maybe… Maybe if I'd just listened to Asuna, and been a little more reasonable about my business, then this wouldn't have happened.

Kirito stood up abruptly and startled me. Wordlessly, she started walking back in the direction of the east plaza. Oh crap, was she planning to do something to Nezha? With a slight bit of panic, I hurried after her. "Hey, you're not about to do something stupid are you?"

"Jury's out," she said without pausing.

I sighed heavily. "Look, I get it. I feel awful about what happened too, but we can't harass Nezha about it. It's not his fault."

"I'm not so sure. I mean, you felt something was off too, right?"

"Well, yeah… but even if he did something sneaky, we have no way to prove it."

Kirito nodded. "You're right; that's why I'm gonna do some investigating."

I leveled her with a flat stare. "Investigating, huh? How? No offense, but you don't exactly look like a detective," I told her skeptically.

She scratched her cheek sheepishly after my observation. "Um, well… you're not wrong. But I have the hiding skill! I'm gonna tail Nezha and find out whether there's something to that unease we felt when he was upgrading Asuna's sword."

I was slightly taken aback by the resolve in Kirito's voice. She was serious about this. I had the impression she was close with Asuna from how they'd interacted, but now I was sure Kirito was the type of person who couldn't stand to leave the people she cared about alone when they were in trouble.

"Alright; I'm coming with you," I told her, determined.

Kirito started. "Uh, I don't know…"

I snorted, "Oh come on! Asuna's my friend too, ya know! I wanna help her."

She took a few moments to consider her options, during which I found myself growing increasingly indignant, before she finally said, "Fine, but you have to follow my lead."

I grumbled under my breath about the arrogance of this girl, but still nodded. From what I could tell, Kirito was a front-line player, so she would have more experience with this kind of thing than a blacksmith who sat in town all day like myself.

The two of us made our way back to the eastern plaza where Nezha would still be working. Right before we entered the plaza proper, however, Kirito pulled me aside and started walking along its edge. When we finally stopped, I was awkwardly pressed up against Kirito, who had her back to a tree and was watching Nezha.

I tried to focus on the task at hand, but it was hard to stop my cheeks from coloring with how close we were. After a few seconds, Kirito grimaced and opened up her menu. After some navigation, she produced a dull grey coat from her inventory and placed it on my shoulders. "Put this on," she told me. "It'll make you harder to see."

I looked down at my pink shirt and maroon vest and felt even more like an idiot. I hastily threw on the coat and returned to stalking Nezha. Not a whole lot happened for the first ten minutes of our stake out, but I was more or less expecting that. Eventually, though, he packed up his tools into a vendor's carpet just like my own, and started to walk out of the plaza.

I made to follow him after a few seconds, but was stopped by Kirito. I turned to give her an annoyed look, but stopped when I saw her eyes. They had a faint greenish blue glow to them that I knew came from having the searching skill active. Maybe she was better prepared for this than I'd thought.

Regardless, we started tailing Nezha in earnest after a few more seconds. I had no real experience with being stealthy, but I tried my best to trace Kirito's movements and keep quiet. Together, we would slide between patches of darkness. Sometimes hiding behind more trees, and sometimes in between buildings or crouching behind low walls. A tingle of excitement shot through my spine as Kirito and I continued to sleuth. I hadn't experienced this kind of thrill since before I got trapped in this death game.

Eventually, I couldn't keep my curiosity silent and said, "You're surprisingly good at this. Honestly it has me kind of concerned."

Kirito glanced at me and said, "I'm really just trying to riff what I've seen in spy movies…"

My face instantly drooped in disappointment. I'm not sure what I'd been expecting, but that was still really lame. Anyway, eventually Nezha entered into a bar. For the half a second the wooden door was open, I heard "Good to see you, Nezuo-!" but then the door closed and everything went silent.

In SAO, it was impossible to hear through doors unless you knocked first or the door was already open. Well, I'd heard that if a player's listening skill was high enough it was possible to get around that rule, but as I didn't have it and I doubted Kirito did, it wasn't much use.

I sighed and asked, "Is this where we turn in for the night?"

Kirito was silent for a few seconds before finally letting out a low growl of frustration. "No. I'm still not satisfied. I can't shake the feeling something shifty is going down."

She looked at the door in deliberation for a couple seconds before finally moving. I scrambled after her and we took up a position next to the door. Kirito and I were pressed up so tightly I was practically wearing her, so I was a little miffed at how unbothered by the contact Kirito appeared to be. She just carefully pressed a hand against the door and gently pushed it open.

Five, ten, fifteen; when the door was finally cracked twenty degrees open, Kirito and I became privy to the conversation inside.

"Let's raise a glass for Nezuo! Thanks for bringing in such a tidy profit!"

"T-thanks…"

Aside from Nezha and the guy who'd spoken before him, I thought I heard around four other voices from inside the bar. They sounded like they all knew each other, and were close friends.

"This is great, Nezuo. With this, we should be able to participate in the field boss fight."

"Well, it's the least I could do…"

I was starting to form a clearer picture of the situation in my head, and I imagine it was the same for Kirito. From what we'd heard, it sounded like Nezha was part of a party, and that his blacksmithing was a way to help them make enough money to get some gear that would allow them to fight on the front lines.

Thing is, there was nothing shifty or suspicious about that. It was a perfectly reasonable thing to do in this game. Unless something changed soon, it looked like we were gonna be leaving with nothing. Well, that's not entirely true; I'd be left with a burning feeling of shame for letting my paranoia run wild and villainize some guy.

And as if someone had heard my thoughts, what was next said threw me for a loop.

"...Guys, I think we should stop the operation."

I met Kirito's eyes, and a wordless understanding passed between us. We'd been right. We still didn't know anything about how they did it or why, but I couldn't think of anything more incriminating to be said. Unfortunately for us, the players inside quieted down and started talking in hushed whispers.

From where we were standing, Kirito and I couldn't hear a thing. I growled in frustration. Come on! We finally catch wind of something suspicious and then things go silent. It was vexing, and I leaned further into Kirito in an attempt to hear them better.

That was, of course, when everything went straight to hell.

While I was trying to press myself closer to the door, I suddenly lost my footing and fell forward. Kirito's hand snapped back as if it'd been burned and she darted to the side. I would've been mad about that, but I'd already made too much noise and her grabbing me would've only gotten us into deeper trouble. Instead, I slammed open the door to the bar and fell on my face with a "Gyah!"

The bar went deathly silent, and I slowly raised my head from the ground with a nervous smile. "Eheh heh…" I chuckled nervously, precisely because I've been caught with my hands so red they could've been used as traffic lights.

It certainly didn't help matters when Nezha looked at me with a shocked face and said, "Y-you! What are you doing here?!"

I snapped to my feet and put my hands in front of me cautiously. "Whoops! This isn't my inn! I must've gotten it confused 'cuz I'm so tired. Well, I'll be going then!" I lied pathetically before turning around and trying to leave.

Unfortunately, there was no way things were gonna be that simple.

"Hold it. You were eve's dropping on us, weren't you? Don't try and play dumb."

I stopped where I stood and turned to face the guy who'd spoken. He was a burly guy with banded armor and a bassinet, onion-shaped helmet. He was pretty intimidating, and even though I knew he couldn't do anything to me in town because of the game's strict anti-crime code, I still found myself freezing in fear.

Crap. What do I do?! There was no way I could deny I'd been spying on them, and Nezha knew that I was friends with Asuna. What if they tried to target her because of this?! Could she be kicked from the front lines if they said she'd hired me to spy on them or something? I didn't know; the only front-line players I knew were Asuna(and possibly Kirito). Regardless, things were turning sour fast, and I needed to find some way to get out of this.

With my mind spinning like a roulette wheel, I pointed accusingly at Nezha and blurted out, "Recompense!"

Him and the rest of his party looked at me in confusion. "Recompense?" Nezha murmured.

I didn't blame him for that reaction, because I didn't know what the hell I was trying to say either. Even so, I was gonna roll with it. "That's right! I want recompense for all the work you've stolen from me!" I huffed, planting my hands on my hips in a haughty manner and trying my best not to show my nerves.

"What the hell are you going on about?" The burly guy I assumed was their leader asked me.

I glared at him in a way I hoped expressed indignant rage. "You listen here, bucko. I'm a blacksmith just like Nezha over there, but I know for a fact I'm way better at it than him! I was trying to be fair and play nice since he set up shop before me, but now I just can't take it. Nezha, you owe me for all the work I've been missing out on because of your lackluster skills. You're scaring all the customers away because you suck!"

As I spun my tail, I kept trying to glance behind me and see if Kirito had any plans to help me out. Unfortunately, however, it looked like she'd totally flaked on me. There was a phrase I'd once heard about not bullshitting a bullshitter, but I really hoped it wasn't about to come back now and bite me in the ass.

Thankfully, however, it looked like the group of six was buying my indignant act. Minus Nezha-who once again looked horribly sad-they were all regarding me with flat looks that just screamed 'is this chick serious right now?'. It was probably the best I could hope for after I'd screwed things up this bad.

Suddenly, the burly guy stepped forward and loomed over me. Despite myself, I quieted down out of fear. "Listen lady, I think we've heard enough by now. Will you leave us alone now? It's not our fault Nezha's more popular than you, so stop bothering us."

I snorted and huffed, trying to keep up with my haughty image, before turning around and speeding out of the bar. Once I was outside and the leader had returned to the rest of his group, I let out a long sigh of relief.

"Oh my god; I can't believe that worked…"

"Yeah, same here."

I yelped and leapt about three feet off the ground before whirling on the person who'd spoken. "Well it's not like you were any help back there!" I shouted at Kirito, who'd appeared out of nowhere like a ninja.

"Sorry. Listen, I really need your help right now. I think I figured something out about their trick, but I don't have much time! Send a message to Asuna telling her to leave her Inn door open for me."

"What, why-?" but before I could hope to get a word in edgewise, she was already gone. I growled and gnashed my teeth together. This chick was seriously infuriating! Not even two words spent on apologizing for leaving me behind, and she's already ordering me around! Despite all of my misgivings, though, I did what Kirito asked. The intensity of her face when she'd asked me was enough for me to know it was something extremely important.

Still, I wasn't satisfied with just that!

I started running toward the inn where Asuna was staying. I hadn't put too many points into my agility stat, so I couldn't hope to catch up to Kirito-who had already disappeared from my line of sight-but I still made a good pace as I ran through the streets of Urbus. After about ten minutes, I burst through the door to the inn. I knew Asuna's room number was 207, so I dashed up the stairs and down the hall. Thankfully, the door to room 207 was still unlocked, so I was able to come in.

What I saw inside, however, was truly bizarre.

Asuna stood next to the bed, looking completely mortified while Kirito hunched over a large pile of belongings. It looked as though Asuna had scattered the entire contents of her inventory over the floor. Including, I noted with a growing blush, a sizeable collection of underwear. Underwear that Kirito was now rifling through as she doggedly searched through Asuna's items.

"Excuse me, are you one of those people who wishes for death?" Asuna asked with a scary evenness.

"Not even-ahah, there it is!" Kirito's approaching execution was just barely avoided when, with a cry of victory, she raised her arm upward. In her hand, was an immaculate, undamaged, wind fleuret. The very same wind fleuret we had all scene shatter on Nezha's anvil.

"...Just what the hell have we gotten involved in?"