The three weeks of preparation passed quickly in Kirito's opinion, but it had probably seemed even faster for Frodo, who seemed to be slightly dreading this expidition. They packed their food and water and other travel necessities, but tried to keep it as light as possible since speed and stealth was pretty high on the priority list.

For Kirito that was pretty easy since he could just store everything in his Inventory except his sword, which remained on his back, and a few smaller hunting knives and a few other small things he hid within his coat pockets upon Aragorn's request for safety measures since it did take a few seconds to retrieve anything from the inventory and he couldn't really walk or run with it open.

Kirito offered to put the other's stuff in his game inventory as well, but they declined in favor of keeping their own possessions on their body, both for personal and safety reason like if they managed to get separated during the quest. (*coughforeshadowingcough*)

Over the three weeks, the others who did not know Kirito's story began getting small bits and pieces, but obviously realized that Kirito didn't want to talk a ton about it. They heard something about being trapped in a world that wasn't reality with 10,000 people and having to fight a bunch of monsters to get out and it took over 2 years, but that's all Gimli, Legolas and Boromir really got concretely. Sam and Frodo had more idea what was going on, but didn't know exactly how much Pippin and Merry had left out, added, changed, forgotten or exaggerated in their recounting of what Kirito had told.

Plus they also had a pony named Bill that would be going with them for carrying extra stuff. He had actually come with them from Bree, but he was going to be continuing to be in their service.

Then came the day of departure. Everyone gathered in the front courtyard to see them off, the same place Kirito had been reading when the other council men had arrived.

"The ringbearer is setting out on a quest to Mount Doom," Elrond started the goodbye, "And you who travel with him own him no oath nor bond is laid to go furtherer than you will. Farewell and hold to your purpose and may the blessing of elves, men and all free folk go with you."

Kirito decided not to comment that he left out the blessing of Hobbits and Dwarves… and thankfully, so did Gimli, though not without a slight glare.

"The Fellowship awaits the ringbearer," Gandalf said.

Personally, Kirito thought this was all a little overdramatized, but went with it and watched as Frodo walked to the front of the group and exited Rivendell first, Gandalf at his side.

"Mordor Gandalf, is it left or right?" Frodo whispered to the wizard, which Kirito picked up with his hearing skill. He hid a smirk at the question as it was a bit humorous. Frodo really had no idea what he was actually doing, did he?

"Left," Gandalf replied, so Frodo turned left and the rest of the 10 followed him. They headed out and crossed the bridge and out through the hidden passage. As they walked, Kirito remembered the first leg of their journey, according to Gandalf, said that they would hold this course for 40 days, west of the Misty Mountains, then they would turn East to Mordor.

They walked, and walked and walked. Several times Kirito thought how much easier this would be with cars, or you know, transport crystals (which had all disappeared from his inventory upon SAO's deletion since everywhere they could go was destroyed), but never complained. The scenery was cool and this was good exercise, even if it did get a bit boring and tedious after a while.

Out of the group, most of the tensions were with Boromir- well, besides the irrational racial one between Gimli and Legolas anyway. He seemed most susceptible to the rings power, but was holding out, and had even become rather close with Merry and Pippin. He was a bit brash as well, but most people in this world were. As the days of constant company traveling together went on, the tensioned eased a bit.

Everyone had to admit, Kirito was a bit of an enigma. Most of the time, he didn't talk much, but when he did it was either something useful or something sarcastic, but he wasn't usually unpleasant unless you were on the receiving end of the sarcasm.

His lack of social skills did show. As did his lack of team work in most areas.

One night, the needed some meat and were tracking a deer, and instead of using his sword, hunting knives or Legolas's or Aragorn's bow, he picked pulled out a small, slender needle like dart object about 3 inches long from his coat and charged it with his energy until it glowed white-orange. Then with a small flick of his wrist, the dart flew through the air and embedded itself in the deer back of the head/neck where the brain stem connected the brain to the rest of the body, killing it quickly and quietly.

They ate well the next few nights.

A few days later, they were resting on the grassy/rocky mountains just a few miles south-west of the Caradhras Mountains. Sam was reheating the last of the deer meat in the shape of sausages and passing the servings around, Legolas scouted the area around them with his elf eyes and Boromir taught Merry and Pippin some basic sword maneuvers while the others were observing them.

"1, 2, 3," Boromir repeated as they went through the exercise, "Good, again."

"Move your feet," Aragorn reminded them as he nursed his pipe.

Kirito watched the lesson with some interest, as he had always just used the game skills and what he remembered from his Kendo classes before he quit to master swordplay. He had never been taught basics this way even though he was far beyond them now both in game and IRL with or without game skill aid. Two straight years almost constantly sword fighting had given him quite the mental and muscle memory.

In the background, Gimli and Gandalf were saying something about passing thought the Mines of Moria, where Gimli supposedly had family, but Gandalf thinking it was a really bad idea.

"If you're not strong enough to overpower an enemy alone, try attacking at the same time, or rapidly switching out," Kirito offered when Merry got thrown off balance for the fifth time.

They nodded to him, but kept going through the exercise they had been doing. But a minute later when Boromir accidently nicked Pippin's hand with his sword, they followed Kirito's advice full out tackled Boromir to the ground together, dropping their swords in the process. It was rather humorous. But when Aragorn went to go break up the wrestling match, he ended up getting his feet taken out from under him.

Kirito laughed, "Well, I think its safe to say they're getting better."

"Would you like to go around Kirito? We've yet to see you demonstrate your skills," Boromir asked as they managed to climb back to their feet.

Aragorn smirked. He had seen Kirito's skills.

"Uhh, okay," Kirito replied and stood, drawing his blade from the sheath on his back.

All eyes trained on them. Kirito almost used his menu to initiate a duel, but then remembered that he didn't have to here. They stood apart swords pointed at each other, and then they sprung.

The first thing they learned about Kirito's fighting style was that he was fast. Really fast. He did, not that they knew, have the fastest reaction time out of 10,000 people after all.

He was also very sporadic. As soon as Boromir managed to block a strike from the front, Kirito would somehow already be behind him aiming another strike at his spine, to which Boromir had to clumsily stumble and parry manage to block. Kirito also had a habit of not always blocking Boromir's sword, but dancing past it or rolling under it, in order to try throwing Boromir off balance, not that it always worked though. Boromir had skills as well.

Boromir put up a damn good fight. However after a while, Kirito then aimed a swing very strong swing at the tip of Boromir's sword, forcing Boromir to step back and loosened his grip on the blade. Kirito quickly ducked under the sword, got in close and hooked his cross guard – the little T shaped area where the blade connects to the hilt- with Boromir's and twisted. The sword was forced out of Boromir's hands and skidded to the side. The fight ended with Kirito's sword pointed at the Gondor man's chest.

Everyone was quite speechless for a moment. They knew Kirito was good with a sword, but that was…almost scary how Kirito moved and so causally, yet determinedly, like Boromir was an actual enemy.

"That was quite an impressive display," Gandlaf finally said.

"Thanks," Kirito was awkward in reply as ever as he put his sword away. He wasn't used to dueling someone when they weren't an enemy and couldn't use his snarky insults to finish it off.

"Where did you learn skills such as that?" Boromir asked, retrieving his weapon, "You fight as though expecting I had some extreme advantage over you."

"Well…." Kirito didn't really know where to start responding to that, considering his time in SAO, "SAO was kinda…-"

Luckily, Sam spotted something on the horizon before the conversation could continue.

"What is that?" he asked, gesturing to the black cloud-like mass. All heads snapped in that direction.

"Just a wisp of cloud, nothing more," Gimli said confidently. No one else was so sure.

"It's moving fast," Boromir said.

"And against the wind," Aragorn added.

"I don't think that's a cloud," Kirito input.

"Creblin from Dunland!" Legolas suddenly exclaimed.

"Hide!" Aragorn ordered.

Everyone did so, erasing any evidence their party had been there within seconds. Sam dumped water on the fire the others grabbed the bags and pulled Bill the Pony behind some rocks. Kirito stepped between two rocks and into the shadows. And just as everyone/thing was out of sight, a huge swarm of large black birds ripped through the area.

They were like crows, but bigger and faster. They swept the area then kept moving on. Everyone waited at least 45 seconds after they passed out of sight to get out of their hiding places.

"What was that?" Kirito asked.

"Spies of Saruman," Gandalf said with grim confidence, "The passage South is being watched. We must take the Northern path through the Caradhras."

They all turned North, where a rather large and rather snowy mountain awaited them.

"How can it feel like summer here but that entire mountain just a few miles away be covered in snow?" Kirito thought as they quickly began moving towards the mountains. They reached the base of the path of the mountain within the day and spent the night there.

And in the morning, they began trekking the mountain pass. The snow was almost up to Kirito's knees, but luckily, they all had just enough protection to bear the coldness of the air and snow and they all had decent boots. Well, the Hobbits didn't have boots, but they were okay enough so far.

"We're gonna have to be careful. Weather in higher mountain ranges can go from completely clear to full out blizzard in just a few hours," Kirito said as they walked.

"Yes, but for the moment, this is our only option of passage," Gandalf said.

"There's always the mines," Gimli grumbled, but was ignored.

Luckily, the first day on the mountain was clear and completely uneventful except for once instance where they were going up the snowy hills and Frodo tripped and fell all the way to the back of the part where Kirito stopped his fall and Aragorn helped him to his feet.

Frodo panicked for a moment and his hands flew to his neck, but found the chain around his neck with the One Ring on it was missing. They looked up to see Boromir holding it, having picked it up from the snow where it had fallen from Frodo's neck when he fell.

Boromir just starred at it for a while.

"Boromir?" Kirito called.

No answer.

"Boromir," Aragorn called louder.

"It is such a strange fate that we should suffer so much fear and doubt over so small a thing… such a little thing," Boromir said to no one particularly as he seemed to be perplexed by the ring.

"Boromir!" Aragorn snapped louder, getting the man's attention finally, "Give Frodo the ring."

He obeyed, but hesitantly at first. Then he gave Frodo a smile and held out the Ring on the chain. Frodo hastily snatched the ring back and put it back around his neck. He ruffled Frodo's hair and gave them another smile before turning around and walking on like nothing had happened.

Frodo hesitantly walked after him, Kirito and Aragorn joining a second later after exchanging worried glances and Aragorn released his grip on his sword as he had been ready to attack the man.

The Ring was getting to Boromir.

Little did they know as the marched on, the Creblin had reported back to their master.

The next morning when the group awoke, the sky was dark and stormy, but they had to continue on. They couldn't afford to lose all that time they had spent walking up yesterday.

Kirito knew this had to be a bad idea, but he trusted Gandalf's judgement that the mines were more dangerous than the mountain… for the moment.

It was snowing before noon. And that snow only got worse. By 1 o'clock the snow had gone from knee deep to just above Kirito's waist. Gandalf was at the front of the group, using his staff to break the snow in front of them, then Kirito, Aragorn and Boromir packed it down more for the others.

The Hobbits were having the worst time, but Gimli was a close second, but at least he had a bit more stamina, meat on his bones and thicker clothing that helped him overcome the fact that he'd be barley poking the tip of his head out of the snow if the other's hadn't packed it down before him.

At the moment, they were on a semi-narrow path, to one side was a giant cliff and to the other was a large drop off above pointy, snow and ice covered rocks.

"Someone's going to get hypothermia or frostbite if this keeps up," Kirito thought as they still had a few days march to get over the mountain, "But at least this isn't a blizzard yet."

Legolas, being the nimble light footed elf he was, could actually walk on top of the snow without sinking in. He scouted a few feet ahead, because anymore than 5 feet and the others would lose sight of him as it became increasingly hard to see.

Kirito was just focused on not tripping and falling on his face. Aside from the cold winds and snow, the Ring really didn't seem to like him and gave him a headache whenever he walked next to Frodo for too long, and on top of that, there was some other thing that seemed to be making him more disoriented, but he pushed on determinedly, hoping the others wouldn't notice.

The storm worsened and visibly got lower and lower and the pain in Kirito's head seemed to get sharper as well, more so than what the Ring did to him. If he had been thinking about it, he would have classified the storm they were in now as a blizzard. Boromir had taken to carrying Merry and Pippin while Aragorn held Frodo and Sam for the snow was now too deep and too harsh for them to walk on their own.

"There is a foul voice on the air," Legolas suddenly said.

When Kirito heard that, he tried to listen more closely, and sure enough, there were worlds in a language Kirito didn't quite understand… and now that he thought about it, they were rebounding in his head, making his headache worse.

"It's Saruman!" Gandalf cried.

A sharp wave of pain made Kirito suddenly dizzy, and then the next thing he knew, lots of rocks were falling down from higher up on the mountain, just barley missing the narrow path they were on.

"He's trying to bring down the mountain! We must turn back, Gandalf!" Aragorn called over the storm.

"NO!" Gandalf replied and walked another few steps to the ledge.

Kirito winced as more of Saruman's words of power fell across the wind.

But then Gandalf started speaking the words of power as well to counter the evil voice, and Kirito barly contained the cry of pain that almost escaped his lips. His vision got fuzzy and he became dizzy. Even back home, where he had no pain shock resisters, he had never felt pain in his head like this.

"Kirito? Are you alright lad?" Gimli, who was standing closest to Kirito asked, but Kirito barley heard it.

This got Aragorn's attention.

Just as Gandalf spouted another line of magic words to try and counter Saruman's who began screaming on the wind at that moment, Kirito winced and a small yelp of pain escaped him and Aragorn realized what was wrong.

Just as Aragorn was about to say something to Gandalf when lighting struck the snow above them. Several feet of snow from above rained down on them and completely buried the Fellowship.

As the snow hit them Kirito blacked out for a minute. When he finally came back to his senses and opened his eyes, he was confused for a moment because even though his eyes were open, he couldn't see….

….and he also couldn't breathe. He began struggling to get up through the snow and vaguely heard the others calling his name, but his vision was beginning to get dark…er, again from the lack of oxygen.

At least the pain in his head had stopped. Which probably mean both Gandalf and Saruman were done casting high powered spells… for now.

But the damage of the blizzard was already done and the storm wouldn't dissipate on it's own for several days, maybe even weeks, since it was a natural storm that had been enhanced with powerful magic.

Finally he managed to free his head from the snow and was able to breathe. Someone, which he later realized was Legolas, grabbed his arm and pulled him the rest of the way out of the snow and steadied him on his feet. He nodded a thanks towards the elf and finally noticed that he was the last one to unbury himself. Everyone, including himself, was caked with snow on their clothes and hair.

"We must get off the mountain. It will be the death of the Hobbits. We must make for the Gap of Rohan then take the West Road to my city," Boromir called. Kirito could confirm that the Hobbit's health bars had been declining even since the snow had started falling, in fact, everyone had taken some HP damage from the snow, even Legolas, though once again there were no numbers to tell exactly how much.

"Yes, we must get off the mountain but the Gap of Rohan takes us too close to Isenguard, and Saruman," Aragorn replied and subtly looked at Frodo and Kirito.

Kirito agreed with Aragorn for more than just the Ring's sake. If Saruman had been that powerful from so far away and made his head hurt with his spells like that, Kirito wanted to stay as far away from him and delay any confrontations with him for as long as possible.

Then Gimli made his suggestion once more, "If we cannot go over or around the mountain, let us go under it. Let us go through the Mines of Moria."

At the moment, despite what Gandalf said about not wanting to go to Moria, it was sounding like a pretty good option right now.

Gandalf paused to think for a few long moments, then finally, hesitantly said, "Let the ring-bearer decide. Frodo?"

Everyone – minus Gandalf – looked at Frodo pleadingly.

"We will go through the Mines," Frodo decided almost instantly.

Gandalf looked grim at the decision, but realized they'd never make it over the mountain alive in this storm and with the likely event that Saruman would try to intervene again.

"So be it."

And so, they began trekking back the way they had come. It was a bit easier since they had already stomped down the snow in that direction, leaving a clear pathway, but the snow had already filled in the stomped down area about a foot. They had to move quickly or they would lose their path and have to go from memory and start packing the snow down a lot again.

But at least the pain in his head was gone… and no one seemed to gotten frostbite or any other illness.

The storm didn't dissipate, but was less harsh as they got to lower elevations. And by less harsh, they could see more than three feet in front of them and weren't constantly on a cliff side with a 50+ foot drop and the risk of getting crushed by falling rocks and ice.

It took them a day and a half to get off the mountain. Kirito was surprised that they made it down as quickly as they made it up considering the weather. The Mountain had defeated them.

When they were no longer in mortal danger and the snow was barley falling anymore, Aragorn finally confronted Kirito about what happened.

"What happened?" Aragorn asked as they were finally back down to only calf deep snow.

"What do you mean?" Kirito asked.

"You know exactly what I mean, Kazuto. On the mountain when Saruman and Gandalf were pushing against each other's magic," Aragorn replied. He had taken to using Kirito's real name when he was dead serious and demaded the kid's attention, "You looked like the words of power were hurting you."

"They didn't affect you? I dunno, they spoke and whatever energy the words were giving off kinda hurt my head," Kirito replied, trying to keep this as little of a deal as possible.

"Lad, words of power are not supposed to hurt ye if they not be directed directly at you," Gimli said, reminding Aragorn and Kirito that he was walking right behind him, "And ye were probably the last thing on Gandalf's mind as he was trying to ward of that blasted Saruman."

But Saruman was trying to hurt them.

Kirito knew the entire Fellowship was listening to the conversation. That really wasn't playing into his plan to draw as little attention to the subject as possible.

"Guys, it's fine. It was probably just a onetime thing…. from the cold or something," Kirito tried to sound as casual as possible as he defended himself.

Gandalf, at the head of the group was taking all this in. It had been a very long time since he had met a person who was affected by words of power like this. He had also neglected to tell the rest of the Fellowship that with Saruman's power, the storm at the top of the mountain should have been much greater, but and yet Gandalf's power had been unhindered and that was why he got Saruman to stop making the storm any bigger than it was so quickly when it should have been a battle that very well could have lasted hours if not days.

But still, he had to be sure that what he thought was going on was truly what was going on.

He suddenly turned and said a few words of power loud and clear, staff pointed at the boy. Kirito winced like Gandalf had just pinched him, but that was the only reaction.

"That spell should have thrown Kirito at least 20 feet backwards, not something I normally need words of power to use, but still should have been all the more effective," Gandalf confirmed and marched up to face Kirito, who was still standing firmly on his feet.

"What was that for?" Kirito muttered shaking, the rest of the small amount of lingering pain from the pinch his brain had felt (though not nearly as sever as during the storm) when the words sounded, then leaned backwards when he noticed how close the old wizard was standing to him.

"What?" Kirito asked cautiously.

Gandalf frowned then muttered another few words. Some snow sticking to Kirito's coat sleeve patterned itself into a circle and Kirito didn't wince or feel any pain at all.

"What?" now he was actually curious

"It seems, we have a Dinendal Elensar in our presence," Gandalf said, analyzing Kirito.

"A Dinendal Elensar, are you sure Gandalf?" Legolas said.

"What's a Dinendal Elensar?" Kirito asked, 100% lost.

"What is a Dinendal Elensar, Gandalf?" Sam echoed, it seemed the Hobbits were just as confused as Kirito.

"I thought those no longer existed," Aragorn said.

"That's cool, but can someone tell me what it is?" Kirito said, but again was ignored.

"I have not known one to exist for a very long time, but it seems that old forms of magic can still arise in unexpected places," Gandalf replied to Aragorn.

"Gimli?" Kirito asked, giving up on getting Gandalf or Aragorn to tell him what was going on.

"I cannot tell ya lad," Gimli shrugged.

"It's someone who malicious magic does not work on, or at least has the effects of the malicious magic directed at them is greatly lessened, only being redirected to a smaller pain centralized in the mind," Legolas finally explained, "But the last known Dinendal Elensar died 3,000 years ago… during…"

"Small?" Kirito mumbled.

"During the first war against Sauron," Boromir concluded, "It seems that fate is having its fun with us, providing a new one as the new problem arises."

"Or it's got something to do with the Pain Shock skill I mysteriously gained when I arrived here, or maybe something to do with how I couldn't feel most physical pain while in SAO, or something like that. Why would I have this form of magic if I'm not even from this world?" Kirito thought, "Yeesh. New unique skills appearing, just like my dual wielding. Why me?"

"This may play to our advantage against Saruman. But we will discuss it later, for now, we must move," Gandalf said.

"Yes, onto the Mines of Moria," Gimli announced with some glee and they began walking. Aragorn clapped Kirito's shoulder and gave him a reassuring nod before walking on ahead.