My sincere apologies for not updating for so long. Have been busy with exams and stuff. Here's a real long chapter to make up for all the time you waited. Hope you like it.

DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN SWORD ART ONLINE.

CHAPTER 6

THE FALLEN

"The... The... The Fallen..."

These were the only words Agil uttered with a terrified look on his face.

Even the carefree Klein was now horrified and had a serious expression on his face.

Sinon and Lyfa, were the only two members of The Knights of Survival, who had not been in the old SAO. As a result of that they were totally unaware of this person.

Lyfa broke the silence and asked, "Who is this Fallen? "

"The name is creepy." Sinon replied in her usual cold manner.

"And so is the person." Klein shot back.

Both Sinon and Lyfa were shocked at his response.

"I.. I .. I feared it might be him. But I didn't want to believe that it was him. "Asuna's trembling voice scared the two even more.

If even Asuna is scared, then this is even more serious than what it looks.

"Can somebody tell me who this Fallen is?"

Agil finally regained his composure and answered Lyfa's question.

"Back in SAO, PKing was not encouraged. No. PKing was wrong. It was a morbid crime because the person died both in VR and in reality. It meant that PKing was murdering. Even though Kayaba Akihiko had clearly stated that a person's death inside SAO would mean that the person would die in real world, some people still went around killing other players."

"And there was this one guild which was full of people who killed other players. This guild was called The Laughing Coffin. It was that one guild whom everyone feared. Some of them killed for money, some for items and some, well, they just killed because it was fun. The members of The Laughing Coffin were strong as well. They hid in certain floors, and once they found a prey, they killed them. They even accepted money from other players to act as assassins. They were ruthless and they were nothing more than cold-hearten blood thirsty murderers."

"The Fallen was one of the strongest members of The Laughing Coffin. Not only in his guild, he was one of the strongest in SAO. No one knew where he trained or how he had gotten so strong, because he never fought on the front lines. He never took part in any boss fights. Yet he was very strong, or that's what I heard. No one ever saw him fight. But whenever he was around, there was this eerie feeling and ominous intuition of his strength."

Asuna and Klein seemed to agree with Agil. Lyfa and Sinon on the other hand were listening to Agil with intent.

"Once, the nuisance caused by this guild had crossed the limit. So many players were being slayed. We could not tolerate this guild anymore. We searched every nook and corner which we had unlocked in SAO, searching for their HQ. And after months of hard work, we finally found it in the depths of a certain floor. We gathered a huge force and went to defeat these people."

"Only problem was that it was not a safe zone, meaning it would be a combat to death. For those people killing wasn't new. For us, it was. We feared it. We were afraid that if things got out of control, many would die in the battle."

"As I said, we left the frontlines, gathered some of our strongest players and went to face them. Even Asuna, Klein and Kirito came to face them. It was a brutal battle. Players from both sides died. Our forces were depleted and it looked as if we were nearing our end. We were outnumbered, and then there were three strong players in The Laughing Coffin, whose levels were as good as Asuna's or Kirito's. "

"But what happened next felt unreal. That was the only time I had seen Kirito lose his cool in the game. He had fought with a rage in him before, but for some reason, on seeing Fallen and the other two, Kirito became irate. He took his two swords, and without thinking killed whoever came in front him. We had gone there to capture and lock those criminals in the jail at SAO. But matters had gone out of hand, and the only way to defend ourselves was by killing them."

"Kirito killed a few of them. They were dumbfounded looking at Kirito's ability. All of them. Even Fallen. Some members of their guild gave up. Some surrendered. Others fought in vain and died. And after all the blood that had been shed, we won the battle. But there seemed to be no point of winning. We had to stoop to their level to win. We had to PK. We lost so many of our friends as well. We have been burdened by that guilt ever since. "

"What happened to the Laughing Coffin then?"

"It was wiped out. All the members either died or were locked up. But..."

"But?"

"We never caught The Fallen because he left and ran away. Rumors said he got scared of Kirito and ran away. I never believed it though."

Agil's final remark left everyone confused except Asuna and she spoke next to clear the doubts in their mind.

"We all saw him fight. There was a time when he had to face three members of The Holy Dragon Alliance all by himself. Those three were one of the strongest players we had. And he killed two of them without as much as a scratch on him. Before he could kill the third, Kirito and I jumped in and engaged him in combat. But soon, the other members of The Laughing Coffin caught up to us. They were defending him. But for the short moment me and Kirito faced him, I could tell that he was very strong, stronger than me. Maybe even as strong as Kirito. And a player with such power would never run away from battle. He had a morbid look in his eyes. He killed because he wanted to. A person like that would never rum away from a battle."

"We were wrong. When we interrogated the members of The Laughing Coffin, what we found out was even more shocking."

"The Fallen was not a member of The Laughing Coffin when we fought them. He had been exterminated from the guild months before our battle. The reason for his extermination being, his opinion on a certain issue differed from a few others. They ran into an altercation. And Fallen slayed those members when he had the chance. The leader of the group as livid at what Fallen had done and told Fallen to control himself. But Fallen was not one to take orders. He defied the leader. Removing Fallen by force was difficult because of his strength. So, they had exterminated him and paid the Fallen a huge sum to leave them alone. "

"It was odd that he even turned up at the battle. Why should he? Why would he fight for the guild that had exterminated him? For what reason? We could not understand anything from the interrogation. None of the captured members knew much about him. But all we heard were gruesome tales of The Fallen. His powers, some said, were beyond imagination. We only saw a glimpse of his powers and it was shockingly strong."

"To date, none of us know, why the Fallen came to fight that day or the reason why he ran away. It has been an unsolved mystery."

There was a long silence in the forest. The only sound came from the fluttering of Yui's small pixie wings. None of them spoke as they all were immersed in thought about what was going around them. Another system announcement broke the silence.

[SYSTEM ANNOUNCEMENT]

[TIME ELAPSED: 3 HOURS 42 MINUTES]

[TOTAL NUMBER OF GUILDS: 64]

[GUILDS ELIMINATED: 59]

"What? 59 guilds have been wiped out already?" Klein asked in a confused manner.

"Divide and conquer. I think separating the guild members did not work well for the players," Sinon said in her usual cold voice.

"Out of the five guilds remaining, we are one. So the remaining four..."

Lyfa was instantly cut short by Asuna.

"One of them is the Laughing Coffin. And there is a possibility that The Fallen might be leading them." Asuna swallowed hard on saying these words. She had still not told the others about the pain absorber level, because she feared it might scare them beyond imagination. Kirito-kun, where are you? We need you. I need you.

Before anyone could say another word, another system announcement interrupted their conversation.

[CONGRATULATIONS TO THE FIVE REMAINING GROUPS]

[YOU WOULD NOW BE TELEPORTED TO THE BOSS ROOM NOW]

"Boss room? What is happening here?" Klein's spat out with an annoyed expression on his face and these were the last words spoken in that eerie forest as the teleportation began.

And with a flash of light, all of them warped out of the deadly forest.

A/N: Firstly, I apologize for writing about the battle between the Laughing Coffin and the crusaders. If you have read Volume 5 you'd know it. But I went on describing it in the first few paragraphs because some of you might not have read Volume 5. Also I changed certain things to make them fall into my story keeping the original storyline intact.

Nonetheless, thanks for reading. Hope you liked it. And as always PLEASE REVIEW.

The next update might be the final chapter. So stay tuned!