Cadmus plopped down, thoroughly exhausted. Although one did not tire from physical exercise in this world, the pounding mental strain of being hunted was starting to get to him. The NerveGear's sensors registered his mind's fatigue and allowed a few beads of virtual sweat to appear on his face.

The area around them was outlined by a faint, shimmering white line that marked the boundary of the safe zone. Running up to and fro between the trees, it wove a rather spacious circular perimeter surrounding an area almost a dozen meters in diameter. Inside this area, neither monsters nor their attacks could penetrate past that holy barrier. Hence the name: «Safe Zone».

Gently, he laid down his son on the grass beside him. Carefully, he studied his unconscious face; he seemed to have aged far beyond his years. It was impossible for someone to physically change in this world outside of customizing their hairstyle, but it seemed he had more lines on his face, his chin seemed rougher, marring his usual exotic features.

He was still out like a light. He had always been very adamant against killing. He had abhorred it. And now, he had killed three, snuffed out three individual lives... Cadmus himself could cope with something like that, being a retired army captain, but it must have been very, very traumatizing for his son, who had never before taken a life.

"Well, then," Cadmus murmured in fluent English, "What are we going to do now? Especially with that cursed thing..."

He stared hatefully at the orange diamond that floated above his son's head, which winked as if taunting him. The thing that was preventing them from heading into safety. If they ever set a single vertex of their avatars into a Code-protected area, they would immediately be assaulted by hordes of guards. There was no safe haven for them, for now. Not until the color winked out in a few days.

The only course of action seemed to be staying one step ahead of their pursuers and trying to wait until the Orange status timed out. Only then could they enter a town and be shielded from the PKers under the authority of the «Area Protection Code».

Of course, he could always abandon his son, but the thought never occurred to him. His son was his life. He'd follow him to the ends of the earth if needed.

But for now... he had to wait for his son to wake up.

Stretching out on the soft grass, he resigned himself to a power nap. It was something he had done many times in his military career, a short sleep to regain some mental energy when time was of the essence, or when the enemy was close by. Sighing, he immediately fell asleep.

Although it seemed like an instant to Cadmus, it was actually a while later when he was woken up by the snap of a tree branch. He instinctively rolled over and drew the long knives he had on his belt, springing up into a combat stance.

Due to their similarity to the trusty commando knife he had used so often on his campaigns, he had assumed the weapons as his main choice of armaments. Although there wasn't a «Dual Wield» skill and the «Knife» skills he could use only affected one weapon at a time, he was quite used to using two and it served well for blocking anyways.

He quickly looked over the area. His son was still unconscious, so the sound could not have possibly come from him. No monsters could enter this safe zone, and generally, computer-controlled creatures gave this area a wide berth, so the sound must have been caused by a player.

A player...

There were two possibilities. One was that it was an extremely dedicated player coming out for some midnight training. The other spelled doom, death, and destruction in capital letters.

Straining his low leveled «Searching» Skill, he swept the area with it. He picked up a small signal from the northwest. He squinted, and after a moment, managed to pick out several cursors heading his way. Slowly growing larger.

A mixture of orange and green cursors. Ten of them.

Reinforcements!?

Cadmus quietly let out the most vulgar curse he knew.

Chapter 8: Shades of the Future

"Kirito?"

He stood frozen, unable to think. Or more accurately, unable to piece together what he had heard, like a kindergartener learning arithmetic for the first time. His mind simply could not wrap itself around the equation.

PKers + Safe Zone + ? = Something Bad

"Kirito! Kirito?"

"Kirito-kun? Are you okay?"

Both of them, his friends, in front of him. Sirius was waving a hand in front of his face; Mane was tugging worriedly on his sleeve. Something in their faces made the gears click in his head.

'Wasn't Cadmus heading towards the safe zone? Because his son's orange cursor denied them access to a village?'

'But then... The PKers, that means, that means...'

"Kirito-kun!"

An unnaturally strong tug nearly pulled him off balance. Mane hastily withdrew her hand, looking at him with an embarrassed face apologetically. "Sorry-Kirito-kun," she belted out, melding the words together in a hurry.

Sirius slowly closed the screen where he was composing the message, a small notice popping up stating that the unfinished message had been saved to Sirius' s drafts folder. He looked the black-haired boy over, storm-grey eyes scanning him over with the intensity of a laser, Kirito noted in a rather detached way. The boy had been really tense and cloudy as of late.

"Kirito. Is there something wrong?"

"I... I, I, there's..."

For some reason, he couldn't put his thoughts into words that could be conveyed. He took several deep breaths, trying to calm down, and spoke slightly more clearly.

"There's... Some people. Two people, in there. We need to, we need to go help them."

"There's people in the safe zone?"

"Yes, two." Kirito turned as if he had to go somewhere, then paused as he turned back to explain. "They were a part of a party that was assaulted earlier and almost completely wiped out-"

Sirius immediately seemed to understand and cut him off. "We have to go warn them. Did you friend them?"

Kirito shook his head.

"No PMs then." Sirius made a step forward. "Mane, stay here."

"Huh?" Mane looked at him in surprise. Kirito shook his head to clear his mind as Sirius frowned. Mane tilted her head. "But why? I can help!"

Kirito reached out and placed his hand on her head. She blinked, confused.

"Mane, these are people who can kill. They kill other people, for no reason. You..." He gestured vaguely with his other hand. "Your fear of death, if it comes to a fight, will be too much for you. For your own safety, it's best if you stay here."

Kirito didn't understand how he pulled those words out, but it seemed to mirror what Sirius had been thinking, as the boy nodded in agreement. Almost as if he was playing devil's advocate, his mind immediately went to thoughts of dissent. "But I think Mane's strong enough, she should be able to handle it!"

"Wha- but I'm not that weak anymore! I can fight! I can..."

A whisper of Mane's thoughts made its way over to him, as their thinking went into sync for a few moments and both of them shared feelings for a moment. A few seconds of silence passed, then Kirito, slightly rebellious as Mane's mood affected him, grudgingly conceded that Sirius was right.

Mane seemed to be of the same mind for a moment, then something occured to her and the link was abruptly cut, as Kiriro didn't share the same thought. He did catch a glimpse of fear though; something was scaring her, and it was frightening her badly. Although he didn't have the time to discern the source of the fear, that glimpse reinforced the "Mane should stay behind" thought in Kirito's mind, and he gently patted her head. "Mane, it's alright. Just wait for us at the inn, okay? We'll be okay."

She opened her mouth to protest, but Kirito was already running towards the northern exit to the town, Sirius following close behind. Her words went unheard except by the NPC shopkeeper, who scratched his head as if it were itchy.

And now, thoughts of Mane were gone from his mind as he sprinted around the edge of a particularly large Nepent nest that lay near the Safe Zone. He watched the writhing vines of one of them out of the corner of his eye, making sure it didn't display the telltale signs of aggro. It wouldn't do to be found and forced to spend a few precious seconds to dispatch it. Those few drips could very well mean the difference between reaching the two survivors in time and being too late.

In quick words, he described to Sirius, who was keeping up alongside him, what had happened and why those two were in the safe zone. The silver-haired boy had answered with a small huff of breath and a slither of steel as he drew his sword in preparation. Kirito also drew his, almost certain there would be a fight. He didn't know how, but he knew.

A Nepent, straying unusually close to the edge of its enclosure, noticed the two running by and shook its vines angrily. It gurgled, throwing its pitcher-shaped head back, and spat a glob of acid at the two boys, both of whom nimbly rolled to opposite sides to dodge it. Hissing in annoyance, it slithered after them at a surprisingly swift pace, almost as fast if not faster than the boys pace.

As fast as it was, it had no time to react as two streaks of light cleaved it into quarters; a dark blue edge striking vertically and a hardened grey lance cutting horizontally. The sheer power behind each blow gave it no chance as its HP was depleted almost instantly, causing it to disintegrate into countless bits of blue light.

The wielders of both blades barely spared a pause before planting their feet in the ground at an angle, halting their momentum, and using the spring-back to get themselves back on track.

Even though the whole process had taken less than five seconds, Kirito felt like several minutes had been wasted, and he redoubled his pace. Sirius was forced to do the same to keep up. "Kirito-"

The black swordsman stopped abruptly, causing Sirius to collide into him. He fell to the ground, stifling a muttered curse and agilely springing back to his feet. "What are you-"

Kirito held up a hand, cocking his head and listening closely. Sirius fell silent, also straining to catch any sounds that were out of the ordinary. Kirito lanced at him as ears pricked as Sirius strained his «Searching» skill; unlike Kirito and Mane, he had focused more on combative skills rather than utility ones, and only picked it up later. As a result, his skill level was marginally lower than that of the other two.

But surely even he could pick out the sounds of clashing swords, coming from the general direction of the «Safe Zone». The combatants weren't exactly trying to be discreet.

"Hurry!" Kirito whispered urgently as dread flooded his heart. His hand clenched the sword tightly, causing his knuckles to stand out in stark relief against the rest of his hand. We were too late!

Sirius wasted no further words as he ran ahead, taking the lead with his weapon held up in a battle-ready position. The grey coat and scarf he wore streamed out and flapped along with his hair behind him as he bent over, close to the ground, to maximize speed. Kirito followed suit, lightly balancing his weapon in the palm of his hand.

As they drew closer, Kirito, with the aid of his high Searching skill, could make out the diamond-shaped markers of the players, dancing and weaving around each other. A mixture of green and orange, moving back and forth in the generic pattern of sword combat. That, or they were dancing, and Kirito had no doubt that it was a dance of death.

A quick scan of the area allowed Kirito to estimate the general numbers of both sides. Around eight oranges, six greens. Kirito knew one green and one of the oranges should have been Cadmus and his son, and that the other green players had to be the worms, the PKers who retained their green cursors so they could infiltrate targeted parties. All in all, it probably meant they were probably outnumbered twelve to two. Kirito's heart felt like it was made of lead as his spirits plummeted.

But the positioning of the cursors was a little strange... the conflict seemed to be split into two clear groups, three greens and an orange versus a large group of orange, the smaller faction hemmed against the southern side of the safe zone. A few greens were loitering nearby; they were probably the PKer's moles, whom needed to preserve their cursor color for future infiltrations.

Of that smaller group, one green and one orange had to be Cadmus and his son.

Were other players here as well!?

He burst into the clearing, side by side with Sirius, swords up and ready-

"Asuna! Heathcliff!" Sirius exclaimed.

"Sirius? Ehh, Kirito?"

The Leader and co-captain of the Knights of Blood, Heathcliff and Asuna, standing alongside Cadmus, arranged in a semicircle around the stirring form of the son. They were surrounded on all sides, backs to the thick foliage behind them. Each one was dueling two or three enemies at once, with two remaining sitting aside as they recovered their health.

His immediate thought was one of suspicion.

Why are they here?

Kirito immediately answered his own thought. Doubtlessly they had planning to do some night training, as he himself had done several times already.

The resolute paladin was holding off three of his foes single-handedly, even managing to gain some ground as he pushed forward with his massive tower shield. Asuna, not as heavily armored, had been striking and parrying with her blade at an impressive speed. Her blade hung unused by her side now as she gaped at the new arrivals.

Cadmus was wielding two long knives, which Kirito would have mistaken for short swords had they not been curved and tapered to a point. His face was hard and tense as he bared his teeth at his adversaries. His son was lying against a rock a few meters away, groggily clutching his head. He appeared quite confused.

A motley assortment of players faced them. Surprisingly, each and every one of them looked like regular players, carrying varying levels of equipment. The only word that could be used to describe them was ordinary: Their faces were both young and middle-aged, one even appeared to be no more than thirteen. Even on the green-cursor'd PKers loitering near the fight, Kirito had expected some sign of evil; at the very least, an eyepatch and a scar.

But no, they reminded Kirito of the frightened players in Starting City on the first day. Incredibly ordinary.

Upon their entrance, everyone seemed to have frozen in surprise. Cadmus was the first to recover, drawing his right hand back and initiating a Knife skill, causing the weapon to glow a bright yellow. With a flash, he smote his opponent from shoulder to hip in a devastating blow, the force pushing the PKer back.

The man's HP blinked, dropping almost 40%. Kirito was surprised, and slightly impressed; apparently Cadmus had specced a lot of his stat points into Strength. The elation was short lived, however, as two others reengaged the father and he was forced back on the defensive, with no chance to follow up.

The clearing unfroze as two of Heathcliff's adversaries resumed their onslaught, drawing their blades across his tower shield in a skittering of sparks. The paladin, in return, calmly lashed out with his sword, scoring neat gashes across the chests of the PKers and dealing quite a bit of damage to both. With a grunt, they fell back a few steps.

Asuna was the last to recover. Taking advantage of that, the two PKers facing her attacked simultaneously, both weapons glowing with multicolored light and descending through the air towards her. Immediately realizing her blunder, Asuna whirled around and raised her blade.

In an amazing display of dexterity, the rapier weaved around the oncoming sword, warping around it and batting it aside. In the same movement, she threw herself into the air, bending her body desperately, and just barely managed to dodge the second blow, the blade hissing past the white cloth of her uniform. It did manage to snag a small lock of her hair though, a few strands floating in the air.

Landing on her feet and crouching low, she used the built up force in her legs to spring forward. Green streaks streamed off the tip of her rapier and with a shout, she pierced the first PKer's stomach with two rapid strokes, causing a great deal of damage. With a strangled groan, the man backed off, one hand reflexively clutching his abdomen and the other unhooking a potion from his belt. Bits of blue light filtered through the gap between his fingers.

But by lunging forwards, Asuna had overextended, leaving herself open to the one behind her. Even as she took out the first, she presented the second PKer an opening to attack. Seeing the opportunity and eagerly seizing it, he raised his both his arms, readying the broadsword for a devastating double-handed cut. The system recognized the movement, causing the edges of the blade to be coated in red fire.

A burst maniacal laughter escaped the man's mouth, which alerted Asuna to the danger behind her. Off balance from the thrust, she frantically twisted, but knew she couldn't escape this one.

The tip moved back a little, then in a flash, rushed down in the 2-H Sword overhand skill «Skyfall». Edges blazing, the sword cleaved down towards Asuna's exposed back.

Clang!

Surprised, the PKer found his sword blocked by the thin blade wielded by Sirius. The silver-haired boy had thrown himself into harm's way, drawn his sword, and moved to intercept at a surprising speed. There was a strange glint in his storm grey eyes, his brow furrowed in concentration.

Their weapons emitted steely rasps as Sirius moved closer for leverage. With a few shrieks of protest, the hilts locked together, and Sirius stood his ground under the supposedly unblockable force of the «Skyfall» skill. Then he shouted out wordlessly, shrouding his sword in grey silk and executing the «Uppercut» skill.

Although Sirius's skill was not as fancily named nor did it have as much base power as the «Skyfall», his higher «Strength» allowed him to overpower it. With an explosive retort, the oncoming skill was overwhelmed and cancelled out, throwing the attacker back a few paces. Shards of red light crumbled off of the sword as the last vestiges of the skill faded.

"Thanks," Asuna murmured as she regained her feet.

Eyes still carrying that strange look in them, Sirius did not answer, instead poking the pinwheeling PKer one more time as a warning before backing up to Asuna; both of the enemies who had been recovering had been completely refreshed and converged on their position.

Kirito, meanwhile, had not been idle. As soon as his friend had sprung to Asuna's aid, he himself dashed to where Heathcliff and Cadmus were dueling their foes, both holding three apiece.

By unspoken consent, Heathcliff swung his shield around in a lethal semicircle, clearing some space for Kirito to engage as well. All but one of their foes managed to avoid the blow; the unlucky victim caught the shield full on his face and tumbled head over heels to the side. Even with no pain, it would still induce shock as the force of the blow was enough to temporarily stun him.

But in return, the momentum of the shield threw Heathcliff off-balance. With double raw-throated yells, two of the others lunged forward and thrust their weapons forward, a lance and a sword, at Heathcliff's exposed breastplate. With his shield dragging his arm the way it was, he couldn't block or retaliate in time.

A shower of sparks emitted as the weapons skittered across the surface of his armor, rutting deep gashes in the otherwise unblemished crimson steel. Accordingly, Heathcliff's HP dropped by a small amount, a numeral greatly reduced by the defensive values of his armor as well as his higher «Vitality» stat. As the paladin tried to counterattack, they swiftly withdrew, the pikeman keeping Heathcliff at a distance with the longer reach of his weapon.

But now Kirito was here, a dark blue dart streaking from his hand and catching the leg of the retreating swordsman. With a sickly shrrriiik!, the boy's leg was completely sheared off below the knee, and he collapsed, unable to support himself anymore. Quickly, he was pulled away by one of his comrades, while the pikeman tried to cover them. The abandoned limb lay forlornly on the ground, gently de-rezzing at the cut end just like the stump on the PKer.

While loss of limb was not technically lethal in this world, it could still lead to death. The only way to restore the missing extension was to either heal yourself at a special spring in a village or use a healing crystal, which completely restored HP and limbs, though not other debuffs. Otherwise, there was no way to regain the appendage except the medicine of time.

In addition to the feeling of having your arm or leg cut off, that strange feeling of emptiness would be enough to temporarily incapacitate a player. In active combat, that was especially deadly if you had no one to assist you. The opening would be enough, for man or AI, to strike a truly lethal blow. The absence of pain only made it worse; it was an otherworldly feeling, something that should not have existed normally.

The battle quickly became a game of attack and counterattack, as all duels usually disintegrated into. The fight separated itself into five 2v1 situations, all of them trying fruitlessly to incapacitate the other somehow. Kirito's side was hard pressed; even though they could handle two enemies alright, all of their enemies were equipped with healing crystals. An endless fight; the PKers were determined to hold their ground and kill them. If one was wounded, the other would fight hard to cover him while he was healing. The crucial four seconds it took to completely heal from a crystal would have been a golden opportunity had they been fighting one on one, but as it was, the PKers could last indefinitely. Even their potions, when they ran out of crystals, were the fast-acting kind, leaving almost no time to take advantage of.

They could have tried to retreat. All they had to do to "win" was to survive, whereas the PKers had to kill them. But the thing was, it was hard to extract oneself from a heated fight without exposing him or herself to an attack, especially with the dense screen of foliage behind them. If they turned to pick their way through it, they would be open to attacks from behind. If they tried to back away facing the PKers, they wouldn't be able to retreat effectively through the mess of vines and trunks behind them.

Usually PKers would just strike and if the battle dragged on long enough, they would automatically retreat with the loss of the element of surprise. In a lengthy fight, other people could always chance upon them.

But at this time of the day... Kirito grimly thought, They know no one in their right mind would be out in these woods, much less near our position.

Thus, they fought.

Kirito ducked under the swing of a PKer, a nerdy kind of kid wearing oversized glasses. The look clashed horribly with the leather armor he wore as well as the pitted short sword he was swinging back and forth. His blows contained terrible force, a result of a super high strength stat, but the attacks had pitiful accuracy and moved at the speed of a snail.

Still, the power had surprised him when he had attempted to parry the blow and it nearly destroyed his guard. He had jumped aside just in time, barely avoiding having his hand cut off as his sword was batted aside.

But now, he had a clear opening, as he whipped out with his sword and struck three times in quick succession, dark blue flames staining the air in front of him. Three clear gashes opened up in the material. Unlike Heathcliff's steel plate, the leather armor did not have much in terms of defensive stats and the HP drop was quite high. Startled by the damage, the man flinched.

Before Kirito could capitalize on this mistake however, he was under fire from the other PKer, a man with dirty-blond hair who appeared to be in his mid-twenties. Wielding a pretty decrepit longsword but high-grade armor, he attacked with a flourish of his blade and slammed it down.

Kirito neatly dodged to the side, losing his advantage over the other kid in the process. Quickly, the damaged kid scurried back and received a potion from his teammate: one of the green-cursored "moles" still staying back from the fight. He popped it open and chugged it down, watching his health slowly regenerate.

Next to him, Cadmus was parrying, feinting, and striking with his double knives about as fast as the eye could track. Suddenly, he threw himself into a furious assault at one of his adversaries, ignoring the blows from the other one. Both his and his target's HP began to drop at a steady rate; for a moment, it looked like he would break through and kill him.

But then one of those fighting Heathcliff momentarily detached himself from his engagement and attacked the exposed bits of Cadmus. With two of them whaling on him now, the man cursed and was forced onto the defensive.

His HP whined as it faded into a dangerous yellow color, perhaps around 30%, as best as Kirito could estimate. He reached for his belt, intending to quaff a potion, but the two enemies were onto him before he could grasp ahold of it.

Slightly infuriated and worried, the black swordsman counterattacked, driving his sword from the side as a feint, then dropping to his knees as the enemy's sword rose to block it. With the blade now by his side, he lashed out in a backhand blow.

But the man was pretty fast, tilting his blade and catching the retaliatory attack on the crossguard. Growling in frustration, Kirito leaned forward, putting his entire strength into the deadlock. A small rattling sound rapped out as the swords ground against each other, squeaking in protest.

Narrowing his eyes, Kirito stared into the opposing eyes of the man. They appeared clouded, unreadable to him. Or perhaps the system simply wasn't that advanced.

Or maybe it was and the man was simply just emotionless.

"Why do you do this?" Kirito whispered. "Why? You know this is real murder."

It was something that had been nagging at him ever since Cadmus mentioned the PKers. Why would they do this? What was their goal, their purpose in this killing?

Currently, there wasn't much value in PvP. Equipment and items rarely dropped from killed players, and it certainly wasn't worth losing the advantage villages and towns gave, especially in this game of death. In addition, this game was mostly populated by avid gamers, not the sort of person who would actually have the guts and the will to rip another's life away and cast it into the void.

But the man simply stared at him blankly, with clouded eyes. Either that or, he mused again, the system simply didn't display the opponent's emotions that well.

Suddenly fueled by a driving disgust, a strange sense of pity, Kirito heaved all his might and pushed the man back, sprawling. Whipping around with the momentum, he pivoted on the heel of his foot and activated a small skill. With a grunt, he slammed the flat of the blade into the man's head, causing less damage than what was desirable but also imposing two small debuffs onto the man: «Delay» and «Tumble». «Delay» would slow down the man's reactions, while Tumble would warp his standing balance. Both had short durations but were also quite potent in a one on one fight.

The problem was, it wasn't a one on one fight.

There was a deep humming sound from his left, and suddenly, his body seized up in a sudden instinct. Reflexively, he leaped up, as high as he could, straight up, tucking his legs into his body to maximize the distance between his body and the ground.

The short sword that carried a high amount of power behind it swung underneath him, hissing past the soles of his boots. Had he not jumped, he would have been caught just above the waistline and probably would have been sliced in half. At the very least his HP would have dropped tremendously.

Twisting in midair, he threw out a stroke in the direction of his attacker without looking. The dark blue arc curved just above the head of the glasses-kid, who had dropped to his knees to avoid being decapitated.

Tch!

Landing unsteadily on his knees, Kirito grunted and tried to regain his bearing.

But in that time, he had lost his advantage once again. The taller blond man had shaken off the debuffs placed on him and was ready to begin combat again. Back to square one.

Again.

He couldn't finish this, Kirito realized. He was strong enough to take them on one at a time, but he was falling just short of taking them both at once. After around ten minutes of constant combat their ability to tag out and use their healing items was proving to be quite potent: his HP was falling down, however slowly, with no chance of recovery, while the bars of his opponents were jumping up and down like kangaroos.

Also crippling was the fact that he had to hold off from dealing lethal blows, as he was no killer, but his enemies had no such restriction. There the problem lay; even if Kirito had an opening, he couldn't use a higher powered skill for fear of depleting their HP. And as long as they lived, they could recover and rejoin the fight.

In addition, the nonstop swordplay was beginning to take its toll on his stamina. His responses were slowing, his heightened senses diminishing. If he could have taken quick breaks, perhaps he would have had a much better pool of energy to draw from, but as it was, he, along with Sirius and the rest, were on the losing side.

If they only had a few more people, just one more, perhaps, they might have been able to win.

Mane! He involuntarily cried out in his head. Mane!

But there was no response. Of course there wasn't. They weren't linked.

He raised his arm to ward off a blow from the blond man, but momentarily distracted by his own thoughts, he was too slow to react to what he realized afterwards was a feint. Changing direction, the sword switched from a stroke across the chest, which was protected by his sword, to an attack across his stomach, which had been laid bare. There was a dreadfully cold pinching feeling, and when Kirito glanced down, there was an ugly red gash across the black material of his coat.

Even as he glanced down, he heard a familiar whum-whum sound and threw himself to the left. Despite the fast reaction, the short sword carried by the other kid sliced off a flap of his shoulder; no more than half a centimeter deep, but enough to cause a pang of fear to run through Kirito's heart. That pang intensified when his Health bar in his HUD display flashed to draw his attention and shifted color into a sickly yellow..

The color of an HP bar under 50%.

Suddenly fueled by this fear, the sword seemed to come alive with a spirit of its own, darting in from several different directions at once. The blond man was caught off guard by the sudden burst of ferocity, and he was thrown off balance by the first onslaught. Seizing the chance, with no thought of the consequences, Kirito dove forward and, with a loop of his edge, lopped off the man's sword hand.

The owner of the limb paled, his severed appendage falling to and twitching on the ground, and kicked out. In his position, head close to the ground, Kirito was booted right in the face and thrown back. He landed with an uncomfortable crash on his back, his sword falling from his grasp.

Frantically, his fingers scrambled for the hilt and closed around the wire-wrapped shaft. He sat up from his position on the ground to see the glasses-kid beginning a downward swing, sword blazing in the light of a sword skill.

There was an evil, triumphant look on his otherwise quite ordinary face.

Which turned to abject horror as he was run through by a knife-type weapon, the tip of the blade protruding from his back. With a disgusting tearing sound, the weapon was ripped out, its gleaming serrated edge leaving a massive Damage over Time effect on its target as evidenced by the gushing streams of red light leaking from the wound.

Just like in real life, the rate at which damage was inflicted from a DoT wound was influenced by the victim's position and the location of the wound. Common sense dictated not to move upon receiving such a horrendous wound, but the PKer had already set in motion the overhand sword skill «Rupture», and he executed it, swinging down with all his might.

The blow smashed into empty ground, for Kirito had already rolled out of the way, and the knife-wielder had already dodged clear out of the descending path. The steel screeched and clanged uselessly against a piece of slate, skittering and throwing out orange sparks of friction everywhere.

The motion aggravated the DoT, causing the stream of light to increase in strength. The boy's face contorted; even without the pain, the feeling was extremely disturbing. In this case, it was like something you didn't know resided in you before was pouring out of a hole in your stomach at an alarming rate. He coughed, gasped.

But he had more to deal with than just that. Even as he bent over to instinctively push his guts back in, the knife wielder ducked down, and, alighting the blade with a purple flare, drove it up and into the boy's chest, at the base of his neck.

With an unpleasant crunch, it slid home.

The weak point of the neck, combined with the trickling DoT and a bright flash signalling a critical hit, was enough to send the numbers spiraling past two hundred, one hundred, half a hundred-

He was screaming now, screaming as he beheld the weapon in his throat, screaming because of the fear, the fear of death-

-a quarter, ten, nine-

It was definitely a killing blow. He was still screaming, as he must have noticed the rapidly decreasing amount in his life gauge by now-

-five, two, one-

His eyes were straining, fixated upon the top left corner of his vision, filled with fear and despair-

Zero.

The boy fizzed and shattered, banished from both the world of the living and the floating castle for eternity. His sword and a helm dropped from the light of his remains, clattering to the slate beneath.

The entire clearing froze, every set of eyes turning upon the scene, gazing upon the slowly evaporating mass of particles that blew away like so much dust clouds even as they gazed upon it. The man who held the knife, panting, eyes glazed over by a wild, feverish look-

"Va-" Cadmus exclaimed.

He fell silent as his son moved forward swiftly, knife point glinting in the fading afternoon sun. Towards the shocked blond man.

With an audible "shick", the knife seemed to fly straight into the throat, vertically. With an equally horrifying sound, the blade was drawn down and out, effectively tearing open a void into his neck and upper chest. The man fell, light trailing from the mess that was once his throat, wordlessly trying to say something.

The knife flipped once, flicking off the few stray bits of light that clung to it, and stabbed down, burying itself deep into the man's cranium. He abruptly stopped struggling, going limp against the ground, before he was deleted as well. His sword and a few potions sat forlornly where he had once been kneeling over.

Two deaths, in the space of ten seconds. The absolute disregard for life, the lack of hesitation the son had, shocked Kirito. The son hadn't given any pause in his movements to indicate apprehension at what he had been about to do, and he slaughtered two individual lives just like that.

Like two monsters, two AI driven beings, killed and vaporized.

Before Kirito could open his mouth to say something, a sixth sense caused him to hesitate. Instinctively, he whirled around.

SHIN-CLANG!

Kirito blinked in surprise to see the heavy edge of a claymore to be quivering no more than a foot away from his forehead, glinting in the fading light. He immediately realized, rather belatedly, that he would have been cleanly cleaved in two had the blade continued along its path. The PKer holding the weapon, a rather sallow looking man with a hooked nose, had his features arranged in a picture of surprise and frustration, most likely directed at the fact his surprise attack had failed.

What was keeping the blade from continuing down along its aligned path was a thinner blade, dyed a deep, timeless blue, angled perpendicular to the blocked weapon. The arm holding it was trembling slightly, its owner's face hardened to display intense concentration, her hair flying to the side from which she had thrown herself to protect Kirito.

"Mane?"

"Kirito-kun...! I'll... protect... Hrrrrragh!"

Gritting her teeth before yelling out, Mane, as it was indeed her, mightily shoved back with Historica, breaking the sword skill and forcing her opponent back. Pinwheeling for balance, surprised at the strength contained in a girl of all people, he stumbled backwards and desperately threw himself back to avoid Historica's return stroke.

Into the waiting arms of Heathcliff.

The red paladin, staring straight ahead with an expressionless and unreadable face, nonchalantly slammed the massive brass pommel of his sword into the side of the PKer's head without even looking at him. As the man crumpled to the ground, inflicted with a stunned status condition, he kicked the prone body back towards his comrades and raised his armaments into a combative position.

It was the one-handed sword skill «Reverse Impact», a hilt-based attack that had a high charge-up time but inflicted a lethal stun condition, rendering the target incapacitated much like the effects of paralysis. Normally it was too cumbersome to use in active combat, but it seemed Heathcliff had predicted Mane would throw the PKer over to him, and had started the ability early accordingly. The target would be unable to move for quite a bit.

Kirito began, out loud this time, "Mane..?"

But she ignored him, instead angling around to get in between Kirito and the PKers. Raising Historica vertically, she held it in front of her and glaring hatefully-

Hatefully. That was an expression he had never seen before on Mane's face. An emotion mixed in with some others that were, like Heathcliff's, unscrutinized. She was breathing hard, knuckles standing out in stark relief against the rest of skin as she gripped her beautifully blue weapon unnecessarily tightly. Her dark eyes glinted even darker as she pinned down the PKers with the most threatening gaze Kirito had ever seen.

Kirito had once heard that the famed "death glares" from a girl spelled certain death, but he had never thought it could actually be true, dismissing it as typical anime-logic. Now, he wasn't so sure it was limited to fiction.

Before, the assortment of player killers had numbered twice that of Kirito's group, and had had no hesitation in continuing the fight. Now, with two dead and one temporarily incapacitated, as well as two new combatants to join their enemies, they weren't so sure, slowly inching away on the balls of their feet. The several green players whom had been staying away from the fight ran towards their group, looking anxiously at the items their two comrades had dropped.

The clearing was deadly silent. A lone owl hooted somewhere outside of the safe zone.

A quick glance around made Kirito realize how bad the situation had been for them. Not a single member of their party, bar Mane and the son, had Hit Points above 50%. Heathcliff and Kirito had fared the best, hovering around forty-five. Sirius and Asuna, both of whom Kirito had lost track of during the fight, stood at the bare border of the red zone. Cadmus was barely alive at ten.

Cadmus, without sheathing his knives or turning away from the PKers, silently ran over to his son and laid a hand on his shoulder.

As if Cadmus had pulled a trigger, his son launched himself at the group, knife flashing in the fading light. With a wordless cry, he grabbed the neck of one of the players and mercilessly stabbed the unfortunate man right in the eye.

A scream screeched through the air. Kirito stood stock still, unable to react to what he was seeing.

With one smooth motion, the boy ripped his weapon out and spun around, drawing a second mouth on his victim's throat. With a crazed and delirious look on his face, he ducked under the collapsing man's arm and sprang right into the arms of another one.

The tip of his knife sprouted from the back of the surprised PKer's head.

Kirito finally shook off his reverie. Pushing off with one leg, he raced towards the rampaging son, yelling "Stop!".

Even as he pulled on the boy's shoulder, the last fragments of both PKers were dissipating into the air. Devoid of targets, the boy swung blindly at him. Kirito ducked instinctively and felt the wind of the blade whistle through his hair.

Somewhat coming to his senses, the boy finally dropped the knife, blinking and clutching his stomach, teeth gritted. Kirito looked around; for the first time, he noticed that the rest of the PKers had fled while leaving their two comrades behind. They were the only ones there.

The only sound left was the insistent chirping of the crickets.

Nothing.

Nothing was going through Sirius's mind as he fixed his eyes on the trees his adversaries had disappeared behind. His hands still clenched tight around the hilt of his , his breathing still rapid as if he was in combat, crouched ready to dodge another blow or deal one.

His focus completely nailed onto the trees, he jumped in surprise as he felt something alight on his shoulder. Immediately pulling down and away to dodge whatever it was, his sword flashed down and up to meet his attacker's throat-

Soichi!?

His eyes widened, his arm's muscles tensed to stop the momentum from carving his friend's head off, the recoil causing him to fling his sword to the ground with a resounding clang. Silver hair swinging around with the motion, Sirius swung around and backed away, horrified at what he had nearly done. His left hand clutched at his right wrist as if to restrain it.

The girl in front of him yelped, jerking her hand and head back to avoid what might have been a fatal blow.

"Sirius...?"

Then his vision cleared, and he took in the sight of the red and white Knights of Blood uniform, the slightly thinner figure, and rounder face, and he numbly remembered it was Asuna. Not Soichi. For a moment his mind wandered and he wondered where Soichi was, and then he recollected the cold fact that she was already dead. The thought hit him like one of Heathcliff's «Reverse Impacts».

He shook his head in confusion, finally realizing consciously that the battle was over. Shaking his hand to relax the tension he still felt, Sirius felt his mouth creak open to croak a horse apology.

"Ah... Asuna, I'm sorry.."

"No, it's fine, Sirius..." she stammered out. With a trembling hand, she returned the rapier back to the thin sheath hanging from her waist. Just as Heathcliff plunked his his shield down into the dirt, accompanied by a heavy thunk, she jerked, slamming the hilt home with unnecessary force. Sirius could easily tell she was almost exhausted beyond belief.

Behind her, Heathcliff crouched, breathing heavy. A good six inches or so of his tower shield was buried in the dirt before him, his blade lying alone on the ground next to him. He was kneeling as if about to be knighted, his left arm hung up by the straps on the back of the shield. His head was bowed low, and his back was visibly heaving, rising up and down like that of a sleeping bear.

Next to him, Kirito was kneeling in a similar position, instead with both hands clasped upon the pommel of his sword, half-buried. His black hair ruffled under a light breeze as he stared at the dirt, not making a sound. Long black hair, belonging to Mane, lay draped on his shoulders as she tightly embraced him from the side. She too, was silent, and Sirius vaguely thought they might be communicating via their heads again.

Cadmus had not moved at all from his spot. His son had sat down hard in the dirt, cradling his head with both hands. The entire clearing was silent for what seemed like a long time.

Then a sudden clinking sound caused their heads to snap in alarm, but it turned to be only the sound of Heathcliff's armor as he reached far a small pouch at his belt. Slowly, he withdrew a small, blood-red crystal encrusted with an intricate gold design. Muttering the word "Heal", he crushed the item in his hand, shattering it into an aureola of comfortingly warm crimson light. There was a long, drawn out tone as his HP shot all the way back to full.

The remaining floating fragments of red light left behind by the crystal shivered and vanished into the air. As if galvanized by this, the rest of the party bar one hastily retrieved their healing crystals, enunciating the word and falling silent again as their recovery items did their work.

Alone now in terms of HP levels, the silver-haired boy kneeled onto the ground, staring at it with both orbs as if it contained the answer to everything. The gentle beeping of his critical health status failed to register with him.

There was a tentative tap on his shoulder. Somehow able to recognize who it was, he didn't react with an instinctive counter attack, but instead slowly turned his head to stare at her out if the corner of his eye.

For a moment, he almost identified the girl in front of him as her again, but he caught himself just in time.

She's dead. She's gone and you do not deserve to replace her.

His attention now turned to her outstretched hand, which was holding something red and rectangular in it, streaked through with shades of gold.

"Sirius..." Asuna nudged his head gently with the back of her hand. "You have to heal up. You have to be more careful..."

He reached out and, with a trembling hand, tried to grasp at that crimson shard, but slipped and ended up grabbing her hand instead, feeling the sensation of heat generated by the system warm his palm and fingers, which in comparison were ice cold. She yipped in surprise, but strangely maintained the contact and did not attempt to pull away.

Suddenly, he could imagine that he was at his school again, and that he was free. Free and happy, blissfully satisfied with the one he liked. Free of burdens, free of fear and regret and self-loathing and all the things tightening around his heart at that very moment.

Free.

He had the sudden urge to smile, to somehow-

Enough!

The feelings were forced down, illusions swept away like so many cobwebs. He shook his head ever so slightly, emptying his foolish mind of these foolish thoughts.

No more.

With a jerk, his fingers released Asuna's hand and curled instead around the healing crystal, removing it from her palm and ceasing contact with her. The sensation of warmth and comfort deserted him, leaving him cold and lonely once again.

Loneliness you deserve.

"Thank.. you," he whispered, loud enough so that Asuna could hear him but no one else. Without waiting for a response, he tightened his grip and crumbled the crystal like a soup cracker, activating the restorative process and rejuvenating his HP bar, if not his spirits and stamina. Shakily, he stood up, falling back against the tree behind him.

"Father."

Upon hearing a voice that he didn't recognize, Sirius jumped, his hand immediately reaching behind his back to grasp at the hilt of his blade. His ears twitched, immediately locating the source of the sound and drawing his eyes towards it.

His grip slightly relaxed as he saw the form of Cadmus's son standing shakily next to his father. The man's voice was uncannily similar to that of his father's, but slightly lighter, placing him at around twenty or so years of age. But the tone he used, weak and quiet, even slightly protesting, sounded a little unstable.

"Father, I..."

"It's permanent, isn't it. The three from before. The two from now. All five of them had been green."

Cadmus's voice was deadly quiet.

From beside Sirius, there was a sharp intake of breath. When he looked over, Asuna was watching the ground, eyes downcast. It seemed like she had just remembered.

Kirito had told him before: as the black swordsman had learned in the beta, five kills on a normal player was the point where the orange cursor became permanent. Three from before, from when he had escaped the killing site of his party. Two from his rampage.

Somehow, all five of those that had died had been the moles. The green-cursored players who snuck into parties to lure them to the target point. And with that, Cadmus's son was stuck with that symbol above his head marking him as a killer forever.

Cadmus himself seemed to realize this only now, as his shoulders began to shake and his face contorted with emotional agony. Growling, he punched his leg, repeating the word.

"It's permanent... perman... blast it!" Cadmus threw up his arms and whirled around. "What in hell possessed you to go kill them!? Did you think you would-"

"They were already about to kill him, Father..." He pointed a wavering finger at Kirito. "I had to kill them. To protect him. There was no other way."

"The last two. What about them!? They were about to run away and you knew it! And... and..." Cadmus struggled to find the words. "...they were Green. Why'd you attack them? And if you had to attack, why THEM!? Why, in the name of... why did you choose to kill them!?"

"Father, it, they were the closest... they were trying to kill us!"

"This isn't like you! You abhor killing! You-"

"It didn't matter!"

Cadmus stopped short, momentarily confused. His face slowly drew up a frightening visage of rage.

"Didn't... matter...!?"

"I was... from before. It was already permanent."

Sirius gave the son a hard look. Heathcliff's head perked up, even as Kirito raised his head from Mane's shoulder.

"What?" Kirito whispered.

"I got..." The boy swallowed audibly. "I got a notice. Right after I killed the first guy to get away."

Sirius lowered his head and sighed loudly. He somehow knew what was going to be said.

"It was permanent... from the first time I killed him. That man... the one who lured us to that place. It's different... from the information from the beta test."

Kirito's eyes narrowed, as did Heathcliff's. Cadmus twitched, grip slackening and squeezing the hilts of his sheathed knives repeatedly. His breathing became hoarse and ragged; it was painfully obvious how much mental turmoil he was going through.

"Why... why? Why didn't you tell me? Why... you, it was permanent? From... ALL THIS TIM-"

A dull thud resounded from behind him. Cadmus spun around, the knives leaping from their scabbards into his hands. But it turned out to be Heathcliff who made the sound again, as he executed another «Reverse Impact» into the PKer, who had been about to get up. He collapsed again like a sack.

"It was wearing off," was all he said to explain.

Furious now, Cadmus looked between the two, as if deciding whom to vent his anger and despair upon. The veins were easily visible on his hands as they clenched his weapons even tighter. Finally, he decided on his son.

"I didn't raise you to be an idiot like this. Do you know what this means!? You can't enter protected zones anymore! There's nowhere..."

Sirius sat heavily on the ground, his focus sliding from Cadmus. Staring straight ahead, he gloomily tried to think coherently; but with his current state, his brain could do no more than think random thoughts he had no control over.

He blearily watched as Kirito stood up, holding up Mane as she was still latched onto him. Sidling over to Heathcliff, he began to quietly converse with the paladin in low tones as the argument went on, nodding towards the still-disabled man on the floor before them. Their faces remained tired, but calm and serious as they discussed some important matter.

His head clouded over again, before flicking to an image of Kirito and Mane sleeping as he watched them, to a thought about the meaning of life, to the topic he had been thinking about during his nap but an hour ago. And lastly, to what had just transpired.

His clouded head joined several of those things together and asked himself a question: What are you fighting for?

What was he fighting for?

He quickly glanced up, returning his eyes to the ground. His knuckles made a dull impact with his forehead as he knocked it three times.

He thought back to his friends. The ones who were dead, banished already from the world of life. What had they been fighting for? Surely their freedom. But what they had wanted was meaningless now, another one of the countless failed dreams afloat upon the sea of time. And he thought he recognized the source of his growing detachment to everyone around him: He had nothing to fight for anymore.

He had decided, on that day, that first day, that he would give his life to protect his friends. That had been his purpose. And it had been completely upended when they had given their lives for him instead. All because of the simple, incredibly dumb mistake of not knowing how to prepare. A mistake he now saw, a mistake that was now completely uncalled for. Hindsight was such a curse, a curse that forced him to reevaluate his past and see all the idiotic moments he had.

Moments and decisions that had cost his friends their lives.

Those words that Kirito had said to him when they first met swam to the front of his mind, and he grimaced. Their dreams? Hah! Let them live on in him? What a joke. He wasn't some fictional hero with a set destiny and plot armor. He had thought he could follow this before, but now he wasn't so sure.

His brother... somehow, his memories of him had started to blur. Real life seemed so far away

Somewhere along the line, his reading and watching of anime and manga had blended and erased the line between imagination and reality and thought that, like an anime character, things would eventually come out right for him in some twist of fate. Like this was a fictional world dreamed out of some mangaka's or writer's twisted imagination, a road hard traveled but a certain goal or boon certain to be achieved at the end. There was always a happy ending, no matter what.

Real life wasn't like that.

There were sad endings that didn't matter to anyone. His friends were not some heroic casualties in the hero's party, they were disposable assets like the random dead soldier shown for one scene of an anime, one panel of a manga, one sentence of a light novel. Only a few among the two-thousand players who had died within the first month of the game.

Just like the two dead players in front of him. Or had been in front of him. Lightly, he stood up without warning, causing Cadmus to pause mid-rant.

He waved his hand down, the universal gesture for it's nothing. Still, Cadmus didn't resume his shouting, as if considering his words and what he had been doing.

A stray branch crunched under his boot and shattered as he shuffled warily over to the lonely drops the first two PKers had left behind. Two lives, he idly pondered, with their own dreams and hopes, albeit twisted, still human beings. Sirius knelt, examining the remains with morbid curiosity. All that remained of these two lives were just these items.

Two weapons, two swords of different design of make. A steel coif, leather strap snapped as if it had been stretched till its breaking point; it was obviously unusable. Four blood-red potion bottles lying on their side.

He picked up the helmet and turning it around in his hand, inspecting it closely. It was unusually shiny, probably the work of of some craftsman. Either that or the owner had loved to keep it in good condition. Otherwise, it was unremarkable, revealing nothing about its late owner. It could have been anyone's.

The swords were likewise anonymous. Pitted and scratched due to low durability values, but they could have dropped from anything. AI-driven monsters? Nothing to show they had been carried by real, thinking people. Potions were potions, identical to the one Sirius himself had used earlier. Or the ones that dropped frequently from the Nepents earlier.

He looked over to the spot where Cadmus's son had slain the last two PKers. Nothing had dropped from those two.

In fact, for all four, there was nothing to mark the fact that they, those people, had existed at all. There was an ominous creaking sound as Sirius's higher «Strength» stat started to place dents into the helmet. Asuna looked at him with an unreadable expression which Sirius ignored.

Just like the monsters in this cruel world, no one stood to mourn them. They died with no one to recognize their existence. And to top it off, they dropped items just like those monsters.

As if they were no more than expendable things that could be respawned and killed with a single line of code. The lives of constructs.

Meaningless.

Just as I am, too.

Unanchored, with no purpose. His purpose had been dashed and could never be achieved again. Perhaps he could have fooled himself before, but he understood more now. He understood that to the world, in the grand scheme of things, the horrible truth that he was worth absolutely nothing, just like his friends.

Just like the two recently deceased people that had once stood in front of him. There would be nothing to mark them by.

Carry on their dreams, eh?

Would it matter at all? They were dead. They were gone. He would serve as their marker, but what would that do? Who would even care about the dead?

What would he achieve?

Nothing.

With a unpleasant grimace on his face directed at the ground, he took the items and placed them into his inventory. Even if the dead were nothing... somehow he felt an attachment to the abandoned drops. Probably because he felt the same.

Recomposing his features into something rather emotionless, he straightened up and walked back to where Asuna was still standing, before spinning around and resuming his meaningless staring as if nothing had happened, leaning back against a tree.

The moment his back touched the bark, his entire body exploded with pain.

Sirius screamed, causing all heads to turn to him as he fell to the ground, convulsing. As if all his nerves were on fire, pain was shooting through every fiber of his being.

He felt as if he was being torn in two bit by bit. His insides were swelling, something was rupturing. As if his body was an inverted melting pot, bubbling as something blew up and settling back down.

At least, that was what it felt like; his nerves were on fire, his brain sending and receiving random signals from his body. He felt like he was melting; then freezing; then he slammed his head against the dirt and his left leg kicked out. His head felt like it was being squished in a hydraulic compactor while his heart was expanding like in a vacuum.

Asuna dropped to her knees and shouted something, but he couldn't hear it. His eyes were wide open and his limbs twitched, his mouth gasping for breath. A massive headache split his head open even as it was crushed. Scrabbling for something to hold on to, his hands ended up crossing over his stomach. He started to spasm, thrashing about as his confused and pressured brain ordered his body to twist back and forth. His legs kicked out; they hit something and someone went down with squeaky "oof!".

In all honesty, he probably looked like he was going into cardiac arrest.

They were all on him now, someone scrambling for a recovery potion of some kind from their inventory, two people holding him down so he wouldn't injure himself, someone was roaring, someone was crying, someone was...

A flash of clarity.

For an instant, the pain subsided. The shock caused him to suddenly freeze, as his muscles locked up. His mind ground to a halt.

What-!?

"What-!?"

Someone responded. In his head.

Actually, not responded. At the exact same time, the two thoughts coincided. In that split second, he thought twice.

Or someone, sharing the same space as him, had thought the exact same.

As if it were a balloon about to burst, the swelling pain returned with another explosion and blasted right through his head. Something began to ring in his ears; he started to see double, as if through two eyes and two minds. Convulsing, he swung his arms, hitting several things. He screamed.

Long after he was alone again, the pain continued to drag him into the darkness.

Kirito gritted his teeth as Sirius's thrashes intensified. As they were not in an area under the influence of the «Area Protection Code», every time Sirius's punches impacted his body, Kirito's HP decreased by a trivial amount. Trivial, but Kirito was instinctively wary of all damage done to him, his survival instinct telling him to get away.

Grunting, Kirito pinned down Sirius's left shoulder, even as Heathcliff pinned down his right. Using his free arm, he forced Sirius's head back and felt a thick layer of sweat on Sirius's brow.

"Sirius! What the heck's going on, darn it, Sirius! Sirius!"

Kirito grimaced as Sirius's arm snapped out in response, targeted right at the spot he had been kicked moments ago. Mane was sprawled out on the ground nearby, winded from a blow to the stomach that had appeared from nowhere, but thankfully this attack hadn't reached her. Their link had already been cut.

Heathcliff turned, still firmly holding down Sirius, and gestured to Cadmus and his son.

"Sir, can you-"

"HRK-!"

The paladin's head snapped back just to watch Sirius abruptly freeze, limbs locking up and stiffening. Small sounds escaped his throat as his vocal chords locked up. Curiously, his arms looked like they were ripping something out of himself.

No one moved nor made a sound.

Then slowly, Sirius collapsed, unconscious, onto the ground, his head lolling sideways and eyes squeezed shut. His jaw unclenched, heaving a huge sigh as his entire body went limp.

Kirito tentatively released his hold on Sirius's shoulder, then jumped back preemptively, expecting another spasm to send a fist flying at him.

Nothing. Sirius didn't stir.

"Sirius?" Kirito whispered, gently poking Sirius. "Sirius, are you okay?"

Mane suddenly sat bolt upright, startling Kirito into tripping over onto Sirius's body. With a grunt of surprise, Kirito flailed around for a moment and landed hard, directly onto Sirius's stomach.

Asuna let out a small gasp. Even with that impact, though, Sirius did not move.

The black-haired girl squeaked an apology before shuffling over to Kirito's side and helped him up with a combination of shame and worry on her face. Hesitating as if she didn't know what to do, she finally crouched down next to Kirito and poked Sirius in the same manner that he did.

"Sirius?" Mane echoed, uncertainly. Her eyes were unfocused, and her entire manner expressed shock. Her hands jittered occasionally.

Kirito instinctively covered her hands with his own, muttering small words of comfort. Much like himself in the past, he reflected, his hands wouldn't stay still when he was afraid. They had always itched to grab hold of something.

Mane...

While he had been glad that she had saved up to help them with the PKers, Kirito's brow furrowed upon remembering the expression her face had held: pure hate. The image of her gritted teeth and deadly cold eyes, her aura of killing intent... it disturbed him.

Mane had always been a timid girl, antisocial, and only comfortable around those she knew well. In the several months he had known her, fought beside her, lived beside her, Kirito had only known her to express fear, sadness, and the occasional happy smile. Sometimes emotionless. Sometimes childlike innocence and curiosity.

Never the raging anger that she had expressed just now...

Kirito bit the edge of his lip.

Is she growing? Or... is she... why am I so worried about this? What-

CRNCH.

"Vassa-!"

Behind me.

Immediately, Kirito's muscles tensed. Wrapping his hand around the hilt of the sword on his back, he pivoted on his foot, ready to strike-

"Eeeee-ow! Kirito-kun!"

-before realizing it was just the sound of a branch being stepped on, and that he had unwittingly tightened his grip on Mane's hand and dragged her around as well. Her body was twisted in an uncomfortable position around him as she struggled to maintain her balance. She looked at him, bewildered.

His gaze, however, was fixated on Cadmus, who was reaching out with his right arm at the retreating back of his son.

"Son, come back! What are you doing!? Where are you-"

Running as if though dazed, the boy blazed through the boundaries of the «Safe Zone», not even responding to his father's call.

"Vassago!"

Without hesitation, Cadmus charged directly after his son, through the edge of the shimmering white veil, and out of sight among the trees.

Asuna stood up and made as if she was about to follow, but then stopped and fell to her knees. Heathcliff looked in their direction, then sighed, before swiping out his menu and beginning to type a message.

Kirito stood stock still, unable to comprehend what was going on.

Sirius... what happened to him? Cadmus... Osmund, what will happen to them?

What are we going to do?

Author's Note:

So, what am I going to do?

HELLO AFTER A YEAR OF INACTIVITY I FINALLY POST CAUSE I JUST GRADUATED 3 HOURS AGO WEEEEEHEEEEEEE I'm an adult! (Not really I'm still 17).

In all seriousness, I apologize a lot. I... sort of had some real life problems, sort of causing me to lose my will to write, in addition to a heavy workload from school. I'll be updating more frequently now though! I'm free of homework, and I've sorta gotten over my problems.

Stay tuned for a chapter for Soul Ablaze, my Pokemon-SAO crossover, in a few weeks as well! I've gotten my drive back :3

As always, please please please review! And leave constructive criticism as well! I'm still a writing newbie. I need to improve.

~Vee!