Sword Art Online: Desert Army
Blacksmith
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"Oi, why aren't we flying?" Asked Klein, who was walking with heavy steps in the soft sand.
Kirito looked over at his red-clad friend and wordlessly pointed toward the mountain range ahead of them, "Too high to fly over."
"What about just to the base of the mountains? You know, just to get there quickly." Klein retorted, hoping to speed up the pace.
Silica hopped up to the front of the group and turned to Klein, walking backwards as she did so. "Awe Klein, where's your sense of adventure?" She asked wistfully.
The Salamander only sighed and jerked his thumb back over his shoulder, "I left it back in the Labyrinth. Too bothered to find it again."
"At which part was that? When you were the first to be taken? Or the part where you got your ass handed to you by the King himself before anyone else was taken as well?" Asuna hummed in thought. Her skill in innocently masking her words with venomous insults was impeccably brilliant.
Klein flinched under the gunshot to his pride and grumbled an incoherent excuse.
Soon, Kirito's hand plopped itself down on the now sulking samurai's shoulder and gave it a reassuring squeeze, "Relax man, you tried your best. We're almost there by the way."
True to the leader's words, the mountain range was dead ahead. As the group made their way forward, the size of the rocky structures began to tower over their own miniscule presence in comparison. The sandy grey mountains were rigid and cracked in every possible way. Protrusions of sharp stone outcrops and hollowed caves seemed to be abundant in the chain of broken faces of nature.
The range spanned all the way from coast to coast, surrounding the first village on three sides.
"Does anyone else feel really small right now?" Leafa asked.
The girls of the group raised their hands idly, staring up at the mass of stone.
Klein placed his hands on his hips and stared challengingly up at the rocks. His sense of adventure seemingly found its way back to his heart and lit the fuse of adrenaline.
"Meh, I've fought bigger." Kirito shrugged, dipping his hands into his pockets.
"Yeah! Daddy fought the Alpha Goliath on floor 76 all on his own! That thing could level mountains." Yui's light voice swooped through the air as she circled the group on Pina's back.
"Why does that not surprise me?" Sinon asked rhetorically, looking around at the rest of the group.
Liz let out a small laugh and pat the archer on the back, "Nothing surprises me anymore with Kirito. You should've seen him fight that dragon just so we could forge him a new sword." She giggled and looked over at the Spriggan, cracking a fond smile, "The idiot almost died protecting me."
Sinon stared at the swordsman as well, "Yeah, I can relate to that."
Liz just smiled and pat Sinon between the Cait Sith ears atop her head, "Awe look at you, already snuggling your way into Kirito's heart."
The archer fought the blush that dusted across her cheeks and made an attempt at her own retort, but something interrupted her.
A loud rumble echoed from the mountain side. It's dull thudding shook the sand beneath the group's feet and sent loose stones tumbling down the steep slopes.
The groaning noise grew louder, then quieter after a few moments. Eventually the noise dissipated all together.
"What was that?" Asuna asked.
"It sounded like a landslide, but from inside the mountains." Leafa responded.
Kirito was the first to step forward, breaking free of the hesitance that dawned on the group of fairies. His fingers danced across his virtual map for a second before resting in an idle position. There was what looked like a ravine that cut through all the way to the other side. It was nearby too.
"One of these days. There will be something that scares that kid. Just you wait." Klein mumbled, moving forward and walking alongside the leader.
The two guys were quickly joined by Asuna and Sinon, and lastly by the remaining three girls. They seemed hesitant to move, all wondering what the noise was that echoed out of the cracks just moments ago.
The loose sand soon turned to hard sandstone as Kirito led the rest to the entrance of their path to the other side. It took a few minutes to reach it, but it was nothing compared to the distance they traveled to get here.
It was a little after noon now, the sun high in the sky and directly overhead. Its rays shot straight down into the rigid ravine that opened up in front of everyone.
"We need to get through this before the sun passes, or we'll be walking without much light." Kirito warned, being the first to begin walking into the gaping crack of the mountain.
The end wasn't visible from the entrance. Its crooked rock face and jagged edges curved and turned in a wide ravine that slices through the entire mountain range. It seemed to be the only way through to the other side.
Thankfully, it was wide enough to fit the entire group and then some; making it easier to traverse through it in large parties. However, the walls were unbelievably tall. Its ridges easily topped at 6,000 to 7,000 meters in height alone. The length was unknown, but it hopefully won't take too long to get through.
"Okay, now I feel really small." Said Leafa, her eyes roamed upward and watched the rough stone walls pass by over her head.
"We all do." Klein commented.
Their voices seemed to resound off the tall cliff faces and softly echoed in the deep ravine.
"Maybe we should try and avoid making too much noise." Sinon spoke quietly, her eyes roaming as well.
She was eyeing the countless holes that spread out across the walls. They were too dark and deep to look into, which meant they dug deep into the mountain range. The whole thing was probably riddled with cave systems, making the entire structure unstable. But below that danger, lay the possibility of what lived inside those caves.
"She's right." Kirito agreed, his hand resting on the hilt of his blade. "I don't want to stay here longer than we have to." He emphasized his point by drawing his Veldi's Eostryder.
"Better safe than sorry." Klein agreed, drawing his own katana.
The group followed suit. Each member drew their blades with the exception of Sinon and Liz, she quietly drew her bow and held it at her side while Liz held her mace a little more tightly.
Tension lingered in the air as the group passed wordlessly through the first half of the ravine. If Kirito's instincts were correct, they seemed to have reached the halfway point of the journey. But even his upgraded skills weren't enough to tell how much further they had to go before they reached the end.
The ravine seemed eerily quiet.
No signs of life, no falling stones, no movements aside from the foot falls of the walking fairies. The light that shone down from the long cracked opening above sifted through the uneven walls and bathed the hard sandy ground with shadows and soft light.
It was creepy.
As the group moved onward, Kirito's gaze strayed from his map and looked upward. The sun was quickly disappearing over the wall of the ravine. They didn't have too much time left to get through this. He could easily give everyone night vision, but he was more concerned about what else had night vision in this place.
Probably something deadly.
The Cardinal System quite enjoyed that kind of thing.
It was built that way after all.
A bulky shadow passed unknowingly overhead, drifting through the air and perching itself on a high rocky outcrop far above the fairies' heads. Its glowing orange eyes were shrouded by black mist as it gazed over the jagged edge.
Kirito, to put it simply, had a growing feeling of unease. It was feint at first, but after a few minutes it started getting stronger. He was becoming more wary of his surroundings.
Nothing seemed out of the ordinary though. It was still deathly quiet. But that didn't stop his gut from twisting and contracting at everything that moved. He was beginning to feel paranoid.
"Does anyone else get the feeling we're being watched?" Klein's voice broke the dull silence.
Looks like Kirito wasn't the only one with that uneasy feeling.
"Yeah, I've been feeling that way too for ten minutes now." He agreed, keeping his black eyes roaming for anything out of the ordinary.
"Kirito, have you been watching the shadows passing by over the ravine?" Asked Sinon, her eyes staring straight up as she walked.
The Spriggan looked up, and for a sense of proving the Cait Sith's point, he noticed a shadowy bird swoop across the gap above and disappear.
"Yeah, I just thought they were birds though." Kirito responded.
"I don't think those are just birds." Yui's voice spoke up. "Daddy, they seem to be massing in numbers at high vantage points above us. I think their going to attack us."
Good to know. I'm glad I wasn't just paranoid then. Kirito thought, "Thanks Yui. We'll just have to keep an eye on them. Hopefully we can get through without any of them attacking." He said, but he doubted that would be a possible outcome.
"How many?" Asked Asuna.
Yui looked up and scanned the area, "26."
"That's nothing." Spoke Klein, giving a sigh of relief.
"We don't even know what they are yet. What if those things are higher levels than us?" Asuna informed, hoping to get the point across to Klein and everyone else. They could very well be in a lot of danger.
Throughout all of this, Kirito and the rest never stopped moving forward. As they continued, his eyes stared down the gaping opening of a circular cave close to the base of the ravine in the wall. The walls were smooth, and the tunnel ran deeper than he could possibly see.
"If it gets too dangerous, we can try our luck and take cover in the caves." Klein argued.
"Bad idea Klein, you don't know what's down there." Kirito replied, finally prying his eyes away from the deep hole after passing it completely.
"30 now, and they're starting to dive!" Warned Yui's voice, her small arm pointed upward as the shadows leaping off of the rocky edges.
Here they come! Kirito reversed his grip on his blade and positioned it horizontally and out in front of him, the sharp blade pointing to his right. As soon as he got it into the right position, it began to glow blue as it charged a quick sword skill.
A shrill squawk screeched into the air as one of the birdlike monsters dove downward.
"Got it!" Shouted Sinon, meeting the bird's dive with her own glowing blue arrow.
The arrow embedded itself into one of the large bird's orange eyes and dropped it's health bar by half with a critical hit.
Seeing this, Sinon loosed a second arrow as quickly as the first, hitting it squarely in the other eye and killing it.
Just as it's body shattered, a mass of shadows overhead blocked out the light and began diving as well. They swooped down from directly above as well as from front and back of the group, completely engulfing them in a storm of black feathery beasts.
Kirito dug his boots into the hard sand as he carved his blade through one of the bird's wings before blocking a thrust of steel claws. His black blade locked with the beast's talons and pushed him back a bit.
«Ravenous Sickle»
«Level 65»
Getting a closer look at his enemy, he noticed it looked similar to a Vulture. But these seemed to be slightly larger and armored as well, much like the Shadow Crawler from before. These things had steel claws molded over their already sharp talons and had helmets of the same material as well. The armor fit snugly over the top side of their beaks and curved down into an elongated sharped point-
Shoot, got distracted! Kirito ducked under the thrust of a sharpened steel beak and tried to kick the Ravenous Sickle off of his blade. The bird flailed in a deadly flurry of clawing the air and flapping it's wings.
Deciding to follow Klein's statement from before, Kirito swung forward and pushed. He gave himself the distance needed to dive and roll beneath the beast and slash it's back through and through, carving his blade deep into the vulture's body and killing it instantly.
Now that he had a brief moment of free time, he opened his inventory and equipped Excalibur as well.
"Guys! We need to regroup here, we're too spread out!" Asuna called out over the ruckus of clashing steel and ear rattling squawks. She slashed away two Ravenous Sickles before backing her way over to Sinon.
"Everyone! Make a circle around Sinon, we need to fight together!" Kirito agreed, drawing his legendary golden sword and running over to the rest. The members were definitely spread out. Each one were constantly being bombarded by aggressive swoops from above by the circling flock of armored vultures.
"Covering-fire would be appreciated right about now!" Grunted Klein. He was busy clashing steel with two overhead vultures. He had to sacrifice some health by blocking his flank with his arm, letting ones sharp claws dig into him to stop it from hitting any vital spots.
Sinon stopped her volley of arrows into the airborne flock above and took aim at the vulture digging into Klein's arm. She quickly spoke five words of power of surged the arrow forward with added golden lighting, striking the beast in the eye and ending its life.
Klein quickly punched the vulture he was clashing with and stunned it for a brief second, he used the moment to pry his blade from its steel clutches and plunge it into its feathery chest, killing that one as well.
With Sinon's help, the rest of the members fell into a tight guarded circle around her. She was at the center, providing as much support as she could with her well placed arrows. Everyone else parried and slashed away the vultures that dove toward them, either killing them or causing them to fly back and try again.
About half of the mass of birds were extinguished so far. But there were still a little over a dozen still circling overhead.
"I'm down to my last three arrows!" Sinon informed, notching one of the three and drawing the string back.
"Hold up." Said Kirito, stopping her from wasting an arrow.
He held his blades at his sides and pointed them at the ground, "They stopped."
"What do you mean they stopped? Their still circling up there." Said Klein.
Sinon relaxed her draw and let out a slow breath, "Yeah, but they stopped attacking."
The circling Ravenous Sickles were doing just that, circling. They stopped swooping down and clashing with the fairies. They were just flying now, as if they were noticing how futile attacking was.
"Maybe they gave up?" Asked Liz, shifting slightly and letting her mace fall to her side.
"No way. That's not how this game works." Kirito said. They're waiting…but for what?
He finished that thought and watched the remaining enemies above in rising tension. They were still circling. They were doing what vultures do best after all, scavenge.
But usually, they scavenge what's already dead.
They wouldn't waste the energy to attack unless…they knew their target was dead meat walking.
Which means, they had no intention of killing the fairies.
Stalling! They were stalling! "Move!" Kirito yelled, but it was too late.
The ground beneath their feet began to hum and rumble, the shaking was subtle at first but it quickly picked up until it was violently shaking beneath the group's boots. The loose sand that littered the rocky surface began to bounce and drift, sifting into cracks that opened up in the ground and in the walls.
The loud groaning of crumbling rocks from deep within the mountain walls echoed loudly out of the numerous open caves surrounding the group of friends.
Whatever it was, it shook the ground so forcefully it caused the members of the team to lose balance and collapse to the ground. Kirito had to dig one of his blades into the sand and fall to his knee in order to keep himself from falling entirely over.
"Something's coming!" Yui exclaimed, quickly floating from Pina's back and ducking into the safe confines of Kirito's chest pocket.
The sound of crushing stone shook the walls of the ravine, causing rocks to fall from its rigid slopes and crash downward around the fairies below. Asuna had to roll out of the way to avoid being crushed by a large mass of jagged rocks. The fallen stones shattered and began vibrating across the ground due to the still rumbling earth.
Just as the sound began to reach deafening levels, it seemed to cease for a few seconds. The rumbling stopped, the sound of crumbling stone grew quiet.
It was only for a few seconds though.
Above the group, a massive ghostly white worm broke through the wall and sent an explosion of falling rocks down onto the recovering fairies. The sudden entrance dropped some of their health bars into the red and yellow ranges.
Asuna and Leafa had to switch out and begin casting healing spells, just to bring the team members' health back up into the green.
The massive worm's mouth had rotating rows of sharp teeth circling through its large maw. Its mouth seemed to be made of four portions, each one built with extra muscle to tear through stone. It split into quarters, giving it the ability to open wide and crush anything it could pull into it's gaping maw of seven sets of teeth.
«Burrowing Maw»
«Level 85»
Despite its size, it didn't seem to have more than two health bars.
"Everyone scatter!" Someone yelled, but it wasn't important as to who said it. It was why they said it.
Everyone dove outward just in time to avoid the massive Burrowing Maw's crushing form plunging into the ground where they all once laid. The worm easily ate through the stone and began disappearing into the ground. It's white body flowing behind it as it ate through the rocks below.
Its body looked to be about ten to fifteen meters in diameter alone, and its length was quickly falling from its original hole and vanishing into its new hole in the ground. After what seemed like minutes, the worm disappeared completely, leaving behind nothing but a massive gaping hole.
Kirito looked up and noticed the mass of vultures swooping in again.
"Heads up! Don't get distracted!"
Kirito leapt to his feet and drove his blades through a few passing vultures, severing their wings and slashing through some of their bodies. He grounded them enough for the teammates behind him to finish them off.
"The Burrowing Maw is coming back!" Yui warned.
"Guys, time to go!" Klein called out, overhearing Yui's light voice.
Moving around the deep rumbling hole in the ground, the team regrouped and began running forward. As they ran, they had to fend off random attacks from the vultures above who followed their every move.
"Just a few more minutes and we're out!" Kirito called over his shoulder. He could just barely make out the light at the end of the ravine.
The amount of Ravenous Sickles was dwindling now. Only about eight of them remained, but their attacks slowed again as they group neared the exit.
They could feel and hear the rumbling getting louder again. Which meant the giant worm circled around and was hot on their tracks now.
They needed to get out of here.
Just as Kirito cut the final corner and saw the desert through the end of the ravine, he was immediately blocked off by the Burrowing Maw crumbling out of the ground in front of him and forcing him to skid to a stop.
It didn't have eyes, but it could still sense them somehow.
The massive worm crushed the remaining stones in its mouth and fell forward, nearly crushing the avatars of Kirito and Klein as everyone scurried backward in the now narrow ravine.
Its white body entirely blocked off the way out from wall to wall.
"Any ideas?!" Klein asked as he stumbled to his feet, trying not to look into the gaping maw of rotating teeth. If anything, he was backing away from it.
And so was everyone else.
"Yeah, I may have something. But once I do it, everyone needs to hit it with everything they've got!" Said Kirito as he spawned in his wings and took flight.
Immediately, the giant worm responded and tracked his movements.
Kirito surged through the air, high over the Burrowing Maw and dove beyond it. The teen punched through the remaining vultures that circled overhead and kept flying. The massive worm quickly followed the swordsman and made a lunge to bite him out of the air, only to swallow a mouthful of chewy vultures.
In no time at all, it gnarled the beasts down and continued lunging after Kirito.
"Now!" His voice echoed off the walls as he barely dodged the rows of teeth intent on tearing him apart. To keep it distracted, he slashed across whatever flesh he could as he continued to dodge in the air.
Everyone below unleashed sword skills into the body of the distracted worm.
Klein's katana flared with orange flames as he plunged it deep into the belly of the beast. Asuna and Leafa followed up with their twin combo of quick lashes before backing off and letting Silica drop in from above to slice her poisonous daggers down the length of its body. Liz followed the small Cait Sith after being using as a stepping stone for the initial leap, she powerfully charged forward with a glowing shield and bashed it into the worms body. Her charge was followed up with a crushing swing of a mace as well. Lastly, Sinon notched her last three arrows and spaced them out between her fingers. She breathlessly spoke eight words of power before loosing all three.
The team's attacks plunged the worm's health bars into the red. Its first health bar shattered quickly and the second dropped just as fast. Sinon's arrows finished the Burrowing Maw off as the embedded projectiles surged with glowing orange light and exploded in a fiery ploom of flames and smoke.
The massive worm slammed itself into the walls and came crashing down on the opposite side of the group of friends. Its limp body shook the ground as it heavily collided into the rivine floor. Moments later, it shattered into countless golden polygons and dissipated completely.
As a sign to prove that the fighting was over, everyone in the party noticed loot messages popping up in front of everyone's avatars.
"Huh, that felt easy." Kirito commented, landing in front of his friends in the ravine.
Klein waved his hand dismissively and began pushing the swordsman forward, "Can we discuss this after we're safely out of this death trap?"
The party members jogged their way out of the massive ravine and into the sandy desert on the other side.
It wasn't until they were far beyond the entrance when they finally stopped jogging and slowed to a stop.
"Whoa, are you guys seeing what I'm seeing?" Leafa asked in awe, her eyes locked onto the town in the distance.
Contrary to the desolate town they encountered the first time, this one seemed to be much more well-built and…
…populated.
Even at this distance, they could make out some movement on the outer walls of the town.
No, this was a city. Not a town.
The outer walls were built from bricks of sandstone. They circled around the outer perimeter of a massive structure of buildings. The closer you got to the center of the city, the taller the buildings got. And they seemed to grow denser as well the further you looked into the city and over the walls.
The outer walls weren't the only surrounding walls however. There was an inner ring of walls, surrounding the dense mass of buildings at its center.
That was the extent of what they could see from where they stood.
"Let's check it out. It has to be the next city." Kirito suggested.
Seeing no objections, he began leading everyone to what looked to be the front gate. But as they got closer, they noticed something wrong with the walls.
There were a few holes in the defenses where something pushed through the wall's base and caused the walkway on top to collapse and leave an opening.
In fact, the movement they saw was guards posted near the holes in the walls to prevent things from getting in. And below there were groups of workers who were busy trying to rebuild the weakened defenses.
In total, they were able to see at least four collapsed portions of the exterior wall as they approached the gate.
"Halt! State your business or be forced to leave!" A deeper voiced NPC called out from his position in front of the large iron gateway.
He had an iron helmet that looked like some sort of variation of a Barbuta helmet. He was wearing a sleeveless ragged shirt with iron shoulder guards and chest plates. They were connected by leather straps. His forearms also had leather bracers on them and his hands were fit snuggly in fingerless gloves. He also wore a gladiator styled heavy cloth skirt with some strips of metal running down its length. Lastly were his sandaled feet.
He seemed to be rather tanned as well.
"Uh, we've come to help. You seem to have some discrepancies in your defensive wall." Kirito responded to the guard posted at the gate.
"We wouldn't need help if it weren't for you outsiders attacking our city!" The NPC responded.
Outsiders?
Sinon stepped forward and stood beside Kirito, "Wait, who attacked this place?"
The guard looked at the girl with a confused glare and seemed rather annoyed by her question, "What do you mean who?! He come's blasting through with his army of monsters and stealing our resources. The blacksmiths inside have enough trouble trying to fix the buildings themselves, they don't have enough for the walls out here."
"So this is a city of blacksmiths?!" Liz spoke up, her interest rising.
"Yes." The guard responded in a grumble, "And we're not fighters. Very few of us can even fight back; we can only bolster our defenses and wait out any onslaught."
He seemed to be less peeved now. Maybe his anger was just misplaced.
"Well, we can help you with that. Just tell us what we need to do." Said Asuna, as she stepped forward as well.
The guard's eyes scanned across the faces and weaponry of the fairies in front of him. His gloved hand rested idly on the hilt of his broadsword at his waist for a few seconds before dropping to his side.
"Very well, we need the help anyway. Go inside, seek out the master blacksmith and they'll tell you what we need you to do. After that, you'll have access to our inns to rest up if you need it." The NPC spoke evenly before stepping to the side and slamming his fist against the wall of iron.
"Open the gate!"
Moments later, the gateway creaked and groaned as the massive doorway split at its center and opened inward, revealing a large street-like pathway that lead into the inner walls. The group stepped inside and moved onward, not stopping to watch the gate close behind them.
"Well, I guess this is different than what you guys had to go through." Sinon commented toward the guys.
Kirito and Klein just looked at each other and shrugged, "I guess we can't fight off waves of enemies with every town we secure." Kirito spoke.
Klein sighed and nodded his head, "It was kinda fun though."
Behind the outer walls was a wide open area of land with countless metal spikes and pitfalls littering the ground. The traps were literally everywhere in the area between the outer walls and the inner walls.
"I guess that's just added insurance?" Klein asked, eyeing the sharp metal protruding from the ground.
"Probably new. Considering they were recently attacked, these are most likely counter measures." Liz informed, running her hand across the recently forged metal of a passing spike.
The group quickly approached sandstone stairs that lead upward onto a second level of the city. It seemed the inner walls encompassed a raised platform for the buildings themselves. It's actually quite a nice height advantage for a defense stand point.
Which also explains how they could see the buildings over the outer walls so easily.
The central staircase soon stopped and the path led them deeper into the city itself. They passed by numerous weapons and armor vendors and eventually reached the tallest building in the entire city. The building was more like a tower, actually. Each building was build out of sandstone with metal doors and stone flattop roofs. Some of the buildings on the way through the city seemed to have been ransacked with a few walls missing.
Loose stones littered the ground here and there, probably from the broken walls and buildings. NPCs were hard at work repairing the damage done, and were far too busy to even acknowledge the group's presence.
"Do we just…knock?" Asked Klein, eyeing the metal door at the base of the tall cylindrical tower.
Without responding to Klein's question, Kirito stepped forward and banged his fist against the iron door.
Almost immediately, the door opened and a young woman was revealed on the other side. She had her brown hair tide in a long pony tail and her attire was much like the guard's at the gate. However, she sported two long daggers on her waste and much more feminine shaped plate armor across her chest.
She also lacked the helmet as well.
"Can I help you?" The NPC asked.
Seeing how Klein was locked up and was about to do his usual 'suave' introduction, Kirito quickly stepped forward and in front of the stuttering man.
"Hey, I don't suppose you're the head blacksmith we've come to help are you?" The Spriggan asked, completely cutting off Klein.
He felt the Salamander jab him in the back but brushed it off for the pain absorber to take instead.
"Oh, you must be the fairies the leader has been talking about. My name's Asaki." The woman spoke in a lighter than expected voice.
She looked to be in around her twenties, perfect for Klein. And she also had a fighter in her, probably the head blacksmith's personal guard.
She seems nice too.
Did he know we were coming? "Wait, you said he already knew we were going to come here?" Sinon asked, noticing what the woman was implying.
Asaki smiled and simply stepped aside, letting everyone file into the tower before closing the door.
She wordlessly led the group up the spiraling stairs and eventually came across another large archway. Through that was a large chamber with a balcony at two opposite sides. Up top seemed to be some sort of large emerald green dome that covered the tower, in the middle of the dome was a hole. In the center of the room was a circular centralized forge, which was currently spewing smoke out of said hole.
It had a single forging station off on the other side of the arch way and a large work table curved across the back wall. On the wall were countless hammers, intricate blades, sets of armor, numerous styles of weapons, and sheets of metal.
Past the large anvil and through the fire and the flames, a young girl was currently slamming a hammer into a long glowing sword. After a few more swings, she dunked the metal into a deep bucket of water then slid it into a stone compartment off to the side, inside it were more flames.
"Now I just gotta let that sit for a few hours before I sharpen it." She mumbled to herself as she turned and addressed her visitors.
She was around 15 years old and had short scruffy pink hair. The hair reached slightly past her ears but kept its unkempt rough look to it. Her nimble hands reached up and grabbed hold of the scorched goggles covering her eyes. Moving them up to rest in her hair, she gave an amused smile toward the group of bewildered fairies in the archway.
Her sky blue eyes twinkled with amusement as she wiped her hands on her already dirty sleeveless white shirt, eventually going down and patting the pockets of her tan cargo pants.
She also seemed to be wearing black boots as well.
"Took you guys long enough! What took yah?" She asked, furthering the confused expressions gracing most of the party member's faces.
"How did you-"
"Irrelevant!" The girl quickly interrupted whoever it was that was about to ask the million dollar question and brushed it off like it was nothing.
"Now, I need you and you..." She pointed to Liz and Leafa, "…to go and help the local blacksmiths whip up some new metal support beams for the outer walls."
To everyone's surprise, she was already dishing out what needed to be done.
"Come now, off with you!" The girl sighed, "You'll find them just south of the tower."
She made a cute shooing motion, prompting the two in question to leave and follow her orders.
"Now that that's settled, I need you and you to handle gathering up the escaped Rapitarus. Seriously, they always find a way to bust out of their pen. They're probably in the streets somewhere, who knows." Again, she sighed and pointed to Klein and Silica. "You're the beast tamer so it should be easy getting them all back into their pen. There should be nineteen of them buggas."
She walked forward and shooed the samurai and beast tamer out of the room, "Pen's on the east side of town, you can't miss it!"
Brushing her hands and walking back to the front of the pack, she looked over the remaining members of the party.
"Now then, Kirito was it?"
Surprised to hear his name, Kirito looked at the odd girl and tensed up.
"Awe, don't be like that." She gave a sweet smile and bounced on the balls of her feet, "I need you and those two to go out and gather as much ore from the Burrowing Maws as you can. You can probably lure them out of the mountains and kill them out in the open, should be plenty easier than what you did back there." She commented, sticking out her tongue as she did so.
"Wait, you want just us three to kill as many of those things as we can?" Kirito asked in disbelief.
To their astonishment, the girl gave an amused and knowing look, "Of course silly. They eat through that mountain, meaning they eat rock and ore. I need that ore added to the city's recently depleted supply of materials to be smelted." She explained as if it was obvious.
"They don't even have that much health. Just poke 'em with a sharp stick and they dead! Kapeesh?" The head blacksmith elaborated, ending with an odd way to ask for understanding.
Kirito struggled and tensed up even more under the girl's gaze before finally relenting, "Uhh, I guess we can do that."
"Awesome! When you're done you can help your friends gather up the remaining Rapitarus." The little girl exclaimed before nodding to Asaki.
The woman smiled and gestured for the remaining three to leave.
Asuna and Sinon left in awkward silence, not really knowing what else to do. Kirito was about to follow them when he felt a strong tug on his sleeve as he made a move to turn.
"Nuh uh, not yet. Hand it ovah!" The girl commanded, holding out her hand palm faced up.
Kirito looked down at her dainty hand; her fingers kept opening and closing in the 'give it' motion as she stared at him impatiently.
"Hand wha-"
"Veldi's Eostryder dummy!"
Huh? Kirito was taken aback by the girl's knowledge of his current weapon. What was he supposed to do, just hand it over? It took him forever just to get the damn thing to drop. And floor 66 isn't exactly the coolest floor of Aincrad.
And he wasn't talking about looks. That floor is hot as hell!
The girl in front of him seemed to be growing more impatient as she began bouncing again.
"What do you plan to do with it?" He asked, hoping she won't break it somehow.
She smiled wider and extended her arms in a wide gesture while spinning around, "I'm a master blacksmith! What do you expect?!"
An upgrade? Kirito thought. But Liz did everything she could to it already…
The head blacksmith stopped spinning and glared at him, making the same cute hand motion as before, "Now 'gimme!"
Reluctantly and hesitantly, Kirito reached up and slowly pulled his sword off his back; sheath and all.
With a great amount of inner turmoil and second thoughts, he reached out and dropped the weapon into the awaiting girl's hands.
She gave a thankful smile and walked over to the work station. Taking the blade out of the sheath as she walked, she gently placed the sheath onto the metal table and turned to the forge…
…then unceremoniously lobbed the blade into the raging fire.
"H-hey!" Kirito exclaimed, running toward the forge intent on taking his sword back out.
"Daddy, wait."
Yui floated out of his pocket and planted herself in front of his face, causing him to skid to a stop.
"You're little flying girl is right. I'm not destroying it if that's what you're wondering." The girl spoke over her shoulder as she grabbed a large pair of metal tongs from her work bench; goggles already back over her eyes.
"Then what are you doing?" Kirito asked hurriedly.
Keeping silent, the blacksmith simply slipped two thick heat resistant gloves on and grabbed the tongs. She wordlessly made her way over to the burning sword in the furnace and waited.
She seemed to be watching it burn.
To be completely honest, this was probably the first time Kirito has ever wanted to hurt an NPC that wasn't an enemy. She didn't warn him or anything about what she was doing, and it bugged him that she's keeping quiet about it.
That feeling quickly vanished when he saw what was happening to his blade.
What the lore of the weapon labeled as dragon bones, looked to be melting away under the strain of the heat from the fire.
He leaned forward and stared at his sword in confusion, "What the…"
"Yeah, I can't believe you've been fighting with the cover on the whole time." Commented the girl in front of him, she was still watching the sword burn.
"Wait? That was a cover?" Since when has that ever been in the game? I don't remember seeing any information on anything like an outer shell being a part of a weapon. He thought, wondering what exactly was going on with Veldi's Eostryder.
Idle humming was muffled by the flames and whining metal as the blacksmith waited for her moment to pull the blade out. A little over a minute passed before she reached in with her tongs and grabbed the blade.
She pulled out Kirito's sword; glowing orange and appeared to be sleeker and slimmer in design. The glow quickly dissipated, as if being absorbed into the metal itself and cooling itself off in mere seconds.
With a proud smile, she grabbed the once burning handle and laid it out on the work table.
"The handle needs a new wrapping, but other than that it looks like it's supposed to." The girl said, as she looked the blade over.
Carefully, Kirito made his way over and gazed at his new blade's appearance.
He leaned over his sword and took in its new shining beauty. The black metal gleamed under the glow of the flaming forge. It now held a sleek, long double edged black blade that extended into a long point at the end. The black metal seemed to have some sort of ancient text etched into the blade's length that glowed gold for a few seconds before dissipating, leaving a light engraving behind. The hilt was intricately designed to curve at the ends in opposite directions, like a curved rhombus shape. The handle was metal, and the previous wrappings were burned off. But it was straight and long, leaving room for two hands up until the smooth round weighted pommel.
Over all, it looked even cooler than before.
"What did you mean by what you said?" Kirito asked, whipping the drool from the corner of his mouth at the new appearance of his Veldi's Eostryder.
"Don't call me 'you'. My name's Vel." The girl cut in as she began shuffling around on her long table for something.
She finally stumbled across a roll of cloth and skipped back over to Kirito and his blade. The girl took the sword into her hands and began wrapping the cloth around the handle tightly.
"Let me ask you something, Kirito…" Vel began. "…have you ever wondered what would happen if you took iron that was mined from hell and smelted it in the holy forges of heaven?" Vel asked, finishing her wrapping of the handle as she spoke.
"Veldi's Eostryder is a weapon specifically built to clash between Angels and Demons. It was forged by Fallen Angels. They created a masterpiece that broke all rules of balance. They forged a weapon that could kill Demons and Angels alike, and absorb their energy into the unholy blade of power." She explained.
Kirito was, simply put, incredibly interested in his blade's new-found lore now.
"This was the only catastrophe to have ever forced The Devil himself and The God of Heaven to join forces. They banished the blade into the depths of the mortal world, keeping it far away from the clutches of Fallen Angels and leaving it in the hands of a mighty guardian. Veldi. He proved time and time again that he was worthy of protecting such a weapon. Veldi was the strongest and most honorable warrior to ever live. No foe was ever able to bring him to his knees in battle. And so, he was the first to officially create lasting world peace. He lived his life around that very blade, until eventually it was time he left the mortal world completely. In his last moments of life, he disguised the blade with a false appearance and cast it deep into the Kronos Sea."
Wait, that doesn't make sense. Where I found it was a barren and hot dry wasteland. Floor 66 of Aincrad was the complete opposite of an ocean.
"However, what Veldi didn't account for was the power that the blade possessed. It was used in a way against the mighty powers of this world, and it has already claimed countless souls; both corrupted and pure. As centuries passed, the blade slowly burned beneath the waves of that ocean. It wanted to be found. And so, it was. Over the centuries, it slowly burned away the ocean. Completely evaporating the water and rendering the Kronos Sea into nothing but a dry wasteland."
Oh.
"Unholy Titans grew attracted to the power of Veldi's Eostryder. They wandered into the new wasteland and claimed the blade as their own. Never once did they part with it, until now." Vel finished her explanation of the lore.
She happily eyed the blade and handed it over to its rightful owner.
Kirito took the black longsword into his hands and noticed the subtle change in weight.
Vel picked up the black sheath as well and handed that over to Kirito, "The sheath should still fit perfectly, if you're wondering."
"Um, thank you?" Kirito said unsurely, taking his sheath and sliding his blade into it. Like she said, it fit perfectly. He really didn't know what to say. "How…did you know all that?"
Vel looked at Kirito before giving him a small prideful smile. She started bouncing on the balls of her feet again, causing the loose strands of pink hair on her head to bounce around as well.
"I'm Veldi's descendent. He's my ancestor."
Beta: demonic1556
Editor: Allix Stowe
Hmm, cool lore or no? I thought it was pretty cool. For those of you who didn't catch on, the lore to Kirito's blade was masked (aka faked) to disguise the blade and give it a different appearance. More will be explained, don't worry. There's actually a lot more to that blade than Vel explained. What do you guys think of Vel by the way? And for those of you who were wondering how she knew about Kirito and his friends, well that's a story for another time.
She's fun that way.
Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter! The next will be slightly comedic, I hope. Everyone will be doing their own little things that they've been tasked to do.
Should be interesting.
Rapitarus, plural for Rapitaru. You'll understand why their named that way once you see them.
REVIEW, please tell me what you think. Everything and anything you say is very much appreciated. I thank all of you who do leave reviews, you are all awesome for doing that. Favorite and Follow the story. Plenty more to come.
Cya XP