The Last One Standing

"Talking"

'Thinking'

Ch 6

Midori spent that night in tears after hearing Kirito's explanations. Tears of regret and sadness wishing that she was able to do something to comfort him. But also tears of happiness because she was glad that he had someone that would stand by him regardless of what happened.

OOooOO

The 74th floor had just been opened and Kirito was feeling nostalgic. He decided that he was going to clear the dungeon on this floor he took his wife with him on this particular day much to her delight. He was also glad that he still found a certain creature on their way back to town one day though the reward was much larger than it had been previous runs. "Well Liz looks like we'll have enough of this S-class ingredient for our entire guild plus some."

"Is that what I think it is?" Liz asked in disbelief.

"If you're thinking that this is the rare and elusive ragout rabbit then yes it's what you think it is." Kirito said nonchalantly as Liz's eyes bugged out. "Well then who's hungry?" He asked happily as they hurried to town.

OOooOO

Said guild was hanging out at their second unofficial guild house. Even with how close they were they still had some friction between members. Which brings us to our current situation.

"And I said no!" Silica yelled at the look on Agil's face as they stood in his floor 50 shop.

"Come on Silica just because you use a dagger doesn't mean that you can't upgrade to a better weapon type to help your chances of survival." Agil said holding his hands up in defense.

"Just because you think I'm cute and all doesn't mean you have try and change everything about me." The brown haired girl with her hair in two pigtails as the cat ears that were on the sides of her head twitched irritably.

"Please calm down Silica." Kirito said as he walked in.

"Oh Kirito you're back." Silica said her mood turning cheery as she spun around to face Kirito as her ears stood up in anticipation. "Did you get me anything onii-chan?" Silica asked expectantly as she hugged the black swordsman while Pina curled up on his head.

"Well not you specifically." Kirito said scratching Silica's ears eliciting a purr from the poor girl.

This was the scene that Klein walked in on. "Hey Kirito I come here because you said you had something good to show me and I see you treating your youngest sister like a cat.

"But she is part cat at the moment so how is that wrong of me?" Kirito asked innocently much to Klein's consternation and everyone elses amusement.

"How can this be acceptable? It just isn't fair." Klein asked acting like he was in pain.

OOooOO

It was later that evening the entirety of the guild had convened within Agil's store and waited for the designated chef to cook up the feast. "So Kiri-bou can you tell me how you happened to find this rare ingredient?" Argo asked conversationally from one of the seats next to a window in Agil's upstairs room.

"I saw, I reacted, I captured item." Kirito answered in the same tone sitting across the room in the love seat with Liz laying her head on his shoulder giggling at his response.

Huffing Argo turned toward Silica. "Si-chan I'll keep asking till I get an answer I'm satisfied with. How is it that your avatar is part cat?"

"Nya?" Silica asked her ears twitching with her head tilted in confusion.

"Oh you're so cute." Argo said squealing as she brought Silica into a surprise hug.

Silica sighed as she put up with it because it kept her from having to divulge information a little longer.

OOooOO

Some time later the players sat around the table in the middle of Agil's apartment. Lizbeth sighed "That was good a unique flavor that's a cross between beaver tail and beef."

"How do you know that?" Silica asked curious.

"Well my father knew someone in America that was a trapper so I've eaten some strange things." Lisbeth answered before turning towards Agil. "Sorry for having to put up with us Agil."

"Don't sweat it we're all part of the same guild after all. Thank for thinking about little old me anyways." The gentle giant said waving her off.

"Agil since when did you join our guild?" Kirito asked surprised not having paid attention to Agil's cursor till now.

"During your last foray into the front lines." Agil answered. "I figured might as well seeing as y'all hide out at my place even though you own a house."

"Still it doesn't make it any less of a problem for us to invade your place like we do." Liz said as Agil waved her off telling her very insistently not to worry about it.

OOooOO

"Come on honey there's no reason to still be going on about it." Kirito said sighing because Liz was still fretting over the day before. The entire guild had gone into the 74th floor dungeon on this particular day breaking into groups of no less than two. Kirito being alone with Lisbeth for as Argo put it, more alone time, her comments mostly being ignored. The level 96 swordsman sighed as he listened to his wife's mumbling. He loved her he really did just sometimes he felt she needed to just let things go.

"Kirito look over there." Liz called bringing Kirito out of his musing over an hour later.

Looking at it Kirito asked. "Hey Liz remember what I told you in the dragon nest?"

"Yeah what about it?"

"I was unable to do anything meaningful the last four go arounds because I never told anyone but there will be unnecessary deaths in a couple hours if we don't defeat the boss shortly. Do you want our guild to do it?"

"How strong is this Boss?" Lizbeth asked after a minute in contemplation.

"I've more or less soloed this boss five times." Kirito answered solemnly as Liz's eyes bugged out at the admission.

"Y-y-yyooou soloed this boss?" Lizbeth stuttered in disbelief her armor clanking to match her shaking.

"Yes with between 5 to 50 HP left each time."

"Why would you do that, do you need to rub your ego that much?" Liz asked starting to anger.

"It was the only way that we were able to save the disabled players that got themselves trapped in the room because from here on out the boss rooms don't allow use of any crystals."

"I see." Liz said as she sent a guild wide message for everyone to convene at their location.

About an hour later

"So you want us to challenge this boss all by our lonesome?" Argo asked in quiet disbelief before shouting. "Are you insane?!"

"No, because I know for a fact that I could take on The Gleam Eyes by myself." Kirito answered before he realized what he said. 'Crap I gave away too much.'

"Oh so you know who this this boss is?" Argo asked as she walked up to the door and laid her hand on it. "That begs to question how? This door has yet to be open ever." She said with murder in her eyes.

Sighing in defeat Kirito's shoulders sagged. "I should go ahead and tell you then I've played this game before."

"But of course you're a Beta-tester like me." Argo shot back clearly miffed.

"No I've lived this before. I'm stuck in a causality loop." Kirito said with conviction.

"Oh sure Ground Hog day in real life very original." Argo said dismissively.

"The Army is headed up here at the moment with twenty-five men headed by Cobert. Does that match facts?" Kirito asked

"Yyyyeessssss." Argo answered slowly.

"No I haven't been looking through your messages nor have I been following you." Kirito said exasperated. The system apparently didn't want players standing outside the door without entering so the doors swung open of their own accord. "Even if y'all don't come with me I'm still going in." Kirito declared as he manipulated his menu a pale green crystal sheath materializing in an x across his back with Elucidator.

"How can you do that?" Agil asked. "You can't equip a weapon in your off hand, the damage it can inflict is halved."

"He can." Liz said with a smirk hefting her mace as she followed her husband. "With the right sword skill he can inflict three times the damage of two swords held by two people."

"Well if you can't beat em join em." Leafa said shrugging as she followed the couple.

Everyone stood behind Kirito as a row of torches lit around the room revealing a large blue creature with the head of a bighorn sheep the hind legs of an ox the torso and arms of a man and a cobra for a tail.

After the start up sequence was finished the demon brandished its sword that was as tall as it was with a roar that had blue flames erupting from its mouth and with that the battle was joined.

OOooOO

Klein at the moment was fighting through some monsters in the dungeon with his guild the Furinkazan headed for the point on the map where he saw Kirito's cursor on the map when he heard fighting and yelling ahead he and his companions ran to an open door and stopped gaping in shock.

Kirito had just called switch with Asuna as the rest of the guild backed off to Klein's surprise about as much of a surprise as the fact that Kirito was using two swords. Kirito took off in a flurry of movement that the boss couldn't keep up with. The monsters sword was thrust at him which he deflected appearing to break the sword skill chain but Kirito changed to a reverse grip and continued on. The monster went for an uppercut strike which Kirito blocked with Elucidator still held in a reverse grip using his other sword to finish the sword skill with a thrust. When the sword hit all movement stopped Klein was worried that Kirito was out of HP but then the monster dissolved into blue polygons. "It's over." Was heard echoing through the room as Kirito collapsed into a sitting position Lizbeth running up to him and using a healing crystal on him before giving him a hug.

"What the hell was that?!" Klein yelled surprising the members of the collective in front of him.

"Oh Klein you made it." Kirito said nonchalantly with a smile.

"Don't go changing the subject what did you do just now?" Klein asked indignantly.

"Well about six or so months ago I was going through my skill options and I found it, dual wielding." Kirito answered to gasp of shock from the Furinkazan.

"Dude are there prerequisites?" Klein asked excitedly.

"If I knew that I would have told somebody by now." Kirito answered with a smirk.

"Yeah I see that. But seriously you pretty much took a boss on by yourself." Klein said going through the info broker option on his menu.

"You can look all you want you're not going to find anything on it because there is none." Argo said.

"I see so the prerequisite was you being you then because you have a unique skill." Klein said happily as everyone else with him made exclamations of awe.

"Yeah he's great like that." Liz said as she gave him a kiss on the cheek.

"Well we're going to go activate the gate. You want to come with?" Klein asked as he and his guild headed for the door to the next level.

"Nah go ahead. We'd like to stay out of the spotlight for a little longer." Kirito said dismissively.

"Well you know that it's not going to last forever." Klein mumbled as he left with a dry chuckle from Kirito.

OOooOOooOO

Have you been drinking recently?

No Chris I don't believe I have.

Interesting because that's the only way that I can think of that you've come up with some of this stuff.

Really? Well sorry to disappoint.

Fine carry on and please review before you click anything else.