Chapter 6:
"Do you know anyone by the name of Grimlock? Yoruko-san" I asked.
We were in an isolated restaurant, me, Kirito and Yoruko. Her eyes widened a little.
"Yes. He used to be a member of the guild Kains and I used to be in"
"We had the dark spear that pierced Kain-san's chest appraised, and we discovered that it was made by Grimlock-san" Kirito explained.
Her eyes got even wider now and she covered her mouth with her hands in shock.
"Is there anything that comes to mind?" He asked.
"Yes, there is... I'm sorry that I wasn't able to tell you yesterday"
"Then you can repay us by telling us now." I said harshly. I earned a kick in the leg from Kirito.
"I-It's not something I really want to remember, because it's something that d-destroyed our guild"
I understand that guilds support each other and whatnot but I always preferred solo stuff, even when I'm together with the KoB members, I still like to go off on my own and go solo. Apparently it seems that lots of guild have many problems with their members having conflict with each other. This was probably no exception.
"Our guild's name was 'Golden Apple'. Six months ago, we defeated a rare monster that dropped a powerful ring that raises your agility by 20 points. We were divided on whether to use it for the guild, or to sell it and split the earnings." I'm sure this type of stuff was quite common in guilds. "But in the end, we put it to vote. The vote was 5-3 in favour of selling it."
"Our leader, Griselda-san, planned to stay overnight in a large town at the front lines, so she could sell it to a broker. However, she never came back. Later on, we learned that she had died, and I still don't know how"
"No-one would venture into the outer field with a rare item like that, so could it have been sleep-PK?" Kirito wondered.
"Six months ago would be just before that method became popular" I told him.
"But it's hard to believe it was a coincidence. Griselda-san must've been attacked by a player that knew about the ring. In other words..."
"One of the other seven members of Golden Apple..." Yoruko continued for him.
"Those opposed to selling it would be the most suspicious" He muttered.
I'm seriously getting bored here. I mean, it's already partly my fault for more than 1,000 people already dead, why not just add that 1 more? I sighed.
"You mean they attacked Griselda-san to obtain the ring before she sold it?"
"Probably"
Kirito turned to face Yoruko again. "Who's Grimlock-san?"
"He was Griselda-san's husband. Just within the game though, Griselda-san was a powerful swords-women. She was also beautiful and smart, Grimlock-san was a kind man who was always smiling" Always smiling? I wonder if it was just fake.
"They made a great couple, and they loved each other. If Grimlock-san was the perpetrator of yesterday's murder, he must be after three who opposed selling the ring. 2 of 3 were myself and Kains."
"Then who's the other?" Kirito asked.
"A tank named Schmitt, I hear he's now with the front line guild, Divine Dragons Alliance."
"Schmitt?... I've heard of that name before" He mumbled. "He leads the Divine Dragons Alliance's defence forces, he's a big lance-wielder " I told him.
"Oh, him" I practically researched nearly everyone I fight with...for my own safety, you never know when someone will go crazy and attack their own allies you know?
"Do you know him?" Yoruko asked.
"I've only seen him a few times when clearing bosses though"
"Could you allow me to meet with him?" She asked him. "He probably hasn't heard about what happened, and what happened to Kains could happen to him..."
"Fine, we'll try to get a hold of Schmidt-san" I said tiredly. "I'm sure Asuna would know somebody from the Divine Dragons Alliance, we can go to their headquarters and maybe be able to talk to him."
"We should get Yoruko-san to an inn first" Kirito said.
"Yoruko-san, don't leave the inn until we return, no matter what" She nodded "Okay"
"Oi, if you think he's dead, then how do you think it happened? Kirito" I asked him.
"I basically see three possibilities. The first is through a legitimate duel. The second is through a system exploit that combines various known methods"
Hearing that still hurt a little of my pride...
"Then what's the third possibility?"
"Some unknown skill or item that bypasses the safety of inner areas. No the third possibility can't be it, cause it's unfair. I kind of hate to admit it but SAO's rules are essentially fair. I can't imagine this game allowing murders at inner areas"
I gave a barely visible smirk "Heh~"
We were a lodge in a room with Schmitt and Yoruko talking to each other, I tuned them out and closed my eyes. Until only a few moments later, he stood up panicking saying:
"Why would Kains be killed now?! Did he... Did he steal the ring? Was he the one who killed Griselda?" He sat back now again.
"Does Grimlock plan to kill all three of us who opposed selling the ring? Is he after you and me too?!"
Yoruko spoke "It could be another member using a spear Grimlock-san made for him, or it could be Griselda-san's revenge... Only a ghost could possibly kill someone at an inner area"
Ok, she's officially gone crazy.
"I was up all night thinking. In the end, all members were responsible for her death! When that ring was dropped, we never should have voted! We should've just let Griselda-san decide!" She was screaming now, how annoying...
She started walking backwards towards the window. "Grimlock-san was the only one who suggested that we let Griselda-san decide. He has the right to take revenge on the rest of us...To avenge Griselda-san..."
Schmitt was shaking, "You gotta be kidding me. Why now? Why now, six months later?! Are you fine with this Yoruko? Are you fine with being killed mysteriously like this?!"
He was going to start walking towards her but Kirito grabbed his arm. In that instant I saw Yoruko's eyes widen, she turned to face the window, and then fell out. All of us saw the dagger that was impaled into her lower back before she fell.
Kirito ran to the window "Yoruko-san!" I heard the noise of shattering, the noise used when someone died.
I saw Kirito look around, he seemed to have spotted something. "Saki-san, take care of things here!"
"Eh?!"
With that he jumped out the window and onto the roofs, probably chasing someone down. Watching him jump from roof to roof, made me seriously jealous that he got to have all the fun.
While I had to stay here and reassure Schmitt that it's okay, which wasn't all that good since I only knew to say "Don't worry, it's okay"
I heard the door opening and turned to face Kirito. "So, did you catch him?"
"Unfortunately, he managed to teleport away. I thought the system would keep us safe while we were in this inn. I really did. Damn it!"
"I thought so too, so calm down..." I said looking the other way.
"That robe belonged to Griselda. That was Griselda's ghost!" Schmitt said shakily. And another one went crazy~
"She's here to take revenge on all of us! Haha, a ghost could easily PK at an inner area" He started to laugh weirdly.
"That wasn't a ghost" I turned back to Kirito. "There's got to be a system-related explanation for the two inner area murders. There has to be" "Yeah..." I muttered.
We left Schmitt to let him calm down and sat on a bench nearby outside. "Are you positive that it wasn't a ghost?" I started up a conversation.
"Yeah, 'cause a ghost wouldn't use a teleportation crystal"
"Yeah, you're right."
"Wait... teleportation crystal?" He frowned.
"What."
"Hey, do you have anything you really don't need?"
"I don't really understand you but, I guess I have a sandwich"
"May I please use it?"
"Use it? Are you crazy?"
Either way, I handed him a sandwich I requested Asuna make for me. He violently threw it to the ground and it shattered.
"Hey, are you purposely trying to make me mad, HAH?!" He held out his hand to make me stop talking.
"I've got it"
"...Did you figure something out?"
"I, no, we didn't see something. We thought we saw something but we were looking at something entirely different. The inner area murders. The method and weapons to carry these out... Never existed in the first place!"
"Say what?"
"Yoruko-san and Kains-san are still alive. Players cannot lose their HP at an inner area. But an object can still lose its durability, just like your sandwich."
"Oh, I get it now..."
"Kains-san's armour was pierced by a spear, but the spear was chipping away at the armour's durability and not his HP. Meaning the thing that burst into little pieces was just his armour. Which means Kains-san used his crystal to teleport away the moment his armour broke"
"And Yoruko..."
"She had the dagger in her back the whole time when she was talking with us, she never turned her back towards us in that room. She talked to us while keeping an eye on her clothes' durability as it decreased, then she timed the whole thing to make it look like she'd been stabbed by a dagger flying in from outside"
"What about the guy in the cloak?"
"I'm almost certain that it was Kains-san and not Grimlock-san, they tricked us all to find out who was the culprit from the ring accident"
"They must've suspected Schmitt from the start, hey, you still have Yoruko-san on your friends list?"
"Yeah, she's out in the field in the 19th floor, on top of some small hill some distance away from the town area, and she's also with Schmitt-san, so I assume Kains-san is also there" I said checking her location.
"We should leave them alone now though, we've already fulfilled our obligation here" He said.
"Yeah..."
Just then, a rumbling could be heard, and I looked straight at Kirito's stomach.
"Ah, looks like I'm hungry~" I took out the other sandwich I had and threw it at him.
"You had two? You don't look the type of person to eat a lot..."
"I got it for you, stupid!"
"I-I see, what about you though, aren't you hungry?"
"I can last a few more hours."
"But seriously, I completely fell for Yoruko-san's scheme, but I'm not mad about it at all." He said.
"Yeah, but I feel kinda stupid" I said laughing a little, a little.
"If you were in their shoes, and a rare item dropped, what would you do Kirito?"
"One of the reasons I go solo is to avoid those squabbles. We give it to whomever first received the drop."
"Yeah, in SAO, people don't know what items were dropped until the players declare them, that rule is the only way to avoid problems like players hiding their drops. Also, that system is why marriages in this world have significance. So once you marry someone, you can no longer hide anything from them, this inventory sharing is a very pragmatic system, but I also think it's very ro-AH! What am I saying?!"
"What were you gonna say~? Saki-san~?" I could feel my face heating up.
"But really, you seem a bit talkative about that subject" "Well... In real life, when I was little, my favourite books when I was younger were the fairytale stories, and how the main characters would get married. A-A-And it's kinda my dream to get married since I was youn-... STOP IT! You're making me say such weird stuff! BAKA BAKA BAKA!"
He was smiling at me "It's quite, how should I say this..Refreshing? to see that someone like you has such an innocent dream"
Someone like me? Just because I hide my emotions...
"Are you wanting to marry in-game? or in real life?"
"I don't know, b-but it's not like I'm going to find someone I love that quickly anyway, I'll have to really trust this person to let them share my inventory"
And another thing was that, I can't risk getting close enough to someone that they'll find out my secret about SAO.
"Shared... Inventories? If your spouse dies, what happens to the items?"
"Are you talking about Griselda-san and Grimlock-san? Well, if one of them dies, then the other gets all the items."
"So that means the rare ring in Griselda-san's inventory..."
"It would go to Grimlock's inventory instead of the culprit's, so the ring wasn't stolen..."
"No" Kirito objected "It was stolen, Grimlock took the ring that was in his inventory"
We both stood up. "We should check up on them" I nodded.
Kirito and I split up in the forest, him saving Kains, Yoruko and Schmitt while I look for Grimlock. I soon saw a figure in the distance,
"Are you Grimlock?" I asked.
"And if I am?"
"Then I need you to come with me" I said pulling my sword out.
He didn't even try to escape and I stayed behind him with my sword at his back as I led him to where the group was.
There was some talk about why he killed Griselda-san and how that was the only thing he could do, to preserve his memories of the real-life Griselda-san.
"That's why you killed your wife?" Kirito asked.
"It's more than good enough of a reason. You'll understand one day, Mr. Detective, when you're about to lose the love that you found"
"That kind of love is just disgusting, no, I wonder if it can even be classified as love. You just wanted to possess her!" I said annoyed.
He gave a little gasp and fell to his knees, was he on the verge of breaking? Kains and Schmitt walked over to him "Kirito-san, could you let us deal with him?"
"Okay" was his reply.
They lifted Grimlock up and walked away, Yoruko-san following them after giving us a small bow to which we both bowed back.
The sun started to rise and light was brought upon the forest.
"What would you do in his position?" I asked.
Kirito stretched, "As in, finding a new side of someone I love?"
"Yeah..."
"Well, I'd consider myself lucky I guess." Say what? "I-I mean, if I marry someone, it means I already love the side she's been showing, right? So if I find out later that she has another side to her and grow to love it too, i-it'd be double the experience..."
"You're such a romantic" I said playfully.
"Says the one who has a dream of meeting the one she loves since she was young~!"
"That never happened." I said with a dark aura around me.
"Hai, Hai!"
"We've been away from the front lines for two days now, so now we have to try even harder. How stupid" I said.
"Yeah. But I'd like to clear the current floor within the week"
I started walking away when Kirito grabbed my arm turning me around. I instantly spotted the figure standing there. Griselda. She was smiling at us, there was no voice but I'm sure she was saying thank you. The area of her grave seemed to be brighter than before.
"H-Hey Kirito... Do you want to b-befriend each other? I-It's not like I really want to or anything! It's just that we're both in the front-lines, and you're a very good fighter to have. Yeah, that's right, that's the only reason!"
Kirito gave a small laugh "Sure, but are you really that desperate to make friends~?"
"I dare you, say that last bit again"
"Nothing at all Saki-sama!" Was his quick reply.
"Let's walk back to town and eat some breakfast" He said.
"Yeah."
Kirito's P.O.V
As we were walking back, I made some small talk and Saki at first made some short replies, but they gradually got longer and we were having a full conversation. She was finally opening up to me, it was kinda cute.
As we neared a place that served food, her stomach gave a small rumble and her face heated up real quickly. She looked at me embarrassed saying "I'm hungry... S-So what"
Man, I must be real lucky, to see a side of her no-one else sees.