Chapter 4: Holding Back

December 3, 2022

Floor 1

Back and forth. Left and right.

Rikki wasn't able to even sit in peace due to Renee and Rosalind's jostling on his right.

"Stop poking me!" Renee hissed repeatedly at the youngest of their group. For her part, Renee was no better. In fact it had been her who had started it.

Rosalind jabbed a particularly forceful elbow into their party leader's side and Renee was knocked over sideways into him. That was already annoying enough but she pushed off him to try and bump the younger girl off the amphitheatre bench.

He knocked shoulders with Ashe on his left. "Knock it off!" He growled at the two. From the beginning he'd known they wouldn't be able to get along. They all knew. The two of them had been bickering almost non-stop since returning to Tolbana. And yet they had made the conscious decision to sit next to each other, probably just to get a rise out of one another.

Renee unsurprisingly pointed to the mace wielder struggling to keep from falling onto the landing. "She started it," she lied.

"Nu-uh," Rosalind said once she regained her spot.

And within seconds they were right back at it, and he was ignored. With a huff Rikki leaned forward onto his knees.

On his other side Ashe offered, "Wanna switch seats?"

"Would it make them stop?" he asked. She shook her head. "Figured as much."

They'd been sitting in Tolbana's amphitheatre for the last ten minutes waiting for the boss meeting to begin. Other players, he suspected no more than forty or so, started trickling in at about the same time and spread themselves out across the landings. This was the second such meeting. The first had happened only yesterday and was what had prompted them to scour the labyrinth in search of the boss room. Renee had appeared indifferent to attending this one after the discovery had been stolen out from under them and Rikki couldn't say he felt any different. It had been at little Rosa's insistence that they made their way here this evening.

Another attempted body check caused both girls to fall against him and pinned his arm uncomfortably to his side. "Oh for crying out loud…" he muttered, then to Ashe, "Switch me." Laughing quietly at him, the brunette nodded and stood up. Eagerly he slid into her spot and she placed herself between him and Renee.

"It was supposed to start at four, right?" he asked as he glanced over at the halberdier. She rocked with the rough-housing of the two beside her but she weathered it with a much greater deal of patience than he had.

"I'm pretty sure," she said, lifting her chin as she consulted her memory and then the clock in her HUD. It was only just past four now so he was just being impatient but he'd blame that on the other two.

Ashe was rather pretty, he thought. In profile and with her dark hair tied back, he could see the finer features of her face. Her eyes, the same colour as her hair, narrowed as she considered something in her menu. The mishap in the labyrinth from this morning no longer looked like it weighed on her shoulders or at least not heavily. Rikki glanced down at his left forearm where his shield would typically rest and frowned. She swung her wrist to dismiss the screen and looked back to the amphitheatre floor, a smile pulling at the corners of her mouth.

He started to follow suit, just as someone began to clap loudly from the lowest level. Rikki spotted a male stepping into the center. From his bronze armour and long blue hair he recognized the man as Diavel, the same guy that had hosted the first meeting and that they'd seen in front of the boss room just this morning.

"Okay, let's get this underway, folks. I have an important announcement to make. We've found the boss room!" He raised his arms high overhead to a low rumble of hushed mutterings between players. But the self-proclaimed knight was not deterred by the lackluster response as he reached into the pouch behind him and produced a few bound pieces of parchment. "By now everyone should have purchased a copy of this."

Far to his right Rikki heard, "What's that?" He turned to see Renee and Rosalind finished their squabbling. The latter leaned forward with curiousity.

"Here," he said and produced his copy of the pamphlet that he'd picked up on their way from the inn. He tossed it to her and the girl began pouring over it. Having already read it over while they walked, Rikki didn't think he'd need it. All around them he could see other players diving into their inventories in search of the item. A few got up and left for the NPC shop stall in the corner of the fountain plaza to grab a free copy before returning to their friends.

Despite being only three pages, the pamphlet was packed full of information, including the boss' estimated health, the reach and speed of his attacks, his accompaniment of Ruin Kobold Sentinels, and, of course, his name.

«Illfang the Kobold Lord»

"Hey, some of my stuff's in here, too," Renee said as she glanced over Ashe's copy. A smug grin plastered on her face she pointed to the section on the boss' sword skills. "Who's useless now, miser?"

"Still you," Rikki retorted. He didn't even need to look to know she was pulling a face at him. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't seem to wrap his head around the idea that someone that immature was not only almost the same age as him, but also their party leader.

Ignoring the both of them, Ashe flipped through the rest of the pages and turned the pamphlet over. "From the SAO beta test… Details may not match the current version of the game." Rikki glanced over then and saw the same words written in red font across the back of the page.

Diavel straightened down below them and called back the attention of all the players present. "Let us be thankful for this information, my friends!" he said. "Regardless of its source, this guide is going to save us two or three days of scouting the boss. I'm actually quite grateful for this. It's the reconnaissance missions that carry the greatest risk of fatalities, after all."

Heads bobbed up and down in agreement, though Rikki spied a few whose faces were still twisted with anxiety.

"If these figures are correct, the boss' numerical stats aren't too dangerous. If SAO was a normal MMO, we could probably take it out with an average level three – no, five levels below the enemy's."

Except this wasn't a regular MMO, Rikki thought, and he wasn't sure how comfortable he'd be going into that room knowing his level wasn't at least as high as the boss'. But the speed of their levelling had slowed over the last week. Individually, the monsters they encountered were giving progressively less experience, a sure sign that they were nearing the level cap for the floor.

Unabated, the knight continued, "So if we work on our tactics and come equipped with plenty of pots for healing, it should be possible to win without any deaths. No, let me rephrase that: We're not going to have any deaths, period. On my pride as a knight, I swear this to you!"

Someone in front and to the left of their group raised a cheer at Diavel's bold statement and a round of applause followed. Rikki couldn't find the energy to manage more than a couple lazy claps.

"All right, now I think it's time to actually start planning out the battle! After all, we can't start taking roles until we've formed a proper raid party. First off, form into parties with your friends and others around you."

All around players were already beginning to gather together into bunches of six. Their party was two bodies short of being full and he began looking around for people to fill those spots when he felt a tap on his shoulder.

"I think we're leaving," Ashe said before glancing back over her shoulder. He followed her gaze and saw Renee getting to her feet with a stern look that belied her usual immaturity. The blonde looked to each of them in turn and gestured for them to get to their feet, quietly though, so as not to disturb the ongoing strategy meeting happening below.

Still clutching his copy of the Rat's Boss guide, Rosalind turned in her seat and asked, "Why are we leaving? It's only just starting."

Shrugging her shoulders, Renee answered, "Because we're not taking part in it. Now come on. Get up."

Braid swinging as her head swiveled back and forth between him and Renee, Rosalind gave him a pleading look. With a sigh, he got up from his own seat and gave her a pat on the shoulder. "Let's go." She appeared hurt by that but closed her mouth and quietly got to her feet.

The group of four climbed the last few landings leading out of the amphitheatre. Behind them, Rikki could hear Diavel starting up again, making comments on the parties that had been formed. They didn't stop. But once they passed the nearby fountain Rosalind couldn't hold her tongue any more.

"Wait," she said. "Why aren't we going to join them?"

"Because I said so," was Renee's immediate answer.

Rosalind didn't appear convinced. Honestly, neither was Rikki. "You were looking for the boss room yesterday, though."

"We were. So what?"

"So don't you want to go home?"

"No, we do, but…" Ashe trailed off.

Renee picked up for her and pointed a finger at the ground. "This is the first floor." She flicked her wrist to point up at the sky, and the giant disc 300 feet over their heads. "That's the bottom of the second. There's another ninety-eight above it. Participating in that battle isn't going to get us out of here any faster."

"You don't know that," Rosalind protested.

"No, I do, actually." Renee said. "But if you're really that eager to get yourself killed, you're free to go back."

"Renee!" Ashe said.

"That's enough." Rikki stepped in at the same time.

The blonde leaned away from them both, but recovered quickly. "What? Do I have to remind you that this one almost died today?"

"I was doing fine."

"Define fine," she said, and fixed her eyes on the younger girl. "Look, a boss fight is dangerous. For all of us, not just you. And maybe you've forgotten, but we only get one chance here. I don't plan on wasting it." There was a hard edge to her voice just then that Rikki hadn't heard before, and neither he nor the other two around her had any words to counter with. Rosalind held her gaze for a few seconds, and then lowered her eyes to her feet.

"So, what now?" he asked. They had plenty of free time on their hands now that they'd decided (been told) that they weren't joining the boss battle.

Renee lifted her eyes up to him before straightening. "You've got a good stash of money on you, right?"

"Well, yeah…"

She smiled faintly and banged a fist against his chest plate. "Then it's about time we finished upgrading your stuff."

He stared down at her, mouth hard. "My stuff's fine. Worry about yours first."

"You're our only tank, stupid. I'm looking after everyone here by making sure your equipment is in good condition."

"But I have a shield, too," Rosalind cut in. She lifted her new buckler to prove it. It was a sturdier version of the one she'd stormed the labyrinth with, although it hadn't been upgraded yet since they'd only bought it a couple hours prior. The small number of attempts on the thing hardly made it worth it.

Renee spared the girl a glance. "You'll need a better one than that before you start getting any weird ideas in your head." It wasn't the worst thing she could have said, and something in her tone told Rikki that she had resigned herself to the young teen sticking with them.

"So we're heading to the lakes, then?" Ashe asked. Rosalind gave her a questioning look and she went on to clarify. "The «Swamp Kobold Trappers» around there drop some of the ingredients we need for his sword."

Renee nodded her head in agreement. "And mine, too," she said, hand on the hilt of her «Pale Edge».

.

.

"How many more of these do we need?" Rosalind whined from behind her shield. The small kobold that attacked her had a flanged mace delivered into the side of its wolfish face and burst into pixels a moment later.

Rikki was surprised with how easily she was dealing with them. They'd come at her and be repelled by her shield first, and the slate grey metal of her weapon would follow, lit with blue light. Watching her, it became clear to him that her surviving the first month alone was no fluke. She'd learned quickly.

"As many as you can shove in your inventory in the next ten minutes," Renee shouted out her response as she whirled her own blade around to catch another in the chest. Ashe could be seen close by doing much the same.

Tolbana's blacksmithy closed at eight, just like every shop. It was just past that now so time wasn't an issue with collecting items anymore. They'd just get what they could while they still had some light and drop by for upgrades tomorrow.

He bashed his shield against another Trapper and heard the tinkling of bells as it exploded and dropped another «Kobold Fang» into his inventory. With just an eight percent chance of dropping, the sound was like music to his ears. Along with the base stuff needed for upgrading, additional materials were also required, both to determine which of the five parameters were improved, and to increase the upgrade's chances of success. The enlarged canine sitting in his inventory was one of a few currently available drops that boosted Sharpness.

The cor and experience he received appeared briefly in front of him before he turned away from the window and toward the next enemy.

The Kobold Trappers were tricky mobs, capable of inflicting a «Disarm» effect on a player. To add insult to injury, they spawned in sizable groups, with no fewer than five at a time. For a lone player of a lower level, if their weapon were knocked away into the mud and panic set in, the wolfish little creatures could become decidedly lethal. Hunting them in a group, however, considerably lessened their threat. It also made acquiring the more rare drops needed for equipment enhancement a whole lot easier.

"We should start back before it gets dark, though, shouldn't we?" Ashe asked.

Frankly, Rikki agreed. Once the sun set any mobs they encountered would become more aggressive. At their current level it wasn't a death sentence but caution was still necessary.

"Can we go back now? I'm tired," Rosa said off to his right.

Renee almost looked betrayed in the dimming light, but after casting her eyes around to Ashe and Rikki, both of whom voiced their agreement, she slumped her shoulders. She dispatched the last Kobold Trapper around them. Further down the lake bed Rikki could see the darkened silhouettes of another group. They were too far away to launch themselves at the party, but if they lingered here more than another couple minutes, some would spawn close by and fix that.

"How many did we get?" Rikki asked as they all gathered back together to begin the trek back to town. He was scanning his inventory as he walked, counting up the number he'd acquired. "Seven for me." For almost four hours of work he thought it was pretty good.

"Three here..." Renee sounded despondent.

Ashe gave her a one-arm hug from the side. "I've got five you can use for your upgrades."

"Really?" she asked.

The brunette nodded. "I'm not using them."

Several steps ahead of them Rosalind threw her arms high overhead and cheered. "That means I win!" she cried. "I got ten!"

"Good job," Rikki said, although there'd been no competition between them, and stepped up beside her to ruffle her hair. Her smile widened and she pumped her arms excitedly. All the frustration from earlier had evaporated.

He glanced back over his shoulder to Ashe and Renee. The latter had her arms wrapped around the former's waist in a tight hug and her head rested on the taller girl's shoulder. "Uh, hey, hate to disturb you two but… you've got enough Steel plates for the both of us, right?"

The way Renee glared at him made it seem like he'd just intruded on something deeply personal. It certainly looked the part. But after a few seconds of staring she grumbled, "Yes. I have enough."

"All I wanted to know," he said and turned back around.

By the time they returned to Tolbana the town was silent save for the nighttime ambience: a soft, far away tune that in any other game would have him standing idle just to listen to the end. A small handful of NPCs were still ambling about, but for the most part the streets were empty and all the windows dark.

"You guys go on ahead," he said. "I'll catch up in a bit."

The girls turned to look at him, all of them questioning, but they nodded and continued down the street to the inn. Rikki took the next right and made his way to the fountain plaza. The teleport gate stood on the opposite end from where he entered. Drumming his fingers on his sword's pommel, he crossed the empty plaza and stepped into the space under the stone arch. There was only one other gate it was connected to right now.

"Teleport: Town of Beginnings."

There was a flash of light before his eyes. Tolbana vanished behind it, and when it faded, the dreary sight of the starting town's main square took its place. From a design standpoint the two towns didn't appear all that different. Were it not for the stout clock tower immediately behind him and the sheer difference in size, they'd be practically identical.

Breathing deep through his nose, the boy stepped down and around the gate. Heading north, it was a straight shot to the Black Iron Palace. The walk was less crowded than the last time he'd made it.

His steps echoed off the castle's polished floor and came to a stop several feet from the giant stone monument located at the far end of the entrance hall. Unlike the last time he'd been here, the large front hall was lit with pale blue torches that threw odd shadows about the place. Between them and the heavy silence of the town just outside, the monument appeared even more imposing. Ten thousand names were etched into its surface, but even in the gloom he could see that a fifth of that number had already been struck through.

One month. Two thousand lives. No floors cleared.

The reality of it was soul-sucking.

Stepping closer, he dragged a knuckle down one of the columns near the beginning, stopped, and tapped.

-Cyril-

-5:46 pm, November 6, 2022-

-Fell in battle-

"Shit…" he breathed as he read the lines again. They hadn't changed since the last time he'd read them, though the words gave the impression of an end more noble than Cyril had received. The guilt was a lead weight in his stomach. He hadn't killed Cyril, but he may as well have. Granted, he hadn't known, neither of them had. But Rikki had dropped his friend's health, watched the wolf tear the rest away, and laughed. He had to live with that. Frowning, Rikki raised his hand to dismiss the window.

"So this is where you went?" The familiar voice came from almost directly behind him.

Rikki jumped, and turned his head to look. "You're like a pop-up book from hell, you know that?" he hissed when he spotted Renee, cat-quiet, stepping up to monument on his left. He hadn't heard her come in at all.

"And proud of it." She was grinning as she spoke but her eyes were focused on the stone slab in front of them.

Deciding it futile to say anything else on that topic, he, too, turned his eyes back to the monument and closed the window with Cyril's name on it. "What are you doing here?"

"Same as you, I think."

"Who do you have to check on?" he asked. Ashe and Rosalind were back in Tolbana and both were very much alive.

"Just someone I know." Her eyes stopped scanning and he thought he saw the faintest hint of a smile in her profile as she glanced up. From this angle he couldn't tell what name she was looking at.

"Someone you know?" Rikki asked. "Or someone you know?"

Renee scrunched up her nose at the last bit. "Ha-ha, you're not funny," she said. Then she looked away again, back to the mystery name on the monument. She stayed like that for nearly half a minute before Rikki decided to break the silence.

"So is this where you've been disappearing to for the last couple weeks?"

Every few days, after they'd finished their runs through the fields (and recently the labyrinth), Renee had made a habit of breaking off after dinner. Where she always went, neither Rikki nor Ashe had known. There was a location feature available for people registered to a player's friend list, but it only shower the floor they were on. Since this was the only floor available and neither of them had levelled up their «Search» skill enough to get the «Tracking» mod, finding Renee had been difficult.

Renee shrugged. "Maybe. Who knows?"

He took that as a yes. But that raised the question of what she kept coming here for. Or rather, who. She didn't elaborate.

"Well, I got what I came for so I'm going to head back." Renee pulled her shirt down at the edges and fixed her vest before she started back toward the entrance, arms folded loosely behind her back. "And for the record," she said over her shoulder, "I don't actually know them. I probably never will."

And then she was gone, as quietly as she'd come. Soon after, he followed.

.

.

"Rikki!"

He woke up someone pounding incessantly against his door. Groaning, he raised himself up and looked at it across the room.

"Rikki! Rikki, wake up!" Rosalind's frantic voice carried through the wood.

"I'm awake, geez…" he muttered and hurriedly called up his menu to dress himself before he went to open the door for her. He briefly wondered what could be so important. It was only a little before noon so it wasn't exactly early, but they had no plans for the day beyond upgrades so he'd been hoping to sleep a little later.

Rosalind was midway through another knock when he pulled the door open and nearly hit him in the stomach. She pulled her hand back quickly and stepped back, iron tassets clinking with the movement. With her mace on her hip and buckler fastened to her left arm, she already looked prepared to tackle a dungeon.

Stifling a yawn he looked down and asked, "What's the matter?"

"You have to come see," was all she said as she reached out to grab his arm and pull him into the hall.

"See what?"

"The guy in the square," Rosalind answered. It didn't clear up anything.

"Why don't you go grab the other two first, then we'll go see?"

All three of the girls had shared a room last night, he knew. Frankly he thought it a bit unfair that they could split the cost three ways and he had to cover his by himself. It was a small price, though, and he had already thought about whether or not another guy in the party might fix that problem. He'd dismissed it. Rikki kind of liked being the only guy in a party of girls, even if one of them drove him up the wall, and so he kept his griping to himself. Right now, however, he just wanted to see if Rosalind would leave and let him grab another few minutes of sleep. He was not so lucky.

"They're still sleeping."

Rikki groaned. So Ashe and Renee's sleep was more important than his? Leaning down onto his knees, he said, "Rosa, I was still sleeping."

"But you're awake now, so come on." There was no deterring her as she reached for his arm again and dragged him down the hall. He gave up and followed along rather than be pulled, and she guided him out onto the street.

She let go of him once they moved away from the inn and she was certain he wouldn't dip back inside, but she still impatiently ushered him along until they reached Tolbana's teleport plaza. There was a surprisingly large crowd gathered around it.

"What's going on here?" he asked. Rosalind came back around pushed him from behind, prodding him further. "I'm going, I'm going," he assured her.

He pushed past a few players to get to the center where he saw a vaguely familiar face standing. The male had definitely been present at yesterday's strategy meeting. Of that Rikki was certain but he couldn't place the guy's name. More than likely he hadn't actually heard it.

The boy raised his arms high over his head, a bright smile on his face. The teleport gate behind him looked different than Rikki remembered it being last night. Light pulsed in concentric circles within the large arch where before only a translucent film had covered the very bottom of the platform. Then the boy shouted for them all to hear, "Illfang has been defeated. We've made it to the second floor!"

The players around him began murmuring. Rikki looked down when he felt a tug on his sleeve.

"We made it," Rosalind cheered. "We're closer to home!"

"Yeah," he said and smiled as he patted her head. "We're getting there."

It had taken an entire month but they'd finally done it. The players of «Sword Art Online» had punched through to the next floor.

Next Time: Setting the Record Straight

A/N: Sorry, not sorry for skipping out on the first floor boss fight here. It's included in so many stories and everyone already knows how it ends so I felt it would be boring to shoehorn my characters into it. But fear not, there are a great plenty of boss fights yet to come. So who was it that Renee was checking up on? Keep reading to find out and I'll try to get the next few chapters ready in a timely fashion.

Until then, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. If you did, why not drop a review? If you didn't, why not leave me one anyway and tell what you think was wrong?

~Red