Level Twenty Two: Majin

Kawagoe City, Saitama Prefecture – May 17th, 2025

Akemi was sitting on her hospital bed, staring at her amusphere. She was about to put herself back into a hellish death game… Even if it wasn't to be stated in the open, it was a terrifying thought for her. But… she wasn't about to back out… Kazuto was diving into AGSO too… she wasn't about to let him go alone. Aki walked in and tilted her head. "Where's Kirigaya-kun?"

"Not here yet." Akemi stated, looking up at the nurse. "Kazuto had to take his sister somewhere today." She just stared at the brunette nurse, gaze unwavering. "… Aki-san."

"Yes?"

"I want you to understand this." The young woman stated, putting her chin on the back of her hand. "If something happens to go wrong with the system in any way… you are to check on Kazuto first." Her glasses caught the light and caused her to look a little menacing.

"Oh?" Aki smiled, patting the girl's shoulder. "You must really adore him…"

"… Yes. I do." She stated.

"Don't worry." Aki smiled at Akemi. "I'll be sure to check on him first, if anything happens." The younger of the two sighed a little in relief, adjusting her glasses. "And I promise not to touch him while he's in AGSO." Those words made Akemi look up and shake her head a little at the nurse, but she smiled a little.

"Good." Akemi looked up at the door as Kazuto walked in.

"Sorry I'm late." He waved, avoiding Aki's grabby hands and walking over to Akemi, getting pulled into a hug. "U-um… Akemi?"

"Hi." She nuzzled against his torso a little. He ran his fingers through her hair before kneeling in front of her on one knee.

"Are you okay?"

"I'll be okay." She smiled. "The sooner we get this solved, the sooner it'll be over." She leaned over and kissed his forehead. "Come on, let's go."

"Right…" he nodded slowly as he got up, heading over to his bed and sitting down while Aki prepped his Amusphere. His eyes wandered across to Akemi as the girl removed her glasses and her collared shirt, revealing her camisole. Aki helped the girl attach her sensors before she laid down and put the device over her eyes, Kazuto soon going through the process of removing his excess clothes and plugging the sensors in. Aki initiated the sequence and the two fell into the world of AGSO.

AGSO: Startup City – Initial Point

Akemi looked down at her avatar. Noting that she was a kemonomimi type avatar. "Oooh, nice." She smiled, finding a mirrored window a few feet away as Kirito's avatar began loading. Her bangs hung over her right eye and her eyes glowed a golden hue. She smiled a little, seeing that oh so familiar avatar name, Kirito, blink for a moment before the avi opened its eyes. But when she turned, she paused. "Kirito…?"

"Hey." He smiled, looking up at her. "What's wrong…?"

"You…" she pulled him over to the window. "Better look for yourself, beautiful." She whispered in his ear, blushing quite red. Kirito looked at his reflection, pausing to put his hand up, mouth dropping open in disbelief. His hair was long, his face was feminine, and he looked… well…

"I look like a girl." He slumped over. "What the hell?!" But he felt Akemi wrap her hands around his stomach, pulling him close to her. As usual, her avi was busty… slim… but strong. He missed that feeling. "… What is it, Black Fox?" he asked.

"You make a very pretty girl." She mumbled, face still red. "Now I have very good reason to be super protective of you, huh?"

"But won't it be weird if we try and kiss like this?"

"… Guess so." She sighed. "Oh well… It just means more for me to do IRL." She teased, smiling a little bit. Kirito's face went bright red as he averted his gaze from her eyes. "Anway." She let go of his waist. "We should hurry and find out where we can get money and equipment." They hadn't gotten to do too much research on this game, since they'd been so busy with school. "Let's go looking for a place to get some money first."

"How can we get money without any weapons?" Kirito asked.

"I read something that in the big shopping complex in the middle of the city they have a training simulator that is only meant for newbies." She stated. "It pays out money if you complete the challenge without getting hit." She added as they walked past some shady alley ways, some creepy NPCs and players eyeing them both up. "And I figure, you and I can milk the machine for all it's worth." She pet his head, smiling. "It's a 2 coin pay in, and if it hasn't been beaten recently, the jackpot payout will be huge." She smiled. "We've both got about 100 coins right now, and one gold each… but the gear we'd need is sure to cost a lot more than that." She added.

"As always, you research more than you concentrate on school." He sighed, smiling at her a little. "But did you get the chance to look at a map?"

"No, sadly the AGSO maps are not released to the public." She smiled back. "We need to find someone who knows this area well, I guess?" she heard someone throwing cat calls at them, turning to glare, a low growl coming from her throat, causing the people to flinch and back up. "Not these creeps, though." She lead Kirito to a more crowded area of the city, finding no one who was willing to stop for them. They eventually made it though, thanks to seeing a few signs. They walked into the building, and immediately noticed a huge crowd of spectators. They wandered over and noticed that someone was attempting the challenge they'd heard about. But he failed pretty badly. There was a small line of 4 or 5 people who were looking to take the challenge, all talking a big game. Kirito and Black Fox headed into line, getting some cat calls and cheers from onlookers.

"Hey girls, you two look like complete newbies. Better go get some practice in before you mess with this challenge~"

"Hey man, if they don't make it you should ask the shorter one out… she's a loli."

"Yeah but the taller one has big boobs, man…"

"Good luck cuties~!" There were 3 machines that ran this challenge, separated by species. Kemono, Human, and Demon; and so far all the people were in line for the Human Machine. Akemi stepped up to the Kemonomimi machine, hearing people saying that she was crazy. That newbies in the kemonomimi class always failed this challenge, and the humans were the highest chance, but most never got to the jackpot.

"Whatever." Akemi stretched and stepped on the button that activated the machine, causing it to light up and tell her to come get some. She smirked and took a step down the walkway, dodging a bullet with ease. "Oh, I see… it's a test to avoid being shot."

"What, she came in here not knowing what the challenge was?!" someone exclaimed, a buzz going through the crowd.

"I'll assume once I get past the start point, it gets a lot faster?" she asked, the crowd confirming her suspicions. She took a breath and knelt down, preparing herself to run forward. The countdown to start time ticked down to zero and she took off, dodging bullets left and right, managing to avoid being hit. As soon as she got to the half way point, the number of shots doubled. She had some close calls, but she made it through the next mark, her bullet avoidance guidelines telling her that she was going to get shot no matter what she did. But she smiled and jumped out of the way, the guns moving to shoot at her in the air, but she landed on the barrel, swinging around it and landing in the finish box. "Pay up, boys." She smiled, the meter clocking her time at a new record, coins pouring out and racking up in her money meter. Everyone was cheering and screaming. A bunch of people were throwing more cat calls and compliments at her, but she ignored them all, walking over to Kirito and smiling. "Your turn."

"Show off." He mumbled, pouting a little.

"Hey girlie, go get em~!" some people began cheering for Kirito too, even though they obviously thought he was female. He sighed, the other challengers backing down after seeing Black Fox's record crushing achievement, not wanting to even try after that show of speed. Kirito walked up to the start and began his challenge, using a very similar strategy to Black Fox, though not clearing a speed record, racked up almost as many coins as his partner.

Meanwhile, someone in the crowd was watching in a cloak and mask, soon vanishing into the background as more people rushed over to check out what was happening. Kirito and Black Fox left the scene quickly, avoiding all their new found fans and heading out of the building. But as they were leaving, Kirito turned a corner and ran into someone, Black Fox catching up and looking concerned. "You okay?" she asked, helping her partner up, then immediately helping up the girl he'd knocked over. Her short aqua hair pinned by two black hairclips with three holes in each.

"I'm fine." She stated. "Your friend alright?"

"Yes, Kirito's pretty sturdy for a human." She smiled. "I'm Black Fox, nice to meet you."

"Ah, right… I'm Sinon… nice to meet you too." Sinon paused, looking them both over. "Are you both newbies?"

"Yes, we're looking for a place to buy some equipment." Black Fox stated. "We just cleared the jackpots on the challenge machines for our set, so we figured we should try and find a nice place to shop."

"… You… cleared the machine's jackpot?" Sinon looked shocked, hardly believing that these two newbie girls could do such a thing. "When did you make your accounts?"

"Oh, just today." Kirito interjected.

"Today?!" Sinon reeled back a little. "… You… said you were looking for a place to buy equipment?" the aquanette wasn't normally one to divulge her favorite spot to get new equipment but… for these two to have cleared the challenges on their first day…

"That's right." Black Fox nodded. "Do you happen to know anywhere good?"

Sinon had stayed around the pair for a little while, talking mostly to Black Fox since Kirito was kind of… well, he seemed to care more about sticking at the taller girl's side than chatting. The trio had been looking up and down the streets of the main shopping district for a while now, but everything was either super blindingly colorful or way too revealing for either of their tastes.

"Are you planning on entering the Ballad of Bullets?" Sinon questioned,

"The what?" Kirito questioned, causing Sinon to stare in disbelief.

"You two don't know what that is?"

"Not a clue." Black Fox rubbed the back of her neck. "We kinda just threw ourselves in, we didn't really check this game out too much before-hand."

"… Come with me." Sinon stated sternly. She lead them down to a place to rent vehicles, telling them to cough up money for one that could fit 3 and got on, Kirito offering to drive. With his directions, the group set off for a small corner of the city that seemed to not have too many people. The people walking around eyed up the three girls, but Sinon's and Black Fox's glares sent them packing pretty fast. Sinon walked them into the shop, then leaned against the wall. "This is where I shop… I think the attire will suit you two pretty well." She stated, motioning to the wall of black clothes and muted colors.

"Wow…" Kirito went immediately to inspect the weapons, Black Fox chuckling before turning to Sinon.

"Thank you… sorry for the trouble."

"Not really trouble… but you two seem like nice enough girls." She stated. "Not too many girls play this sort of hard core game, so I figure we should watch each other's backs, at least a little."

"Ahaha, yes of course, but-"

"Black Fox, come look at these!" Kirito stated, sounding like a kid in a candy store, catching the girl's attention and causing her to hurry over to her partner after muttering an apology to Sinon. The aquanette shook her head with a small smile at the pair's behavior, finding them to be cute… sisters maybe? Or at least good friends… And after the pair bought their new attire and weapons, they parted ways from Sinon.

"We have our footing set…" Black Fox sighed as they walked along a street to a stopping point. "We gotta start gathering information tomorrow…" but she stopped her sentence as she heard a bunch of commotion down the road where they were headed, seeing a boy with black hair and neon blue accessories standing on a pedestal.

"LADIES AND GENTS, MAY I PRESENT TO YOU OUR BALLAD OF BULLETS CHAMPION FROM LAST TIME AROUND! MAJIN!" the crowd roared with excitement as Majin waved a little.

"I see a few new faces this time around… I look forward to any new players who are ready to face the Ballad of Bullets and try to take my title." He stated calmly, looking around, his eyes landing on Black Fox and Kirito. He jumped off the pedestal and landed infront of them both, taking Black Fox's hand. "Can I hope to see you in the tournament, Miss?"

"H-huh…?" Black Fox might normally have blushed or shoved the person off, but… something about them was… calming. "I-I suppose..."

"… Wonderful." He bowed his head, glancing at Kirito with a look before he walked off, his fans following, leaving a very confused Black Fox and slightly irked Kirito in his wake.

"What the heck was that?" Kirito pouted, taking Black Fox's hand as soon as they were out of sight of other people. "Akemi?" the girl was kind of in a daze, staring off into space. Kirito leaned in and kissed her to snap her out of it.

"Wh-wha?" she blinked. "S-sorry, what?"

"You aren't falling for someone else, are you?" he asked, pushing her against an alley wall and doing his best to make out with her to keep her attention on him.

"N-no of course not." She managed to reply, face now red but eyes focused on Kirito. "… I feel like I know him from somewhere though…"

"Who, that Majin guy?"

"Yeah… I can't place it."

"…" Kirito hugged onto her and pressed his face into her chest, making her wrap her arms around him in an almost automatic response. "You're mine…"

"Yes, I know." She smiled a little, leaning over and kissing his forehead. "All yours… forever."

"Good." He mumbled, looking up at her, cheeks tinted pink. "So… can we go home?"

"Sure. We can't do much else here today." She pet his head, opening her panel at the same time as he did, preparing to log off. "Shall we go out for dinner?"

"Sounds good." He nodded, the pair logging off at the same time.

Kawagoe City, Saitama Prefecture –7pm

Akemi and Kazuto woke up and sat up, Aki doing a quick exam and clearing them both to go home, teasing Kirito a little about staying longer alone with her, but Akemi glared and pulled her boyfriend into her arms after sitting on his bed, glaring at Aki and nearly suffocating Kazuto wither chest. But the pair soon headed out and went to have a quiet dinner at a café before Kazuto walked Akemi home, where his bike was parked. "See you soon?"

"Yeah." She leaned over and gave him a long, loving kiss that he gladly returned. "Goodnight, Kazuto… get home safe, okay?"

"I will." He smiled and pet her back a little before giving her one more kiss, then leaving to head home. Akemi watched him go before she closed her door, hearing Makoto's bedroom door open.

"Nee-san?"

"Hey, Makoto." She said cheerfully.

"… You sure take long dates when you and Kazuto go out." He mumbled, looking a little sleepy. "Did you eat?"

"Ahaha, yeah I did. But did you eat? Shall I make you something?"

"… yes please."

"Alright~ I'll make… gyoza tonight~" she smiled as her brother nodded and went to help cook his meal. Akemi caught her brother looking at her a little differently than normal, but she assumed that was just because she was smiling and being more… giddy about things than normal. After all, he always gave her funny looks when she was all excited about stuff that she didn't normally get all worked up over. Especially not boys… so the young woman just made dinner with her little brother as she kept in mind that Majin person from AGSO, attempting to figure out where she knew him from. It would be a long, sleepless night for Akemi Ryugazaki.

((Using the intermission period before I have to cram for final exams and projects to get some writing done~ I hope you all like this chapter, and I still greatly appreciate reviews~ ; v ;

AGSO is up and running, and if anyone still wants to apply for the part of one of Akemi's gamer contacts, please let me know...? ; v ; I can do it myself, but I figured getting some fresh input might be nice too...

Anyway, I hope you all stay tuned for my next installment~

-Winter Cheshire))