AN: So. Here's the thing, I say a lot that things are always happening in the background that I might not touch on, and this chapter is a good example of that. Pretty much from the very beginning, I'd already decided that in melee Marzanna was rather specialized in crowd control, but she's not so great one on one against stronger enemies, that never really came up until Wadjet the flaming serpent, but that was always how she was in my mind. But that's in melee. It was a while ago but you may recall that all the way back in ch.22 that Hanna told Asuna she wanted to be a spell, ritual, and ward crafter, and because of that, while it hasn't popped up since there hasn't been any ALO fights basing Wadjet, which required her crowd control, in my head, since she finds ALOs magic system cool, and also sees it as a good source of inspiration, this entire time she's been focusing on magic DPS.

It's a similar reason why I actually forgot to mention that she chose to be an Imp when she first joined ALO, because it was so set in my head by that point that it sort of just slipped my mind. I'm bringing these things up, because they create… problems in this arc that I wasn't thinking about at the time. Some of you, if you've watched it recently or just have a good memory of SAO in general, might see why. Those of you who don't will get a reminder soon enough I guess.

Also, I have issues with Kirito and Thrym, the boss of the Calibur Arc. Specifically how Kirito reacts to Thrym's height. In both the novel and anime he acts like he's utterly massive and in the novel even calls him a "giant giant" and insists to himself that the double expression is necessary to describe Thrym's size, as well as thinking that even if he jumped with full force that he wouldn't even be able to reach Thrym's knee. In fairness to Kirito: 1) Thrym is listed in the book as 15 meters (49.2 feet) and that's not a small height by any means. 2) He is more used to SAO bosses which were in general much shorter, ones like the Skull Reaper being exceptions rather than the rule. And 3) While Spriggans have the racial ability to fly in dungeons, even they are barred from doing so in a boss room.

However, first of all, this takes place in VR with enhanced abilities (at least compared to a human, like he was in canon) so that bit about only reaching his knee is nonsense, especially since I draw from both the novel and anime, and while it may have happened while he was punching down at her and therefore lower, Sinon literally jumps up and kicks him in the face. And furthermore, in the novel Tonkii is described as being 20 meters and the giant that was beating him up was "about twice as tall", so not only is he shorter than Tonkii but he's less than half the height of his subordinates that roam Jötunheimr.

So I don't buy his reaction and insistence that Thrym is massive at all. Though I do realize how ridiculous trying to fight the evil gods are for a swordsman like Kirito, it's some attack on titan shit down in Jötunheimr apparently.

Hanna eyes the tall woman in interest as Klein murmurs the obvious, "She's huge…"

It's not really something that should be said to a lady, but the woman she assumes to be an NPC doesn't seem to mind. The voice that comes from her is solemn and seems to echo faintly, "I am Urðr, Queen of the Lake. You fairies who have formed a bond with our kin… My two younger sisters and I have a request for you. Please save this land from the Frost Giants."

Yui flies over to them and lands on Kirito's shoulder on the side that's right next to her, murmuring somewhat quietly as she gazes at Urðr, "Papa, that's an NPC. But… something is strange. She isn't using the set response routines, like normal NPCs. Rather, she's connected to a language-engine module that's near the core program."

Kirito blinks quickly a couple times in faint surprise, "In other words, she's been turned into an AI?"

Yui nods lightly then shifts her gaze to Kirito, "That's right, Papa."

Urðr's eyes slip closed for a moment as though she's remembering before she lifts her hand slightly and gestures vaguely to the frozen underground, "Once, Jötunheimr was like Alfheim. It enjoyed the blessings of the World Tree, Yggdrasil, and was covered in beautiful water and greenery."

As she speaks, the world around them fades away and is taken over by an illusion of the story she's weaving for them. The world she shows them is indeed as lush as the overworld, the bottomless pit a lake full of sparkling pure water, the roots, rather than simply poking out of the ceiling wind all the way down to the ground and curl around said lake without spreading out in an almost protective manner, one of them even forms a large flat platform suspended above the water on top of which she can see buildings, enough so to easily classify as a town. Up near where the roots breach the ceiling, what look sunlight pours into the underground, though given the glowing panels inside the World Tree that had been repurposed into a party/guild quest and the theme of the story of the World Tree providing for Jötunheimr, its entirely possible it comes from Yggdrasil itself.

She lowers her hand and the illusion disappears, "We, the Hill Giants, and those beast kin lived together peacefully." She lowers her head slightly, and though her tone of voice remains consistent, her eyes droop partially closed in sadness, "Below Jötunheimr is the land of frost, Niflheimr. The king of the Frost Giants who rules that land, Thrym, transformed into a wolf and snuck into this realm, stole Excalibur, said to be 'the sword which cuts all trees and iron' that was forged by the blacksmith god Völundr, and threw it into «Urðr's Spring» at the center of the world. The sword cut the deepest root of the World Tree, and when it did, Jötunheimr was cut off from Yggdrasil's bounties."

This time when she lifts her other hand, they can do nothing but watch as the magnificent lake freezes over from the center. Even as it freezes, the entire underground world dims as sunlight ceases to shine on it, and once it's frozen, the entire spiral of roots shake violently as they pull up into the ceiling, carrying the vaguely cone shaped frozen lake with it, a certain golden gleam shining at the very bottom. The town built on top partially collapses in the shaking before what remains disappears into the ceiling. Like a wave sweeping across the land, the trees lose their leaves as the grass withers and dies. Everywhere the wave touches, water freezes and plant life dies. As it spreads, a snowstorm begins, building to a ferocious blizzard that rages across the land with breathtaking speed.

This time, when Urðr lowers her hand, there isn't much change to the surroundings, the biggest difference being the cone shaped frozen lake being carved into the upside-down pyramid dungeon.

Kirito murmurs quietly, "So then… that's why Excalibur is in that place…"

Urðr nods regally, before continuing, "Thrym's Frost Giants attacked Jötunheimr, from Niflheimr, en masse, building many fortresses and castles, and capturing and imprisoning us, the Hill Giants. They built a castle, Thrymheim, in the large mass of ice once called Urðr's Spring, and now they rule this land. My two sisters and I escaped to the bottom of a frozen lake, but we lack the power we once had."

Her eyes had been downcast as she explained the fate of her land, and so absorbed they'd been, they had all practically forgotten that she was just an NPC telling them the story for their quest as they listened quietly. Then she raises her voice slightly, from something close to a murmur to something much stronger, "The Frost Giants are not satisfied, however, and they are trying to kill every one of my kin, the beasts that live in this land. He wishes to do so that the last of our power will vanish and allow Thrymheim to be elevated to Alfheim's surface."

Klein, immersed in the story, takes a step towards her in alarm, "W-What? If they do that, Arun will be destroyed!"

Urðr moves her gaze to him and nods solemnly, "King Thrym desires to encase Alfheim in ice and snow, then continue attacking until he can rise to the top of the World Tree, Yggdrasil. There the «Golden Apple» is said to grow, his desire is to obtain that sacred fruit."

She blinks quickly. Real history was definitely not one of her strong suits, but she knew quite a bit about mythology, due to her grandparents and their tendency to tell her the real stories behind the myths, if they know them. On top of that, with Alfheim being rather heavily themed towards Norse myths, she'd been brushing up on them in her spare time.

In short, she's fairly sure she knows what Urðr is talking about, "You mean the Golden Apple of Iðunn? The goddess of youth, apples, and Spring who's Golden Apples kept the gods eternally young?"

Urðr pauses for a couple seconds, likely her language engine working out the best response to an unexpected question. Then she nods, "It has been called that, yes. Though there is only one, and Iðunn only tends to the Apple, it was Yggdrasil that grew it. Over time such things get twisted into legends almost entirely different from the truth."

She smiles faintly, "Like the fact that myth says that you and your sisters, Verðandi and Skuld, are the Norns, the goddesses which shape the destinies of all men?" She glances down briefly, "Though I suppose the other bit of the myth, that you're responsible for nourishing the World Tree with water from your sacred well is a little more accurate."

She nods, "Indeed. I, and my sisters, by the measure of mortals, are minor gods, though over the millennia after we were cut off from your world, our legends grew somewhat out of proportion. Our kin-servants," She gestures to Tonkii, "are also technically minor gods, though their powers are so limited it may be simpler to call them spirits. They are tied to the land and collectively help tend to it."

It was actually true that near the top of the World Tree, there was an impossibly strong boss mob, specifically an Eagle(1), guarding an inaccessible area. Though with the way this quest was beginning to play out, whether it was inaccessible because there was a quest flag linked to the death of the Eagle boss, or simply that it wasn't time for it, like it was appearing that the case had been with the Excalibur quest, she couldn't say.

She nods, and Urðr lifts her gaze upwards, "Being irritated by their inability to destroy my kin, Thrym and his generals started to use the power of the fairies, which has come far in the time of our realms' separation. He invites them to hunt my kin, offering Excalibur as a reward. However, even were he not so greedy to hold onto it, it is impossible for him to bestow the sword to another. For when Excalibur vanishes from Thrymheim, Yggdrasil's bounties will return to this land, and that castle will melt and return from whence it came.

Silica gasps, "E-eh?! Then it's a lie that Excalibur is the quest reward? Can you have a quest like that?"

Urðr closes her eyes and lowers her head, "When the god of blacksmith Völundr forged the sword, he discarded the one in which he slipped when striking the hammer, which looks identical to Excalibur. The «False Sword Caliburn» is that blade's name. Thrym likely intends to bestow that false blade as the reward. While it is strong, it does not possess the true power of the real one."

After hearing of the planned Caliburn/Excalibur switch, Leafa clenches her fist in anger, "That's cheating! Is a king allowed to do that?"

Urðr nods slowly, "That cunning is Thrym's most potent weapon. But he has been too impatient to destroy my kin, and has committed a grave mistake. In order to cooperate with the fairy warriors they lured in using the false sword, almost all of his subordinates were sent away from Thrymheim and to the ground. That castle's defenses have never been so thin as they now are."

Her mate, likely seeing where this is going as well, quietly murmurs, "I see."

Then Urðr lifts her hand towards them and a golden light flows from her palms condensing into a ball which floats over to be above Leafa, then turns into a necklace which slowly drifts down towards her as Urðr continues, "When this stone turns completely dark, it signals that my kin-servants all lie slain and my power is no more." She gestures towards the ice dungeon as she looks over her shoulder at it, "Fairies, infiltrate Thrymheim, and draw Excalibur from its plinth."

It is only when she's done talking that their immersion is broken, as a 'Quest Accepted' automatically pops up above her head, likely since they had already asked Tonkii to take them to the dungeon. A split second layer, screens pop up in front of each of them with the notification for the quest, simply reading the quest name,«Holy Sword of the Frozen Palace» on top of a line, with the text 'Quest Started' below the line.

Her gaze drops back down to them as she lowers her arm, "I am counting on you, fairies."

Then she dissipates into golden light and vanishes. There's a beat of silence as Tonkii turns again and starts climbing back up towards the ice pyramid though thankfully this time it's gradually, before Asuna breaks it, "This has turned into a really big deal."

Sinon shares a glance with Silica, "This is.. a normal quest… right? But the scale seems a little too big for that. The story is way grander than a quest usually is. Didn't she say something about how if all the bestial evil gods are wiped out, the Frost Giants will invade the surface?"

They all heard it, but Sinon was likely just looking for confirmation for the unbelievably game breaking possibility. Her mate nods, "She did." Then he crosses his arms in thought, "But I don't know if the GMs would do something like that with no update or warning. Normally, you'd have at least a week's notice if there was some sort of Boss Invasion Event planned."

At that moment, Yui, who had been sitting on his left shoulder, flies to the center of their vague circle and speaks loud enough for them all to hear, "Well, this is just a guess, but…" She pauses briefly as though thinking about what she's about to say, before continuing, "Alfheim Online has one major difference from other VRMMOs made from The Seed that they use. Namely, it isn't based on the feature-reduced version of the Cardinal System, but the full specs version Sword Art Online used."

Sinon frowns, "What's the difference in this context."

Yui nibbles on her lip, "Sinon-san might not know this, since she wasn't an SAO player, but the original Cardinal System, since Kayaba was in the game himself, was designed to be able to work entirely on its own, not only for things like adjusting prices, but even quest generation was left pretty much entirely up to the system. It was designed to learn myths and legends or just good stories and the like from the internet and use them as inspiration to create the quests on its own. Some things Kayaba designed, like the fact the main quest was reaching the top, and some of the major quests linked to that, but after that he basically just input the lore of the world into the system and told it to do whatever it wanted while keeping on theme."

Sinon stares at her in astonishment, "That's… incredible."

Yui nods vaguely, then takes a deep breath, "That's not all though, since the story he wanted to tell was that of the strong, respected, clearing guild leader, that is to say himself, actually being the bad guy all along as well as the final boss that once defeated would earn the freedom of everyone and destroy their prison, the Cardinal System has absolute control over the game environment and system."

She frowns a bit, "Since its final task, when the story came to a close, was to destroy Aincrad then delete itself in its entirety. Given how lazy that scumbag Sugou was, I doubt he ever bothered to look into Cardinal's System too much, he likely just thought that it was great that he wouldn't have to pay people to design quests. It's why things like the whale quest happen, because Kayaba was a storyteller."

She shakes her head to herself, "Nothing mattered to him more than a good story, so while in general the system is designed to give players fair rewards for their efforts, sometimes the story itself is meant to be the majority of the reward and Cardinal knows that. It's also been programmed to include a certain ratio of Story Quests, as they're called in the system, to Reward quests."

Her eyes unfocus like she's gazing into the past, "When SAO was still in development and no one knew about Kayaba, no one saw anything wrong with it because they thought it would flesh out the game and it's lore if sometimes players just sat back and took in the stories rather than rushing through for the rewards. Furthermore, Cardinal also has a system programmed into it for classifying the… grandness of the story it generates, and how many of each class. Smaller, more contained stories are the most common, but grandiose epics are well within its scope, if purposely set to be far more rare."

Kirito nods wisely, "You'd get bored if every other story was an epic tale, and on top of that, the smaller stories would become practically meaningless."

Yui refocuses and nods, "Exactly. Additionally, Cardinal also has instructions to make sure epic events happen periodically, since on the other end of the scale, if the game possesses nothing but smaller quests, that's also boring. Games are meant to allow you to step into a much grander role than most people have in their day to day life. The average player wants to be the valiant knight in shining armor who slays the dragon and saves the princess. They want to be the clever wizard who breaks the curse and frees the land. They want to be the hero of the story, or at least one of the heroes from the party."

Her brows furrow, "But… I don't know if Sugou and the new owners, Ymir as you all know, keep interfering, either accidentally or on purpose, or if the updates keep messing with it since Cardinal is meant to run independently, or even if it's some other factor I have no knowledge of, but in the two years it's been running it hasn't gotten to release an Epic Level Quest. There are also programmed limitations on exactly how grand the event can be compared to the last one and how long its been, so since from Cardinal's perspective it's never gotten to push out such an event in the entirety of the two years the system has been running, it's program will basically tell it that it has the full authority to pull out all the stops and do whatever it wants."

She takes a deep breath into the stunned silence, clearly not quite done, "Furthermore, when Jötunheimr was released, Ymir said they just found it unfinished in ALO's programming and assumed that RCT had been working on it, so they just finished it and pushed out the update. But I was once an AI in Cardinal's System, I know the unique… style, I suppose you could call it, that coding done by it looks like, and combined with how lazy Sugou was, I can absolutely guarantee you that it wasn't him and RCT that was in the process of creating Jötunheimr."

"The incomplete files Ymir found on it were absolutely them stumbling across something Cardinal was in the process of generating. I never mentioned it because it wasn't exactly relevant, but since I can see the programming of the things around me, I can tell that Jötunheimr is a strange mishmash of programming done by Cardinal and humans."

She dips her head, "Finally, I mentioned before that the Cardinal System uses the lore and certain major aspects of the game so as to help it stay on theme. Alfheim clearly takes its heaviest inspiration from Norse mythology. This quest clearly follows the mythology regarding the so-called 'Last War'. Not only do the Frost Giants from Jötunheimr and Niflheimr invade, but from an even lower level, «Muspelheimr», the Flame Giant tribe will also appear, and burn down the World Tree… that is…"

Suguha looks down, "Ragnarok, the twilight of the gods."

She sighs, "Putting all of this together, what I'm saying is that with this new information from Urðr, I'm certain that Cardinal generated Jötunheimr and this Quest specifically to serve the purpose of being an epic tale as per its programming, and furthermore since a grandiose story without stakes, without a Princess to rescue or a land to save, wouldn't be an epic or at least not an interesting one. Combined with Cardinal's unlimited authority and the fact that it's not programmed to see the problem with injecting such a colossal upheaval into the game without even a warning I firmly believe that the quest is not joking about the consequences of failure."

Heavy silence hangs over the group for a few beats before she leans forward, "Wouldn't they just be able to rollback to a backup if that happens though?"

The tension drains out of her friends for a moment before Yui shakes her head, "It might be possible if management backed up all of the data manually and the physical media in a separate location, but…" She purses her lips, "If they've just been using Cardinal's automatic backup function, the rollback would only affect player data and not include the current state of the overworld."

The tension returns for a moment before Klein shouts, "Oh yeah!" He immediately opens his menu but after messing with it for a minute he slumps with a sigh, "No good…"

Her mate looks over at his best friend, "What?"

Klein sighs, "I tried getting in touch with a GM, but it says it's off hours for human support now."

Kirito crosses his arms, "Yeah, that sounds about right. I mean, end of the year, on a Sunday morning?"

A beat of silence passes before Leafa smiles, though it's a little strained, "When it comes down to it, we just have to buckle down and do it. For Tonkii and Alfheim. Right, Onii-chan?"

She holds the necklace Urðr had given her. Though roughly sixty percent of it had been dyed black with the destruction of the beast kin, that meant that about forty percent was still lit up, given that it had taken hours for the players fighting with the giants to make that much headway, that still had time.

Her mate nods with a smile as he uncrosses his arms and opens his menu, "That's right. The reason we came here today was to enter that castle and get Excalibur anyway. If its defenses are weakened, then it's in our favor."

As he finishes, he equips his second sword. While he no longer needs to worry about a Unique Skill, he still tends to prefer to default to one sword and switch to two when he gets serious.

Klein unsheaths his sword, and with a pumped up tone of voice, points it towards the ice palace and proclaims, "Okay! It's our last big quest of the year! Let's do this, and earn ourselves a spot on the front page of tomorrow's MMO Tomorrow!"

The rest of them draw their weapons, gathering together and lifting their weapons up to tap the ends together with an enthusiastic cry. As they make the final approach to the platform, Leafa pets Tonkii's head, "Just wait, Tonkii. We'll take back your home."

They disembark, pausing in front of the large double doors that were unguarded, as Urðr said.

They do a few last minute checks, then get into a loose formation with Kirito, Leafa and Klein in front, Sinon and Silica next, and the rear brought up by her and Asuna. Though she did like melee fighting, especially if it was by her mate's side, she had chosen to lean more heavily into the magic of ALO.

Partly it was due to the fact that she knew the group they pulled their usual party members from were mostly melee focused, and even, to some extent, had their identities based around their preferred styles of fighting, to the point that asking Klein or Leafa to put down their katanas, Silica her dagger, Asuna and Kirito their swords, Liz or Agil their hammers and axes and smithing and trade skill, just to focus on learning magic for no other purpose than adding balance to the party would be cruel. Even Sinon, the newcomer with her bow, they couldn't possibly ask.

They weren't terribly off. Asuna had of her own violation had chosen to learn to heal, which she knew to be mostly due to the fact that before SAO, she'd wanted to be a Healer, an ambition she still wanted to pursue, and Silica had picked up through some support skills, mostly through Pina, and Leafa had picked up some various magic skill even before Kirito woke up and they all joined, but they didn't have anyone that was had any noticeable skills as an attack mage.

So she'd been taking on that role for the most part, except if they needed her for mob control, like when they challenged Wadjet and her fire elementals. It wasn't a huge chore for her, she still had her skill levels from SAO, so she absolutely could fight as a melee fighter whenever she wanted. And anyway, the magic system in ALO fascinated her, so it wasn't like she didn't want to learn, and she also hadn't built a large portion of her identity around her melee abilities, like most of her friends who had learned such pride in their melee abilities had.

Well earned pride in her opinion, in the way they could and had fought for their survival with them, in their ability to stand against incredible odds and come out victorious with their skills. And even those who hadn't been in SAO, Leafa and Sinon, had understandable pride and personal identity in their fighting styles, Leafa, who loved Kendo with a burning passion, and Sinon's whole story from that disastrous day and the prowess she'd gained as she tried to recover through GGO.

Besides, given that one of the things she was studying for was Spell Crafting, there was a plethora of inspiration to be had from the ALO magic system, so while some part of her missed fighting with her blade directly by her mate's side, between that and her fascination with ALO's system, it was by and large a role she was happy to take on.

She's glad for it when they reached the boss room on the second floor. As Urðr had said, the place was nearly empty, so their rate of encountering regular mobs was almost zero. Given that in both SAO and ALO a 'floor' and a 'level' where two different things, the latter being a level of the dungeon that begins and ends at the stairs with the former referring to when you hit the floor area boss even if there were multiple levels in it, which honestly felt a little backwards to her but whatever. It means though that there could actually be a lot of bosses on a single floor.

This floor, when she, Kirito, and Leafa had scouted it had originally had a bunch of strong sub-bosses too, but even half of the floor's sub-bosses were absent rather than just the regular mobs. The Cyclops floor boss of the first floor had been present, which made sense, and they had found pretty much the same situation regarding the sub-bosses on the second floor.

And then they found the floor boss. Or bosses rather, since it was two Minotaurs working together, one golden, one black. The golden one had high physical resistance, and the black had high magic resistance. They would've been in a lot more trouble had she not been focusing on her magic skills, but even then it wasn't easy. The two constantly tried to block for each other, and it was proving difficult to separate them enough that they couldn't.

She takes a deep breath and focuses, "Ekku kasuto fimu supotto gurima."

Immediately, unnatural shadow pools on the ground in front of the gold one then lances up into him. The black one tries to get in the way, and Kirito, Klein, and Leafa do their best to stop him. As has been quickly becoming normal in this fight, that only partly stops it, and the black Minotaur manages to tank two of the lances for his buddy.

She huffs in frustration, then calls out, "Do you guys think you could stun lock the black one for a little?"

Kirito calls back, "Maybe if all of us worked together, but you'd be on your own with the gold one, and that would leave no one to defend Asuna while she's healing!"

Before she can respond, Asuna calls back, "This is dragging on too long and taking up more mana than is sustainable though! We'll have to risk it!"

She glances at her friend, "When I say feri, signal them to hold him."

Asuna nods and calls out, "Pin him on my signal!"

Kirito yells, "When Asuna signals, everyone use your Sword Skills and throw everything you've got at the black one!"

She widens her stance and lifts her hands, as well as the staff she's holding, above herself, tipping her head back as though she's praising a god, "Ekku karra andādeyūpī, safunasuto saman tessu rīmi ogu feri-"

Asuna shouts out, "Now!"

Immediately her friends launch into action, as she finishes her spell, "-fijinmazūru min!"

Her friends fall upon the black Minotaur with all the wild ferocity of a pack of wolves as she finishes and the magic begins to rapidly gather, darkness creeps out of every nook and cranny and streams upwards, coalescing above her before taking the form of a giant scythe and swings at the golden Minotaur. it roars in rage as its health begins to plummet, before the bar finally empties entirely and it shatters.

She sighs somewhat tiredly as Asuna calls out a confirmation of its defeat to their friends, who switch from ferociously stun locking the black Minotaur to cheerfully beating it up, since as much of a pain as the gold one had been, a boss whose main gimmick was magic resistance wasn't much of a problem for their unbalanced party.

Asuna touches her shoulder, "Do you need a mana potion?"

She shakes her head, "Nah, since that one has magical resistance, there's no point in me attacking given the composition of our party, so I have plenty of time to regen it, especially since we'll probably take a break after this."

Asuna hums in agreement, "Yeah, but a break doesn't always help with the artificial fatigue that comes from using up mana, while a potion will. And probably the largest drawback of only having one actual attack mage was that you have to do some pretty heavy lifting."

She smiles at her friend, grateful for the concern she shows even here in a normal, non deadly game, "I'm fine Asuna, really, but thank you."

Asuna smiles back, "Of course, what are friends for?"

A shattering sound effect followed by fanfare draws her attention back to the group, where she finds Kirito happily high fiving Klein. They immediately abandon their backline position to join up with their friends, and reach them just in time for Sinon, who had been staring at Kirito weirdly to say, "Umm, is not one else going to mention that?"

They turn to her in surprise, minus Leafa who was nodding along. She tilts her head, "Mention what?"

Leafa puffs her cheeks up, "That thing! With the skills! Onii-chan, you used multiple in a row!"

The confusion washes away, and her mate laughs at his little sister, "Oh! That! It's called skill chaining!"

Klein nods enthusiastically, "Mm! It's actually waaay harder than it looks, but Kirito here discovered it back in Aincrad! Saved my bacon a few times!"

Her mate rubs the back of his head and laughs sheepishly, "To be honest, I discovered it entirely by accident when I was in a rather… tight spot."

Leafa frowns, "What, exactly, do you mean by 'a tight spot', Onii-chan?"

He looks away, "Ah, that is… Um, Hanna and I had gone to a dungeon no one had been able to clear, and I, uh, had a bit of a miscalculation on how much damage I'd do at the end of the fight. The boss survived the skill I used when I thought it'd finish it off, and Hanna was too far away to do anything, so when it went to attack me, I sort of just activated a second skill instinctively?"

Leafa's face goes blank, and silence washes over them for a few beats before she states in a flat voice, "You mean you almost died, is what you're dancing around saying, right?"

He looks away, "Ah. I mean, the boss did take off something like an eighth of my health even when I blocked before…"

Leafa's brows furrows and a frown takes over her face, "Why would you laugh about something like that?"

There's another beat of heavy silence as Leafa stares at her brother and the rest of the SAO survivors shift awkwardly, before she steps forward to place a hand on the girl's shoulder, "Leafa, you have to understand that in SAO, all of us had quite a lot of close calls. It became normal for us. And so did brushing and laughing it off, because a close call is just a close call, and trust me, if you don't learn to live with it and accept that the only thing that matters is that you survived the encounter, the result isn't good."

Leafa turns to her, "What do you mean?"

Asuna sighs as she steps forward, "The players that didn't either ended up pitifully hiding away in the Town of Beginnings, too scared to even leave the city to hunt monsters for money for food, desperately waiting for other people to save them from the game, or they just broke."

Leafa looks down, "Oh…"

She squeezes her sister-in-law's shoulder, "Indeed. So maybe not everyone just brushed it off, or laughed, but everyone learned to cope and just accept it. Maybe you chose to throw yourself into training so next time wouldn't be as bad, or obsessively went over tactics or other things like that, but honestly, those weren't very good for mental health either. So most players learned to laugh it off and move on."

She nods slowly as she thinks about that. She gives her a few moments then pats her shoulder and says in a much more enthusiastic tone of voice, "Besides, the end result was pretty cool! Since that was before he got the dual wield skill and he obviously had to use his off hand, the only thing he could activate was the martial arts skill, so he ended up punching the dragon to death!"

Leafa gives a somewhat forced smile, "You're kidding."

She laughs, "I'm not, he really did."

Klein laughs and tosses his arm over Leafa's shoulder and starts tugging her towards the boss room's exit, clearly meaning to walk and talk, "If you think that's ridiculous, I have got to tell you about some of the other stuff he got up to, since clearly he hasn't!"

Kirito quickly makes after them, probably wanting to do damage control for embarrassing stories, "O-Oi!"

She smiles as her mate starts bickering with Klein and the others at the beginning of what she has a feeling is going to turn into their friends all sharing stories of Kirito's SAO shenanigans with his sister.

The third floor was designed to have an almost labyrinthically complicated layout, but given that they had Yui, who could access the map, it wasn't hard at all. Even the puzzles on their path using levers, gears, and stepping switches were breezed through without taking the time to properly solve them, since Yui already had the solutions. Normally, they wouldn't do that, partially since it was totally cheating and partially because they didn't want to ruin the experience of the game for themselves by just asking Yui for all the answers, but given the consequences this time if they fail and the time limit the enthusiasm of the other players was putting them under, they didn't have much of a choice.

Given all that, even despite running into the third floor's roaming sub-boss twice they still made it to the floor boss room in under twenty minutes. The boss was twice the size of the Minotaur and Cyclops bosses from before, with ten pairs of centipede like legs, but since it had low physical resistance, it wasn't too difficult, even if it was a heavy hitter. The entire fight almost immediately turned into Klein and Kirito taking the aggro, while the rest of them whittled down its legs until it was unable to move.

They only take the time to recover their mana and health and restock their pockets with potions if necessary before moving on. As they run down the hall, all of them conscious of the time limit, a cage begins to come into view. When they get there, they find the bars made of icicles trapping the young blonde woman, who was also shackled to the ground in the cage only a short hallway from the stairs down.

She looks up at their approach, showing off her green eyes, before pleading with them, "Please… Let me out."

Klein, instantly bewitched by the pretty face, despite the fact it was undoubtedly an NPC, immediately moves to do exactly that. As he steps past Kirito, who was in front, her mate reaches out and grabs the trailing end of his bandanna to stop him, and bluntly states, "It's a trap."

As though trying to drive the point into Klein's often girl-stupid head, Asuna chimes in equally blunt, "That's a trap."

Sinon crosses her arms, "Definitely a trap."

Klein looks back with an awkward expression, "Y-Yeah, it's a trap, isn't it?" Then he glances away, "Maybe…"

She hums doubtfully, "I don't know about that. Sometimes NPCs are used as bait, but given the story to this quest, I don't think it really fits. I mean, where would he have even gotten the NPC? Urðr expressly said she and her sisters escaped, so it can't be one of them, and if she was meant to be bait, something should've been mentioned when we got the story part of the quest from her. And it make zero sense for it to be someone like Thrym himself or whatever."

Kirito hums thoughtfully, "Well, Yui?"

She looks down at him from where she's sitting on her favorite spot whenever she's a pixie, namely Kirito's head, "It's definitely an NPC, and it's connected to the language engine module, just like Urðr. But there's one difference, which you might've already noticed. Namely, she has an HP gauge."

Kirito narrows his eyes faintly, "If she has HP, that means we might have to fight her."

Silica immediately follows it up, "It's a trap, right?"

Leafa nods, "I think it's a trap."

She frowns, "I don't know, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to link her to the language engine if we're meant to fight her…"

Kirito turns his gaze away from where he'd been staring at the NPC to look at Klein, "Of course, Hanna might be right, it might not be, but we don't have time to waste." He reaches forward to place his hand on Klein's shoulder, "We need to get to Thrym as soon as possible."

Klein looks back at him, "Y-Yeah… You're right, yeah."

Apparently that's enough for most of their friends as they start down the hall again. As they pass her cell, the NPC pleads with them again, "Please… Someone…"

She's still not as sure as the rest of them, but it seemed like they were heading out, so she goes too. They don't make it that far though, before the NPC calls out again, "Please!"

Klein stops, drawing everyone's attention given how close together they were moving. Klein purses his lips, "It's a trap, yeah. I know. But even if it's a trap…" He tenses up as he clenches his fists, "Even if I know it's a trap… Even if it's a trap, I can't leave her there! Even… Even if the quest fails because of that, and Arun is destroyed, saving her is something I have to do!" His eyes tear up and he clenches them shut, "It's my bushido!"

With that proclamation he turns and heads back. Her friends look a little stunned and she sighs at them as Klein runs back, shouting at the NPC, drawing their attention to her, "I don't know why you're all surprised. As much as we give him crap, Klein really is the sort of person who can't leave even an NPC behind."

Kirito chuckles lightly, "Yeah, that's true. I guess it was an exercise in futility to try to convince him. Her being a pretty NPC doesn't help matters either."

They turn back in time to see the NPC stumble. Klein quickly catches her, and says, "The exit is a bit far, can you get back on your own, Nee-san?"

At this question, the NPC drops its gaze. Normal NPCs only had pre-programmed responses to draw from, and could only really recognize those, a more complex NPC like Urðr and this lady had far more capability, but even a language engine in something as impressive as the Cardinal System still had its limitations.

From the way she fell silent, for a few moments it seemed like the NPC maybe couldn't properly understand the question due to its silence, but agreed a few beats, she responds, "I cannot simply flee the castle. Not until I find my family's treasure, which Thrym, The King of the Giants, stole, and I came here to retrieve. Please allow me to accompany you to Thrym's room."

Klein stutters in surprise, and Asuna frowns and whispers, "This is kind of suspicious, isn't it?"

Kirito hums thoughtfully, "A little…"

Klein calls out to them, "Hey, Kirito…"

When they turn their attention back to him, he's giving Kirito a fairly pitiful pleading look, causing Kirito to sigh, "Ah, alright, alright. We'll just have to follow this route to the end. It isn't one hundred percent certain this is a trap anyway."

Kleins pitiful expression disappears as he gives Kirito a beaming smile before turning back to the NPC, "Okay! We'll do it! Fate brought us together, so we're in this together. Let's go beat up that jerk Thrym!"

The NPC smiles widely, "Thank you very much, swordsman!"

She hugs his arm enthusiastically in her gratitude, and Kirito sighs. A moment later, a screen pops up in front of him asking him for permission, as the party leader, for the NPC to join the party.

After he hits accept, another HP/MP bar appears below the rest of the party's off to the side of her vision, along with the name Freyja.

She tilts her head, "Well. I suppose her name at least, tentatively, indicates that she's probably really not on Thrym's side. Freyja is the name of the Norse Goddess of love, fertility, battle, and death, and the Norse gods didn't exactly have a good relationship with the ice giants."

Kirito hums, "Well, that's a little reassuring." Then he shakes his head and turns his attention to the party, "From the way the dungeon is laid out, once we go down those stairs, we'll be at the last boss's room. He'll certainly be stronger than all the things we've faced so far, but we'll just have to skip the fancy stuff, and hit him as hard as we can. For the first part, I want to defend until we know his attack pattern, and only counterattack when there's a clear opening. I'll announce when we go on the offensive. You all already know this, but it bears reminding, when the bosses HP bar hits the yellow, and later when it turns red, the attack patterns will change, so be careful, because we can't afford to make mistakes." Their friends all nod in understanding and he smiles, "This is the last battle. Let's give it all we've got!"

Their friends give an enthusiastic shout, and even Yui on Kirito's head, Pina flying above Silica, and even the NPC join in the chorus.

As they went down the stairs the previously narrow hallway rapidly widened out into a grand staircase, decorated on either side by elaborate and beautiful pillars and statues, even in the middle of the staircase, on platforms carved into it periodically were elegant decorations. When they reached the bottom, they found the massive doors each had a large and beautifully detailed carving of a wolf.(2) Perhaps it was because that had been created by the very same Cardinal System, but it seemed even here, Aincrad's tradition of more elaborate pre-boss zones and doors continued on. Honestly, it was quite the shame that it would all be destroyed when the retrieved Excalibur and Thrymheim melted back into Urðr's Spring.

As soon as they draw close, the doors automatically begin to open. The cold air along with a hard to describe pressure comes rushing out. A moment later, Asuna begins chanting, first reapplying their Cold Resistance before adding another buff, "Seā firra sukīna haguru, hoggu māguru iruto."

Off to the side of her HUD, she gains the icon for a strength buff. A moment later, to their surprise, the NPC begins to chant as well, "Ōsu nāza fōru regin, tinada varindo yotsun."

Even more surprising, as it takes effect, all of their HP bars increase. Silica exclaims in surprise, "I've never seen a spell that increases your max HP!"

They recover from the surprise quickly, she she takes a moment to turn to Asuna and Freyja, and chant on of the few support spells she'd learned, and only because she was the only one with a high darkness magic level, "Oss fura sukuga osezūru obinamu."

Shadows swirl up from the ground, circling around the three of them. The spell would reduce the amount of attention and aggro they received from the boss. She and Asuna turn and nod as one at Kirito to confirm they're done, he nods back, then sweeps his gaze over the rest of the party, and getting similar confirmations, they head inside. The funny dimly-lit hall they find themselves in had heaping piles of treasure of all sorts.

Silica, looking around with huge innocent eyes, whispers, "How much Yuld do you think this is all worth?"

None of them get a chance to reply, not that any of them except perhaps Yui could come close to answering, before a deep voice comes from the back of the hall, "A fly is buzzing about." Immediately all of them snap their attention to where it's coming from as they refocus, "I can hear it's irritating buzzing. Let me see." The floor trembles with a boom, "I'll crush it." Two more booms, "Before it causes any trouble."

The voice belonged to a giant of course, but unlike the only vaguely human shaped ones that wondered Jötunheimr, other than its pointed ears, size, and blue coloring, this one actually looked human. The King of Giants undoubtedly. He had to be about fifty feet tall, which was surprisingly short compared to the humanoid giants that roamed Jötunheimr who were around 130 feet tall, but he was easily the biggest boss in Thrymheim.

Thrym chuckles deeply, "So Urðr has sent the little flies of Alfheim all the way down here? I'll make you an offer, tiny ones. Tell me where she is, and you can have as much gold from this room as you can take. Hm?"

Klein stepped forward with an insulted expression, "Heh, a warrior just needs to eat, sleep, and laugh! Don't bother trying to tame us with a cheap invitation like that!"

He pulls his katana at the end, and they all follow suit in preparing for combat. Thrym chuckles darkly as he looks them over, but apparently they aren't quite done talking yet, as he calls out, "Oh, if it isn't Freyja-dono? If you've left your cage, does that mean you've decided to become my bride?"

Klein looks over his shoulder towards her with surprise, and yelps, "B-Bride?!"

Despite the fact Klein was looking at Freyja, Thrym is the one who answers, "That's correct. She came here to marry me. But the night before the feast, she was sneaking around my treasure vaults. To punish her, I locked her in a cage of ice."

She furrows her brows, from the vague familiarity of the story, she's probably heard the tale before, but given that she can't actually recall the story, it's probably one of the ones she heard from her grandparents before Aincrad.

A moment later she's pulled from her thoughts as Freyja shouts defiantly, "I refuse to become your wife! These swordsman and I shall defeat you, and take back what was stolen!"

Thrym chuckles and rubs his beard with amused thoughtfulness, "Such brave words. One can see why the legends of Freyja-dono's beauty and bravery are known to the ends of the world. But the more noble the flower, the more fun it is to pluck. After I've crushed these flies, I'll give you lots of attention."

Then he laughs loudly, the rest of them frown at the threats within his speech, which was really toeing the line for a game for all ages, had the automatic quest generator really written it? Regardless, unlike the rest of them, Klein's left hand, which had released his katana when he lowered it as he realized it wasn't quite time to fight yet clenches angrily as he yells back, "You bastard! Watch your mouth! I won't let you lay a finger on Freyja!"

Thrym just grins wider and chuckles again, "I hear the sound of buzzing wings. To celebrate all of Jötunheimr becoming mine, I will start by crushing you."

As soon as the words leave his mouth, the hall brightens as the floors and walls begin to glow with an icy blue hue, and a red cursor pops up above Thrym along with his name a split second before his three health bars appear and fill in, all indicating that the story part was done and it was finally time to fight.

From her angle she can just see enough of her mate's face to see the frown he'd gained during Thrym's speech briefly turned into a smile full of anticipation at the fight to come, before it too smooths away and he shouts, "He's coming! Listen carefully to what Yui says, and begin the fight by dodging!"

Immediately after Kirito's shout, Thrym raises his fist and it becomes wrapped in a small frost storm before he swings it down ferociously.

Kirito, Leafa, and Klein, being the front line, quickly dodge out of the way of it and the radius of the small blast of ice magic that's released with the hit.

She purses her lips, stamping down on the instinct to start chanting a spell. Kirito wanted to play defensively at first, wary and cautious of a team wipe, and that meant her job was to cool her heels and only cast if they needed help, and given that they had Sinon now, who could react much faster with her bow, it was likely that she would stay out of it entirely until Kirito decided they'd learned enough about the boss to switch to offense.

It wasn't easy though, to sit back and watch her mate and friends fight. But watch she does, as Kirito darts in and attacks Thrym's legs to test the waters. He doesn't get very far though, before Thrym lifts his right foot and tries to stomp on him three times consecutively.

Once he's stopped stomping, Leafa and Klein try coming at him as the same time, but he soon begins drawing in air, puffing his chest up like a great part of bellows, before releasing it in an icy breath attack that reaches even her, Asuna, and Freyja in the back. Their Cold Resistance thankfully keeps them from being frozen into ice blocks, and mitigates a good portion of the damage, but it does mean they'll have to keep careful eye on the timer for it.

The breath attack is followed up almost immediately by Thrym sweeping his hand out, though it isn't to hit any of them. Instead, the frost on the ground gathers and solidifies into twelve ice dwarf summons.

She hesitates, then decides that since there weren't many of them, it'd be better to stay in position and rely on magic to help keep them off her teammates' backs. To that extent, she lifts her hands to cast, "Ekku fureigyua-

Beside her Asuna shouts, "Sinon! Hold a moment!"

But she doesn't let it distract her from finishing, "-surīru geīru musupīri!"

Fire magic wasn't one she'd focused heavily on, she'd chosen to main the darkness attribute that Imps were naturally good at, but she had gone out of her way to level all of the elements at least a little so that she'd have something no matter what the situation. Because of that, while the level of both her skill and the tier of the spell was lower, it was still better to cast fire magic in this situation, given the element on the enemies.

And indeed the three flames that appear around her before shooting forward with great speed do considerable damage to the ice summons. Eight of them that were more directly in the path of the magic are destroyed immediately, and the other four are heavily damaged. Sinon finishes them off in an instant.

Thrym roars in rage and tries to stomp on the melee group again, though he isn't anymore successful this time than he'd been last time.

The battle continues along that vein for a little, before Kirito, deciding that the punches, stomping, breath, and summons were Thrym's only attacks for this phase, and that they'd gotten a hang of his tempo and pattern, calls out, "Switch to offense!"

She doesn't have access to a whole lot of fire spells and there really isn't a reason at the moment that another would be better situationally, so since it's her best spell, she just chants the same one and sends it flying into Thrym's face. He roars in pain and rears back, creating an opportunity for their forward fighters.

Being a boss mob, the stagger doesn't last long, and soon Yui calls out, "He's going to punch twice again!"

The forward fighters tense, waiting until Thrym draws his fist back, before scattering. His fist hits the ground and creates a smoke screen, and a few seconds later Thrym emerges from it already swinging at Kirito. Already airborne from the previous dodge, and unable to use his racial ability to fly in dungeons in boss rooms, there's little he can do but bring his swords up to try to block as much of the damage as possible. Even that though, doesn't do anything to the damage he suffers from being thrown into the ground hard enough to break it, sending chunks of ice flying everywhere from the violently made impact crater.

Leafa, distracted by staring at her brother to see if he's alright, almost gets stomped on, only dodging at the last moment. Klein rushes towards the exposed back of the Giant King, undoubtedly trying to pull heat off the two. Sinon helps buy time for him to get there, unleashing an arrow that splits into a barrage and explodes on impact with the side of Thrym's face. Being a Salamander, he gets a bonus both to how quickly he learns the fire attribute, as well as the damage it does, and given that all high level sword skills are imbued with some sort of attribute, the skill he releases on Thrym does more than a little damage on top of staggering him.

All of it takes place in only the time she takes to chant another round of her fire spell, releasing it just in time to hit him while he's off balance and increase how long he's staggered. Leafa rushes in to take advantage and release a wind sword skill at his legs. Kirito also tries to attack while he's staggered, but doesn't reach the boss before it opens its eyes and straightens up.

Yui calls out once more, "His ice breath is coming!" Then the boss jumps, "Three seconds…" Thrym opens his mouth, "Two.." He takes a deep breath as he tilts his head towards the ceiling and leans back, "One… Zero!"

At the end of the countdown, Thrym snaps his head back down towards them, the frigid breath attack extending in a cone in front of him that both the forward and middle line, that being Sinon and Silica to act as both support and to switch in if necessary in Silica's case, dodge.

She and Asuna also tense up to get ready to jump out of the way if it looks like it'll reach them, but Freyja lifts her hand, and a ball of lightning appears above Thrym's head. With a downward swing of her hand, it releases its fury on the Giant King, cutting his attack short before it could possibly reach the back line. In and of itself it wasn't weird, Freyja was clearly cast into the mage role in ALO, but what was strange is that she had remained silent throughout, never voicing a spell.

She gives the NPC an odd look, and out of the corner of her eye notices Kirito look back at them, more than observant to notice the lack of chanting. She shares a look with him, wordlessly telling him that no he hadn't just missed the chant, the NPC really had done that.

Thrym cries out, twitching and jerking erratically in the storm of electricity, before hitting the ground hard, completely toppled over, with a good chunk of his health gone to boot. The forward group is stunned for a few seconds, before sharing glances and rushing in as Kirito shouts, "Okay, let's go!"

Klein and Leafa let out war cries in agreement. Thrym slowly begins to sit up, and Kirito switches places with Leafa, who temporarily sheaths her sword. In a well practiced move, the two males grab her hands and toss her skyward so she can come down hard on the boss. She draws her sword as she's airborne, and with a cry, takes full advantage of it to slice from the right side of his neck down to the left side of his ribs. Kirito and Klein follow up, releasing sword skills into one of his legs, the only part they can reach without jumping.

Given that they've been fighting for about ten minutes, she glances off to the side to check before turning towards her friend, "Asuna, the Cold Resistance."(3)

Her friends eyes dart away from where she'd been intensely monitoring the fight to optimize her healing as best as she can, and seeing that the timer had less than a minute, she begins casting to refresh it.

Thrym enters a defensive pose, and they continue to bombard him until the last of his first health bar drains away. As soon as it does, Thrym gets back to his feet with a roar of pain and rage, and Kirito calls out, "He's changing attack patterns! Be careful!"

Leafa, taking a moment to check the necklace, nervously says, "It's bad Onii-chan, only about ten percent left!" She looks up at him with furrowed brows, "Can you use that skill thing you did earlier?"

Kirito frowns heavily as he turns back to the boss, "He still has two full HP bars. Theoretically, you might be able to chain enough skills together, but in reality if you want to avoid the boss attacking back, you have to hit a weak spot or attack with something they're weak to, otherwise you just end up trading blows. With how hard he hits, that's too much, even for me."

Thrym takes in another deep breath, unlike previously though, this one creates a strong wind that drags the four in the front and middle line forward a bit. Leafa drops the necklace and starts to chant something, but the movement of the boss makes it clear she wouldn't have enough time, and Kirito calls out, "Everyone, defensive positions!"

At his call, Leafa cancels the spell, crossing her arms in front of her and curling slightly inwards, which Kirito, Klein, Sinon, and Silica mimic. While guarding with a shield was obviously far more effective, entering a defensive pose like that reduced the damage one would take.

The breath attack is far larger than any of the previous ones had been, which made sense given that Thrym had clearly entered his second phase, and along with the glacial diamond dust of the frost it also creates an overpowering wind that almost picks up their fighters and flings them away.

When Thrym is finally done, the front and middle try to regain their equilibrium from the sudden change of bracing against the wind to it disappearing in an instant, but before they can, Thrym lifts his left foot, and with a heavy stomp, creates a powerful shockwave that throws them all back to skip and skid along the floor.

Five of the eight health bars in the top left of her head drop into the yellow, and Asuna begins chanting a party healing spell. As she does, she herself rushes through a spell as fast as she can to try and buy time, "Ekku karra erudingu tenan sutado, sutigu nīzūru himuni ifiru obin!"

It wasn't fire magic, but while it may be because she's an NPC, Freyja's lightning magic seemed to work pretty damn well, and her level in that was higher than her fire. Given the circumstances, she decides to take the risk to hopefully stun him, not to the same extent as Freyja had undoubtedly, but just long enough to either buy time for the front and middle to recover and regroup, or if they need more time, for her to cast another spell.

The electricity gathers and strikes him, stunning him with another pained cry. It wouldn't be easy to keep him off both her and Asuna, and the recovering fighters, but she'd just have to do her best.

(1): It's interesting that the writer of the light novel chose an Eagle for the boss. While I'm not hugely familiar with Norse mythology, I Googled 'Golden Apple Yggdrasil' with the intention of actually seeing if I could find out if SAO explains the mention of it in the light novel it in more detail, and was pleasantly surprised to find the bit about Iðunn. I didn't do a whole lot of digging, since it isn't huge for the plot, but according to Norse mythology, the jötunn Þjazi -anglicized as Thiazi, Thjazi, Tjasse or Thiassi- briefly abducts Iðunn in the form of an Eagle, which is a strange contrast to the fact that it's implied that the Golden Apple rightfully should be in Yggdrasil's branches. There isn't any mention of Iðunn, that was my own spin on it, though I suppose rather than being the proper guardian, the Eagle boss might be an interloper players are supposed to get rid of.

(2): I'm basing the description far more on the novels here, given that the lead up to Thrym's boss room was honestly fairly bland in the anime.

(3): I'm not entirely sure why Asuna drops the ball in the anime and let's their Cold Resistance run out, other than to add tension to the boss fight and give Sinon some time to shine, but I've chosen to believe that it's because the fight was so close that she was paying too much attention to their health and it slipped by her. Given that Hanna was just casting the same spell repeatedly and only keeping an eye on seeing if they got in a sticky enough situation for her to switch to melee, she has a little more time to keep an eye on it.