November 9th, 2024

"Every single player will die."

The Sanctuary. Once, even to Kizmel it had been almost a thing of myth. Her mission had been to safeguard the Sacred Keys that would open it, but the consequences of its opening were unknown to her. Supposedly, only Queen Idhrendis and the King of the Forest Elves had known the truth. In the end, even they had been missing crucial pieces of the story.

She'd found the truth horrifying enough, when the Fallen King outlined it to her and her Swordmaster friends. Somehow, learning that it was all part of a deadly game—that Kayaba Akihiko had designed it as a possible tragic ending to the story he was writing for the Swordmasters—had made it even worse. It was… too cruel.

Kizmel had also nearly forgotten about it, with the Elf War long over. Standing in Asuna's new office, confronted with it again by someone she'd thought just an "ordinary NPC", was not improving her already dark mood.

Over by the door, Klein—fresh off his own contribution to the day's bad news—cleared his throat. "So, uh… I get the whole 'everybody dies' thing. But what exactly is it we're supposed to be worrying about?"

"According to what we learned eighteen months ago?" Asuna stared out her window, at the barrier still blocking exit from Ark Sophia. "The Sanctuary is supposed to contain a magic stone. Anyone who holds it obtains ancient magic powers. But if it's removed from its place, teleportation and the magic barriers protecting towns will fail. That is, Teleport Crystals and Plazas will stop functioning… and Safe Haven protections will be disabled."

Most of those present not already aware of it went pale—even, Kizmel noticed with morbid humor, the already-dead Griselda—and Godfree loudly swallowed. "Okay," the bearded KoB team leader got out, blinking rapidly. "That's… bad. But we could still keep going, if we absolutely had to. It looks like anti-crystal traps are going to be a lot more common now anyway…."

"That's the best-case scenario," Kirito cut in. He was wearing the cool expression of the confident solo, but Kizmel could feel the tension in him as she leaned against his side. "The stone can be destroyed. If that happens, Aincrad is supposed to fall right out of the sky."

A nightmarish image in its own right. Kizmel had had nightmares about it, among the many other horrors of that final day of the War. Of the Steel Castle falling apart, dropping into the endless clouds to a ground no one was sure really existed. Thinking of it now, an even more horrifying vision appeared in her mind: of the world around her simply fading to static, and then blinking out like it had never been.

She was going to see [You Are Dead] in her nightmares for a very, very long time.

"Now, just a second here," Fuurinkazan's Dynamm put in, scratching at his stubbly goatee with a nervous chuckle. "That… that's gotta just be flavor text, right? There's no way that could actually happen."

"Kayaba didn't interfere when a zombie apocalypse almost spread all over Aincrad," Rain reminded him, the redhead shivering at memories Kizmel herself could all too easily picture. "I think he's okay with 'bad ends' if the players do it themselves."

"We know he's open to his game ending prematurely." All too fresh memories of a duel flashed through Kizmel's mind, and she was not at all abashed at leaning more heavily into her husband's arm. "If it is possible by the rules of this world, and it would be 'entertaining', I don't believe we should rule out any possible outcome here."

She was glad, when Kirito tightened his grip on her waist, and Asuna turned from the window to give her a sympathetic smile. They reminded her that most humans were not like Kayaba, the man who'd played at being her father—or like PoH, whom she had no doubt wouldn't hesitate to unleash the very horrors they were discussing.

"It's very possible, I'm afraid." Vanel reentered the conversation, reminding the others that she was present. When all eyes turned to her, she ducked her head with a bitter smile. "Excuse me. Some of you already know me from the Fifty-Seventh Floor, but at the time I wasn't at liberty to explain myself. I'm not really a quest NPC; I'm an MHCP."

"MHCP," Philia repeated, frowning. "MHPC… don't I remember…. Oh, yeah!" She snapped her fingers. "That's what Strea called herself, isn't it? She never said what it meant, though."

"Mental Health Counseling Program," Vanel supplied, nodding. "Our intended function was locked out, though, when the game was launched. Cardinal then re-purposed us as its agents. Strea is… you might call her Cardinal's troubleshooter. I usually work more subtly, but PoH and the Echo have gone too far. I had to warn you." She turned back to Asuna. "Lady Asuna, I—"

"Wait." Asuna raised a hand, putting the other to her forehead. "Just… wait a second, please. This is a bit much to take in all at once." Stepping away from the window, she returned to her desk, dropping heavily into the chair.

The silence that followed was restless, but no one tried to break it. Kizmel and her team knew Asuna well enough to see she was in desperate need of a chance to think, and Klein, while clearly on edge, was one of the most perceptive men Kizmel knew. The others in the KoB knew better than to interrupt their new commander. Yulier was obviously having trouble containing herself, but was just as obviously an experienced guild leader in her own right and knew the pressures. And Vanel….

The agent of Cardinal in the guise of a Dark Elf unnerved Kizmel, yet relieved her at the same time. Like Strea, she was clearly more than the programmed dolls of most NPCs, yet still very alien in her manner. Her still patience was utterly unnatural.

Not like me. Whatever I am… I truly am different. Alive.

"…All right." At length, Asuna lifted her head to look around the room. "PoH is going for the Sanctuary, and he's got Griselda-san's husband working with him. That's two problems in one. Vanel-san, I don't suppose you can tell us what happened to Guildmaster Thinker?"

"He's in the Hollow Area, as well," Vanel replied at once. "It was meant as a developer's room, not accessible to players. Cardinal, for reasons not clear to me, established the Sanctuary there. Thinker was tricked into using a Teleport Gate under the Black Iron Castle to go there."

Kirito frowned, raising a hand to stroke his chin. "Wait a second. Kayaba isn't stupid. If Swordmasters aren't supposed to be able to go there, why is there an unsecured teleporter leading to it? Under the biggest Swordmaster stronghold there is?"

"It wasn't unsecured yesterday," she told him, with a helpless shrug. "According to what data I can access, a recent patch had the unintended effect of resetting its permissions to default."

Kizmel had not even the vaguest idea what that meant, even after months of study in the Library of the Ancients. Klein, though, grimaced—and Kirito and Sachi both face-palmed. "It broke when Kayaba started the re-balancing he promised," her husband explained, when she raised a confused eyebrow. "Programming is more art than science, really. You never know when fixing one thing will break something else. If SAO were a regular game, that would've been tested before going live. Since it's not…."

She nodded. The details were still beyond her, and how it could've happened, she couldn't guess, but now she understood the general logic. I'm almost relieved. At least that means Kayaba makes mistakes as much as any of us. …That will be his downfall.

"Okay, then." Asuna tapped her desk, drawing attention back to her. "Thinker is in this 'Hollow Area'. PoH is there, going after the Sanctuary, so that must be where his 'army' is, too. All roads lead there, right now." She took a deep breath. "I have a meeting with the Legend Braves, and I need Rain with me for it. Kirito-kun, Guildmaster Klein, I hate to do this, but can I ask you to go with Yulier-san to the Black Iron Castle?"

"Of course," Kirito replied instantly, not waiting for Kizmel or Philia's input. The elf girl nodded anyway, smiling to herself just a little. It was good that he knew them well enough to be sure they'd agree, and that he had the confidence to act on it.

"We're on it," Klein said, nodding firmly. "We've got a personal stake in this anyway," he added, gesturing to the ghostly Griselda. "She's one of ours now, more or less, and I've got questions for her husband." There were teeth in his smile, for just a second, before he remembered himself and lightly coughed. "So, uh. You want us to check what this Kibaou guy is up to, or try to find the teleporter?"

"Both, if possible. PoH's plot is more urgent—no offense to you, Yulier-san—but Kibaou's actions could have far-reaching implications for the clearing as a whole, and it seems like both lead to the Hollow Area. We can't afford a repeat of Kobatz's stupidity, not now." Asuna turned her attention to the odd one out. "Vanel-san, can you help?"

Vanel shook her head. "I'm afraid not. Unlocking the teleporter to the Hollow Area isn't the only thing that's gone wrong with the current patching, and I need to check other areas to make sure we don't have another crisis."

"Ah, like what, er, Vanel-san?" Godfree asked nervously. Kizmel had to feel for the man, watching him anxiously fiddle with the handle of his axe. As experienced as he was with ordinary clearing, he clearly had little exposure to Aincrad's stranger corners.

The MHCP's smile was mirthless. "Well, for one thing, I doubt any of us want to risk a repeat of the Necro plague incident…."

Faces paled around the room, and Kizmel felt a chill of her own. Even after everything else she'd seen, since the day she'd first met Kirito and Asuna—even after the shattering truth of Heathcliff's identity—the Fifty-Seventh Floor stood out for sheer volume of horror. As far as she was aware, no Swordmaster had ever returned to the floor after it was cleared, and for good reason.

"…Excuse me," Yulier said into the tense silence, a confused frown creasing her brows. "I think I'm missing some things here. Could someone please explain… well, everything?"

Kirito wasn't sure what to expect when the light of the teleport faded. He'd not spent a lot of time in the City of Beginnings in the past few months, but he could tell that the atmosphere had changed—and become grimmer and darker than even the panic and confusion that pervaded it from when the death game had first begun.

Now it was positively silent. Despite the fact that there should have been a couple thousand people staying there, the city was almost devoid of sound; coupled with the sheer lack of people and activity, the deadly quiet lent the place a somber, foreboding air.

Kizmel seemed to agree, the hood that concealed her ears shifting as she nodded. "Something has changed, from when last we were here," the elf murmured. "And not, I think, for the better." She drew a little closer to him, clearly wishing the hour was right for her cloak to make her invisible.

Kirito wished he could turn invisible. There weren't many regular Swordmasters around the plaza, but he could hear a lot of clanking, and looking down the streets radiating out from the plaza he could saw a lot of armored groups seeming to be on patrol. "This is officially spooky," he said quietly, as the teleporter flared behind them. "This feels like infiltrating an occupied town in an old-school RPG."

A quick flash behind him briefly derailed his train of thought. "…So the Paladin was really Kayaba," Yulier was saying, as she came out of the teleporter. "That's… I would never have imagined it. All this time…." She broke off; Kirito glanced back to find her blinking at the situation around them. "Oh. Yes. I'm afraid this has become the new normal."

Griselda had vanished again before they left Ark Sophia, and most of Fuurinkazan had returned to their headquarters to wait for word, but Klein had brought Sachi and Dale. "You mind explaining that, Yulier-san?" the samurai asked, as the group moved away from the teleporter. "I thought the Army's shtick was helping lower-level players. This looks more like an evil empire."

Pretty good description, Kirito thought. Between the tense silence, the clanking footsteps that broke it, and the dark, standardized armor of the Army Swordmasters, the patrols didn't even feel like players. If someone had told him they were enemy NPCs, he'd have honestly believed the green cursors were a glitch.

They've even got an ominous castle, he thought, with bleak humor. Straight ahead of them, at the end of the widest road leading from the plaza, was a fortress built from wrought iron, dark and gloomy. If the KoB's former headquarters in Granzam had felt cold and lifeless, the Black Iron Castle just oozed darkness and oppression. There were reasons he'd never been there much, even before the Army started getting high-handed.

"Evil empire," Yulier repeated, sighing. Looking up at the Castle they were approaching, she shook her head. "It's not how it was supposed to be, but it's certainly trending that way. Thinker and I… to be honest, we were so caught up in managing other aspects of the guild that we only recently realized just how bad Kibaou's faction had gotten."

"There's, what, three thousand or so people in the Army?" Philia huffed, clutching her cape around herself; Kirito had to resist the urge to suggest she put on something with more coverage. "I can see how you'd have trouble keeping track of everything."

"That's no excuse, but I won't deny it, either." The silver-haired woman sighed again. "Certainly Kibaou had been trying to keep it from us. But when Kobatz and some of his men died attacking a Floor Boss, even we realized something was very wrong."

Kirito thought back to the "Lieutenant Colonel" and his doomed raid, and winced. He'd seen a lot of carelessness and stupidity in the two years he'd been trapped in Aincrad, but that twelve-man raid had been some of the worst. Kobatz's utter incomprehension as he died was one of the newer fixtures among his nightmares.

As their group left the Teleport Plaza behind and headed down the central avenue, Yulier continued her tale. "Thinker wanted to talk to Kibaou immediately. I persuaded him to wait, and we spent the last two weeks searching through guild records, to see how things had gotten to this point. What we found was horrifying."

"I've been hearing some nasty rumors lately," Klein put in. The samurai was keeping a wary eye on every alley to the left; Kirito took some amusement in noticing Sachi was covering the right, as natural as breathing. "Like trying to impose some kind of rules on ordinary players. And since Kobatz just up and demanded Kirito's map data, I'm kinda inclined to believe the ones I've heard about tax—"

"Stop it! Please, just get away from us!"

"Why are you doing this?!"

The screams came from a side street, a few blocks short of the Black Iron Castle. Kirito only had to exchange the briefest of glances with Klein before both their groups were charging off to find the source, Yulier scrambling to catch up. This is a town, there can't be any monsters. And orange players shouldn't be able to get in either, so what—?

Covering two blocks in a matter of seconds, Kirito skidded to a halt at the mouth of a dead-end alley. Cowering by the wall at the very end of it, he saw a Swordmaster with blue hair—he thought she was probably somewhere in her early twenties—standing protectively in front of several others. Small Swordmasters. Kids, he realized, eyes widening. I don't think I've ever seen any that young here. And I thought Silica was below SAO's age rating.

They were also scared out of their minds, their protector clearly not much better off. He could see why.

"C'mon, girly. Kids. You know how it is. Pay the tax, and we'll leave you alone. If you can't afford it… well, your equipment will do." A pause, and a sound Kirito really hoped wasn't actually lips being licked. "Or… you could pay us another way, girl. That'd make this whole thing go away, I promise."

Between Kirito's group and the woman and children being threatened were half a dozen men in gunmetal gray armor. Despite being dressed the part of soldiers or knights, their jeers and demands made them out to be much more like highwaymen, and Kirito felt his blood boil at the sight and the threats both.

Worse, the children were fumbling to comply, bringing up their menus with shaking hands. They barely had equipment, but the Army patrol was clearly scaring them badly enough to go along. The woman was more defiant, glaring at the Army members, yet she was obviously at a loss as to what to do.

Yulier closed her eyes. "We only just learned of the 'tax collectors'," she whispered. "Even then, I had no idea it had gotten this bad…. I'm sorry, this is my responsibility—"

Kizmel shook her head, cutting her off. Breaking away from Kirito's side, she stalked up to the patrol. "And just what, exactly," she said coldly, "do you think you're doing?"

The Army men in the rear started, and their spokesman began to whirl around. "Mind your own damn business, you—" He broke off, seeming to notice then the shapely, feminine features visible beneath her hood. "Oh? What do we have here?"

I should punt him into a lake for looking at her like that. But I won't spoil Kizmel's fun.

No question this time that the leader was licking his lips, openly leering at the elf girl. "I haven't seen you around before, young lady, so maybe you don't know about the taxes here. In this case, I'll overlook your impertinence… if you'll pay up another way."

I really should flatten this bastard.

Yulier's eyes widened, horrified. She opened her mouth to say something, anything, but nothing came out. Fuurinkazan, on the other hand, collectively snickered; even Sachi only halfheartedly elbowed Klein for it, unable to stifle a giggle of her own.

Kirito couldn't help a facepalm. Or the slow, rueful grin that crawled onto his face.

"Excuse me, good Swordmaster," Kizmel said gently, tugging back her hood. "But that is not something a gentleman asks of a lady." She smiled pleasantly. "Especially not one who is married. Happily."

The Army officer blinked—and in that tiny moment, lightning-quick, Kizmel's shield swung out, slamming into his chest. In a Safe Haven, it did no damage at all, but the knockback from a Level 96 knight's STR was more than enough to blast him off his feet and into a wall three meters away.

[Immortal Object] popped up, as the man rebounded and smacked face-first into the pavement.

Yulier gaped, as shocked as the Army patrol, and turned to look at Team Kirito and Fuurinkazan. It was Philia who answered her unspoken question, the treasure hunter grinning. "Anybody bring some popcorn?"

"I think we'd better move," Klein said, ushering the group off to the sides of the alley. "Don't wanna get in the way, y'know."

For several seconds, as their leader lay dazed on the ground, the other members of the Army patrol could only stare. Then, finally, one of them yanked out a two-handed sword and yelled, "You bitch! You'll pay for that!" He lunged at Kizmel, winding up for an Avalanche; with a roar, the other four followed after him.

With barely a flex of her knees, Kizmel leapt into the air, clearing their heads with a full meter to spare. Twisting in the air, she landed lightly on her feet facing their backs, between them and their would-be victims. She clicked her tongue at the way they stumbled to a halt, comically crashing into each other. "For an 'Army'," she called out, "you certainly seem to be lacking discipline. And manners. I believe it's time someone taught you better." She glanced over her shoulder at the blue-haired woman and the children. "Pardon me just a moment, please. This won't take long."

"You… you…." The Army officer who seemed to be the first jerk's second-in-command sputtered, pointing his sword at her. "How dare you interfere with the Army's affairs! We'll be taking you straight to the prison for this, and you'll be handing over all your items and Cor before you come out!"

Yulier covered her face in shame. "I am so sorry. Please, just let me handle this—"

Kirito raised a hand before she could move more than a step. "And spoil Kizmel's fun?" He shook his head. "Sorry, Yulier, but you'd better leave this one to her."

She needs it, for one thing….

Watching the Army patrol approach her again—a little more cautiously this time—Kizmel smiled faintly, and drew her saber with an audible shing. "I expect you will be the ones in prison by the end of the day." Her smile widened, taking on a cold edge. "Don't worry, this is a Safe Haven. You'll be in no danger. Of death, at least."

Yulier might've been horrified by the whole thing. Kirito just enjoyed the show, happy to see his wife getting in some catharsis after recent events. The Army patrolmen who spent the next couple of minutes bouncing off stones walls, stone pavement, and each other probably didn't agree. But who cares what they think? They started it.

When the last of them had been rendered senseless, Kizmel landed easily on her feet, calmly sheathed her rapier, and picked up her shield. "Thank you, Kirito," she said, turning a warm smile on him. "I feel much better now." Turning to the Army patrol's would-be victims, she bowed. "I'm sorry for the spectacle; I'm afraid I had a very rough day yesterday. Is everyone all right?"

Silence for a long moment; Kirito was afraid that his wife's beat-down, however cathartic, might've scared them. Not to mention her hood was still down, leaving her ears on full display, and it was always a gamble, wondering how someone would react to realizing she wasn't human—

"That was so cool!" one of the children shouted—a girl of about ten, Kirito estimated. "Thanks so much, Elf-san! How did you do that?! Especially that last skill, I've never seen anything like it!"

The other kids quickly added their own enthusiastic comments, and in moments Kizmel was surrounded. The blue-haired woman, who seemed to be—trying—to keep order, cleared her throat nervously. "I have to thank you, as well," she said, raising her voice over the younger ones' racket. "Um, I'm Sasha. I've been taking care of these kids. Er… maybe we should talk somewhere else?"

Kirito took a quick look around. The six-man patrol Kizmel had flattened looked like they were going to stay flattened for awhile; SAO didn't simulate pain, but their inner ears were probably going to be screaming at them for an hour. On the other hand, given the number of patrols they'd seen so far….

He exchanged a quick look with Klein, who nodded sharply. "That sounds like a good idea, m'lady," the redhead said, slipping into formal-samurai with a quick bow. "Got any suggestions? We'll escort you."

Yulier hadn't thought it possible to be more depressed than she already was. Then they'd escorted Sasha and her children to her impromptu orphanage and listened to the woman's story. What they'd heard had left her feeling sad, disappointed, and enraged at the thought of what had happened to the guild that Thinker had been trying to build.

In light of the many patrols sweeping the streets, Fuurinkazan had volunteered to stay behind, disturbed by the possibility that an opportunistic band of thugs—and that was all the Army had become—might come by and take advantage of the fact that the old church Sasha had claimed and set up in was a public space without the ability to lock anyone out. For that, they'd called in the rest of the guild, even Lux. Guildmaster Klein was taking no chances.

Especially with the worse stories Kirito had told them, about all of the exploits people had been using, like sleep-PKs….

No. We'll put a stop to it. Right now. I have to. But….

She couldn't help but be doubtful when her eyes wandered across the trio that were left; originally, she'd come up to the frontlines seeking the help of the game's preeminent clearing guild. With a full cadre of Knights of Blood at her back, storming the Black Iron Castle would've been an easy feat. Even just Fuurinkazan, alongside Kirito's group, had been a reassuring presence. Now, however….

"Are you sure we'll be enough?" she asked, as they slipped into an alley Kirito insisted was part of a clandestine route to the Black Iron Castle. "We can't be hurt in a Safe Haven, but they can be a roadblock. We might be better off with more people, if we have to force our way through."

Which she was grimly sure they would have to do. Out of three thousand players in the Army, Sasha estimated at least half were patrolling the City, and Yulier was only sure of the loyalty of a couple of hundred, at most. Between what she'd seen and Sasha had reported, she had a sinking feeling those without a stake in the power struggle mostly intended to wait and see what happened.

Well over a thousand likely hostile players, against herself, Kirito, Kizmel, and Philia. Even knowing Safe Haven protections, Yulier didn't like their odds one bit.

Kirito only shook his head, though, as he led them through the back alleys. Eyes lit with the green glow of the highest-level Search skill Yulier had ever seen, he said, "Honestly, we're better off traveling in a smaller group. Easier for us to spot patrols before they spot us. Me, I feel better knowing Fuurinkazan is back there to glare at anybody who tries to mess with Sasha or the kids again. Kibaou's guys are no Laughing Coffin; just two-bit thugs. They'll fold against strong opponents."

Kizmel chuckled, shooting the Black Swordsman an amused smile. "You know, for someone who claims not to understand people, you manage quite well when it counts, Kirito."

"Individuals, I'm not so good at. Mobs, I've had a couple years' experience handling…."

That, Yulier had heard about. Though she'd gone to the Seventy-Sixth Floor seeking the aid of the famous Knights of the Blood, she'd heard stories about the Black Swordsman, especially the way he'd headed off a riot when the very first Floor Boss had been defeated. If nothing else, Kibaou had had a few things to say when his broken guild had merged with Thinker's.

Kibaou hadn't seemed to like Kirito very much. The young swordsman was also, strangely, one of the few people the man seemed to respect. Yulier was hoping that would count for something. She'd gone to the frontlines hoping for aid from the premier clearing guild. She'd take whatever she could get, especially after learning the clearers had their own, not inconsiderable problems.

Thinker… please be all right….

Halfway to the Black Iron Castle, Kirito abruptly stiffened, raised a hand in warning, and led their small group into an alcove Yulier hadn't even realized was there. A few seconds later, she realized why, hearing clomping footsteps in a cadence that sounded almost—but not quite—in a smooth rhythm. "Boy, they're serious about locking down the city," Kirito murmured, so low she only barely heard him. "That was a full-on raid group. What in the world are they planning? There's not that much to loot from Swordmasters here, is there?"

"Throwing their weight around, I'd guess," Yulier told him, grimacing. "Kibaou… hasn't really been rational lately. Especially since losing Kobatz's raid group. I'm honestly not sure he has a plan at this point."

"Fits with what happened with the Gleam Eyes." In the darkness of their hiding spot, Philia's eyes glowed as bright as Kirito's; Yulier could quite clearly see them roll in disgust. "Don't suppose there's any way you can kick them out of the guild, Vice-Commander? I mean, you don't want guys like that wearing your colors, right?"

Yulier had to look away, slumping against a stone wall. "Unfortunately not. The guild's permissions were set up when we were much smaller; only the guildmaster can remove someone from the roster."

Kizmel glanced at her, violet eyes faintly glimmering in the dark. "That sounds… ill-advised. Though I should think that would make your own position, and Commander Thinker's, safe enough. As long as you remain within a Safe Haven's protections, at any rate."

I wish. "Technically true. But the Commander can be removed if both vice-commanders agree… willingly or otherwise." Yulier shivered, even with her thick uniform coat. "That's why I went to the KoB for help."

Because if this kept up, she would agree, in exchange for Thinker's safety. It galled her to the bone, and made her feel truly horrible after seeing the plight of Sasha and the children in her care, but if the clearers couldn't help her, she'd concede to Kibaou. Knowing Thinker was in danger, somewhere she couldn't reach, chilled her to the bone.

From the hooded look in Kirito's eyes, the youth seemed to understand; she suspected she didn't want to know what he'd been through, to bring that understanding. "Then we'll stop him." He tilted his head, listening for footsteps Yulier could no longer hear, and with a quick nod darted back into the alley proper. "If nothing else, we'll get him to tell us exactly where the teleporter is, and get your Commander back."

She wanted to hope, as she followed Kirito and his companions down the alley into a tunnel that led who-knew-where. She wanted so much to hope. But…. "There are only four of us, and he certainly isn't afraid of me," she said, wincing as her voice echoed off the tunnel walls. "I know he's been leveling recently, and he'll have guards."

Kirito flashed a grin over his shoulder. It wasn't a happy look. Yulier could've sworn she saw fangs. "Kibaou and I have… a history. He'll talk." The grin twisted. "If I have to remind him it was one of his people who almost got the whole clearing group killed a few times…."

It had been a long time since Kirito had last ventured to the Black Iron Castle. He'd sent a few orange Swordmasters to its dungeon, but he hadn't gone to it himself in well over a year. Probably, he thought, because he didn't really want to see the Monument of Life, and all the names that had been crossed off it over the past two years.

He still remembered the way perfectly well. The main street of the City of Beginnings led right to it, after all, with the massive edifice easily visible from half a kilometer out. When the alleys that led in its general direction ended, and he and his companions ran out into the open street, he saw it plainly. Just as he remembered, clear back to the days of the beta test.

Where the Knights of Blood's former headquarters had resembled a cathedral made of steel, the Black Iron Castle fully lived up its name: built like a fairy tale castle, but of glossy black pillars and wrought iron; similar, Kirito thought, to the Dark Elves' Moongleam Castle, but way more foreboding. Imposing, he thought, not ethereal or larger than life.

Well, maybe larger than life, he amended, as its towers filled his sight. But not in a good way. The army out front fits, though.

About as literal an army as it got in Aincrad was waiting ahead of his party. Kirito slowed to a trot, watching as more and more members of the Army poured out of the Black Iron Castle's huge gates, and swarmed in from side streets. Dozens, easily, all in the guild's distinctive gray and green, with an impressive array of weapons.

Kirito couldn't help a chuckle, and he spared a glance to his right in time to see Kizmel roll her eyes. Yeah. I bet they think they're intimidating. Good grief.

Behind him, he heard Yulier sigh heavily. "I know I've said this a dozen times today, but I really am sorry. I had no idea it had gotten this bad. And it looks like they knew we were coming."

"Presumably some of those I chastised earlier recovered enough to report in," Kizmel told her, with a casual shrug. "It doesn't really matter. We will be inside soon enough, and then we can get answers directly from Kibaou, and end this farce." She tsked, shaking her head. "I wonder what they think they're doing? So many of them in the street… you'd think they were expecting an invasion."

"I doubt they're thinking much at all," Kirito mused, dropping to a brisk walk. About three hundred meters out from the Castle's gates, the mass of Army troops had finally cut off their route entirely. "If I know Kibaou, he's pacing in his office, trying to figure out how to control what he's set off."

Too bad. He'd thought Kibaou might've learned something after everything that had happened in the first quarter of the Steel Castle. Apparently not.

The sea of gray armor parted abruptly, letting one man through. About all Kirito could tell about him personally was that he was tall, and judging from the image of Aincrad itself emblazoned on his shield, he was probably an officer. He certainly had the bearing of one, from his squared shoulders to his determined stride, topped off by a sword with enough bling it probably would've broken in two seconds of real fighting.

"Halt!" the man barked, slamming the base of his tall shield against the pavement. "This is territory of the Aincrad Liberation Force. I am Colonel Ganelon, and you will go no farther!"

"…Is the fancy rank supposed to mean something?" Philia stage-whispered.

Yulier groaned. "It wasn't like this before, really…." When Kirito glanced back at her, the silver-haired woman took a deep breath, squared her shoulders, and marched ahead. "Colonel Ganelon," she said sharply, "I'm Vice-Commander Yulier. You will stand down and let us through. I need to have words with Vice-Commander Kibaou."

Kirito had to admit, the woman had poise. He kind of wished she was up to fighting on the frontlines; Lind could probably have used her help, keeping his elitists under control. The guy had been doing better recently, but the mess after Kayaba's unmasking showed his guild still needed work.

If only the Army agreed with his assessment. He couldn't see the "colonel's" eyes behind his faceplate, but Ganelon's jaw worked soundlessly for a few moments—until one of his men started laughing. The mirth spread quickly through the front rank, becoming a mocking chorus, and Yulier's face flushed an angry red.

Ganelon was more controlled, only allowing himself a derisive chuckle. The sound was enough to mostly silence his men, combined with the hand he raised. "Sorry, 'Vice-Commander'," he said, when the laughter had quieted enough. "But we don't take orders from you anymore. If you don't want to be thrown into the dungeon—or join Thinker—I'd suggest you turn around and leave. Get out of the City, even. This is our turf."

Yulier's hands tightened into white-knuckled fists. "What," she said, voice shaking with what Kirito thought was a mix of rage and worry, "did you do with Thinker?"

"I don't know," Ganelon answered, with a careless shrug, "and frankly, I don't care. We've been cooped up here too long. With Commander Kibaou in charge, things will be different. If we'd been on the frontlines, we'd have cleared this game months ago."

"Kibaou should know better than that," Kirito said quietly, before Yulier could find a response. Stepping just past the shaking vice-commander, he turned the Beater's cool stare on the Army colonel. "I think it's time we had a chat with him, so please, step aside."

Ganelon stared at him, obviously nonplussed. "I don't know who you are, kid, but you heard me just now. We don't take orders from Yulier, and we sure as hell don't take them from you. Get lost, before we collect a fee." He gaze wandered over to Kizmel, then to Philia. "Looks like you've got some pretty nice stuff…. Tell you what, kid. Give us your fancy gear, and I'll consider telling the Commander somebody wants to see him."

Not quite as disgusting as Kirito had been expecting, after the encounter with the patrol earlier. Still about the most high-handed demand he'd heard since the beta test, and it made him shake his head. All the years he'd been gaming, and people like this still made him wonder how they even managed to boot up a computer.

"That's not going to happen," Kizmel said coolly, stepping up to Kirito's side. "You knew we were coming. I assume the patrol we chastised earlier reported in. You must know you're no match for us."

Ganelon glanced at her with a snort. "That was a six-man patrol, girl, and you had another party backing you. I've got three hundred men backing me. There's four of you. You really think you'll get through us?"

Kirito smiled the Beater's smile. "Yeah." And in a flicker of movement, he was suddenly right in front of the Army colonel, one hand locked on the man's collar. "Easily." Without so much as a grunt of effort, he lifted Ganelon clear off his feet. "I'm Level Ninety-Six. Kizmel and Philia are in the same range. Going through you will be like taking out the trash. If you're smart, you'll order your men to back off."

He didn't really like playing the Beater. It had caused him a lot of trouble over the past couple of years, acting out the role of the villain for the sake of keeping the clearing going. But he'd gotten good at it, and had learned well the value of spectacle. Casually dangling a larger, much more heavily-armored man with one hand was a pretty good show, if he said so himself. He could see Kizmel enjoyed it, at least, even as his wife and partner subtly bent her knees.

And he's a bully. A bully in this situation is going to do one of two things. The question is, will he be smart, or—?

After a moment of stunned silence—barring a choked sound from Yulier—Ganelon found his voice. "What are you waiting for, idiots?!" he rasped. "Get them!"

Nope. Not smart. Oh, well.

With a roar that made Kirito wince, the mob of Army men surged forward, some reaching out as if to grab his team, some of them launching right into a barrage of Sword Skills. The light show was blinding in combination, making defending or counterattacking nearly impossible just from the sensory overload.

Kirito handled the opening salvo by the simple expedient of flinging Ganelon right into the middle of it. Exactly what happened next, he couldn't say for sure, except that in involved a dozen or so misfired skills, a shriek from Ganelon, and the colonel being blasted into the sky.

Then another flash lit up, as Kizmel unleashed the Sword Skill she'd been charging while Kirito distracted them. White light erupted from her saber, wrapping around her, and she rocketed forward into the blitzkrieg charge of a Flashing Penetrator. Backed by the STR of a top-level clearer and the raw power of her gear, she was an unstoppable force flying into a mass of most definitely not immovable objects.

More screams joined Ganelon's as Kizmel scattered over a dozen Army men like bowling pins. Hands quickly filling with Elucidator and the Baneblade, Kirito leapt into the fray in her wake with a Corkscrew, battering aside several more.

"Are we really doing this?!" he heard Yulier yelp as he flew by. "This… this isn't exactly what I had in mind!" Her last word was choked off in a grunt, and a second later he heard a whip crack and a high-pitched cry. "We're still outnumbered, you know!"

A mirthful laugh from Philia. "Aw, don't worry about it! Just follow their lead, and we'll be in the Castle in no time!" There was the distinctive sound like a jet engine's roar, and Kirito caught a flash of red in his peripheral vision confirming the treasure hunter had just set off a Vorpal Strike. "Let's go!"

Kirito had only watched earlier, when Kizmel had smacked the patrol around. Now, he had to admit there was something deeply satisfying about blitzing through a few dozen like they were mooks in a Musou game. There were so many that they were hitting each other as much as his party, and what Sword Skills did make it through just didn't have the stats backing them to so much as make him or his friends flinch.

Admittedly, if they hadn't been in a Safe Haven, the whole thing would've been downright horrifying. Within the safe zone's protection, it was very cathartic to let an Avalanche bounce right off him, while his own Double Circular flung three more into the side of a building. To his right, Kizmel casually caught a Sonic Leap on her shield, met a Cyclone with a kick, and spun into a Treble Scythe that tore into half a dozen more like a tornado.

So this is what it's like to be a boss, Kirito mused, powering down the street, his dual swords spinning and slashing as fast as his avatar could move. I probably shouldn't get too used to this…. Dammit, Kibaou, if you managed to outfit this many, and get them to follow you, why couldn't you have done something useful with them?

Well. He'd just have to ask the cactus-haired man in person. At the rate his party was going, it wasn't going to be a long wait. Most of the three hundred Swordmasters Ganelon had boasted about simply couldn't get to them through the blockade they themselves created; the ones that did stand in the way, he and Kizmel were mowing down like wheat. Yulier wasn't having quite as much luck—though Kirito quickly decided he did not want to try facing that whip of hers; a clearer with that kind of weapon would've tied up one of his swords right quick—but Philia kept her safe easily enough.

Mostly, the trek down the last three hundred meters was pure catharsis, letting Sword Skills bounce off or clip right through while he practiced some skills of his own that were usually too impractical for a real fight. It was cathartic… but also sad. What a huge group of—sort of—disciplined Swordmasters could have done….

There wasn't much time to dwell on that, though. It took only a couple of minutes to batter aside enough of the Army men to reach the massive, wrought-iron gates of the Black Iron Castle. Easily five meters tall, they were some of the most imposing gates Kirito had seen in the two years he'd been in Aincrad. He thought it was kind of a shame they were in a Safe Haven, where fortifications were nothing but window dressing.

The gates were also firmly shut. If it had been a regular guild hall, that might've been a problem; a guild could set permissions to lock out non-guild members, and there was an outside chance even a vice-commander could've been denied entry. But the Black Iron Castle, for all that it was universally acknowledged as the Aincrad Liberation Force's HQ, was technically a public building. Kirito had heard some rooms could be rented, but not the whole building.

"Well, here we are," he said, more whimsically than he felt. Swatting aside an errant Army man's Horizontal Square with the Baneblade, he glanced back at his party. "How about we get this over with?"

"Please." Yulier cracked her whip, smacking another man in the face hard enough to make him tumble back into three of his fellows, tripping them all up. All hesitation had left her expression and her body, replaced with an urgency Kirito understood all too well. "Thinker is still alive, but I don't know for how long. We… we have to hurry."

"Then we shall." Kizmel gripped one of the massive door handles, while Kirito grabbed the other. "It's well past time we had a… discussion… with Kibaou, I think."

With a groan—and a choked-off scream, as Philia snapped someone's sword and hit him in the face with the pieces—the gates of the Black Iron Castle swung open.

Kirito had been to the Black Iron Castle before, but he couldn't remember going beyond the foyer since the death game began. Though he'd explored the place from top to bottom during the beta, that had been over two years before, long before the Army had more or less commandeered it. He couldn't even begin to guess where anything was, let alone the usurping vice-commander.

That foyer was just as huge as he remembered it, a vast, mostly-empty space lit by deep blue torches. With a floor of polished black marble, all that distinguished it otherwise were side doors leading deeper into the Castle, rows of marble pillars along the sides—and the ten-meter-wide cenotaph that was the Monument of Life.

Part of him wanted to check that Monument, to revisit the names he knew all too well. Just as much of him was relieved that they didn't really have time for such a detour. I should, though. When we have time. Right now… um. Where do we go from here?

Yulier, fortunately, clearly knew the Castle's halls like the back of her hand. Back in her own element, she led them through a side door with a determined stride, boots ringing on polished stone. When, halfway down the hall, a door opened and an armored head began to poke out, she didn't even slow down; she just slammed the door in the Army man's face, ignoring the outraged squawk entirely.

Kirito couldn't help exchanging a grin with Kizmel at that one.

Up two flights of wrought iron stairs, they ran into a full party of Swordmasters who seemed to be acting as part of Kibaou's personal guard. Yulier only glared at them, cracked her whip menacingly—and stood aside to let Team Kirito clear the way, ignoring her erstwhile subordinates' angry protests entirely.

A Linear, Double Circular, and Serration Wave later, and the four of them were back on track, leaving six shell-shocked Army men sprawled with varying degrees of confusion and broken gear.

They battered their way through three more groups of similar size on the way up, before Yulier brought them to a door at the far west end of the highest floor. "Kibaou's office is on this floor," she said, anger and worry lending an obvious tension to her voice. "If I know him, though, he'll be up here, instead."

The door opened onto a spiral staircase, leading up into the Black Iron Castle's highest tower. At the very top, there was a double-door simply labeled [Commander]. Yulier didn't pause for even a moment, simply flinging the doors open with an angry shove.

"Hey! Doesn't anybody know how ta knock anymore?!"

The office was about what Kirito expected, given the Castle's overall aesthetic. A few rugs relieved what was otherwise bare stone floor, the windows were bracketed by metal frames; apart from a few wooden chairs obviously added by the Army, the most prominent piece of furniture was a heavy iron desk. All in all, very imposing, and not at all the kind of place Kirito would've associated with a "Liberation" Army.

Standing behind the desk, back turned, was a figure he could only see in silhouette. Even through the glare, though, the man was distinctive: middling height, wearing a fancy but functional-looking sword at his waist, and utterly unmistakable cactus-like hair. Kirito hadn't seen him in a year and a half, and he'd never seen him in that sharp green uniform, but the man was anything but forgettable.

"This isn't your office, Kibaou," Yulier snapped, stalking into the room. "You're not owed that much courtesy."

"It will be soon, Yulier," Kibaou shot back, only barely turning his head. "Ya know the score as well as I do: most o' the guild's on my side. Sooner ya realize that, sooner we can make this official, an' get everything set right." His brow furrowed, just barely visible from that angle. "…How'd ya get through my men, anyway?"

"Given that none of them are remotely on the level of proper clearers, it wasn't exactly difficult, Vice-Commander." Kizmel crossed her arms, one eyebrow arched. "Be glad the KoB are busy regrouping, or our entrance would've been less gentle still."

"Who the—?" Kibaou finally turned around, a deep, confused frown distorting his face—a frown that turned to wide-eyed surprise, then a heavy grimace. "Oh. I shoulda known. I dunno who yer third wheel is, but I remember you, girl. And… not like I'm gonna forget you anytime soon, Beater."

Kirito twitched at the insult, but let it slide. He had an inkling of what was really going on. "Hello to you, too, Kibaou," he said quietly. "Long time no see."

If he hadn't known better, he'd have thought it had been a really long time. SAO didn't have aging as such; Kirito thought from his own experience that it seemed to adjust, gradually, for the Swordmasters' real-world growth, but that was about it. Kibaou, though, looked as if he'd aged at least ten years since the raid that almost destroyed his guild. His face was set in lines that had to be habit, and there seemed to be a bit of a tremble in his right hand.

For all his bluster, Kibaou was plainly not the man Kirito had known before the Twenty-Fifth Floor boss fight.

"Not long enough," Kibaou said with a snort. "Been hearin' rumors 'bout you, y'know that? The Black Swordsman, an' his NPC girlfriend." He shook his head, and dropped gracelessly into the desk chair. "Can't imagine what you're doin' way down here. I know all your acts ta keep the clearing goin', but this is Army business. It's got nothin' to do with you, Beater."

"I asked them for help, Kibaou," Yulier said sharply, walking quickly to the desk. "Guild politics is one thing. You tried to murder Thinker!" She slammed her hand on the iron desk, with a resounding crack. "Why?! Why did you do this?! Why did you do any of this?!"

Kibaou flinched. It was a tiny motion, but Kirito was used to looking for the tiniest cues in a boss' body language; the former leader of the ALS wasn't half as subtle as Kayaba's programming. It was gone in a flash, though, replaced by a condescending eye-roll. "C'mon, Yulier. We've been havin' this argument for how long now? We coulda been doin' more, if you an' Thinker weren't holdin' things back. We're the biggest guild in the game! We shoulda been leadin' the clearing by now."

The man's Kansai was even thicker than Kirito remembered. He's not half as calm as he pretends. He knows this is out of control, doesn't he?

Pushing himself out of the chair, Kibaou walked back to the window and gestured dramatically at the city beyond. "Think about it! Almost four thousand people are dead, Yulier. Of what's left, we got half right here in the Army. An' what're we doin'? Sittin' around in th' first quarter of th' game, building up Cor an' loot for nothin'. Lind's old crew's way ahead o' us, an' those upstarts in th' KoB outran even them. What's our excuse, huh?"

Now that was more like the Kibaou Kirito remembered, he thought with a frown. The man was reckless and loud, but he wasn't a complete idiot. In the abstract, he raised a very good point. The Army's numbers could have turned clearing into a cakewalk. Not so much Floor Bosses, with their constricted arenas and tricky mechanics, but clearing the way to the bosses would've been a cinch.

Except if it was going to work that way, it would have started nearly two years ago.

He was about to point that out when Yulier's hand tightened into a fist, fingernails screeching against the iron desk in the process. "We've talked about this, Kibaou," she growled. "You know why we haven't made any major moves. We can't. And—" she slapped the desk again with her other hand "—none of that justifies what you did to Thinker!"

"Yeah, throwing your guildmaster into a glitched-up zone isn't very nice," Philia put in, whimsical tone and words at odds with the flat gaze she fixed on Kibaou. Folding her arms behind her head, she leaned back against the wall with deceptive calm. "Why would the clearers trust you after you pulled a stunt like that? I mean, you must've heard about Heathcliff by now."

Kirito doubted any of them missed Kibaou's flinch that time, nor the way started to turn to look at them again, only to force himself to stop. "If I kept tryin' the nice way, we'd never have gotten anywhere," he said, biting out the words with the distinct click of his teeth Kirito remembered from older days. "It wasn't nice, but we gotta move, an' he wasn't budging." Then he did look over his shoulder, just barely, and his next words were quieter. "…An' I didn't hear 'bout Heathcliff bein' Kayaba 'til after, anyway."

He knows he screwed up. The Kibaou I knew would be trying to fix things, even if he couldn't admit it without losing control of his people. Can he still swallow his pride even that much?

Making a decision, Kirito stepped forward, steps deliberately loud, to cut off whatever Yulier had been about to say. "What about Kobatz, Kibaou?" he said pointedly. "After what happened on the Twenty-Fifth Floor, what was that all about?"

Kibaou's hands clenched, and he returned his stare to the window. Probably no one in the room was buying it. "That wasn't s'posed ta happen," he muttered. "Kobatz an' his group were s'posed ta map th' dungeon. If they found th' boss, orders were ta scout, nothin' more. If it worked out, I was gonna use it ta convince Thinker we could do more. …I dunno what he was thinkin', tryin' to fight the damn thing."

"But he was still your responsibility," Kizmel put in, folding her arms as she directed an experienced Knight's hard stare—and understanding of command—at the cactus-haired man. "You chose him, Vice-Commander. If you didn't realize he was a glory hound, you should have."

"Fer an NPC, you are way too smart," Kibaou said sourly. Spinning away from the window, he dropped into the desk chair, resting his elbows on the desktop. "Yeah. I screwed up that one. But y'know what? Kobatz an' his guys got ta th' boss. It was a start. Yer buddy the Beater knows me, I can whip a team into shape myself, an' start from there. But Thinker wouldn't listen!"

"Of course not!" Yulier snapped, slapping both hands on the desk this time. "Before Kobatz died, Thinker was considering sending scouts, but after that? You're lucky he's soft enough to have accepted that meeting in the first place. Now, you're gambling with lives like it doesn't even matter—"

"Kibaou knows better than that." Frowning, Kirito walked right up to the desk, and peered closely at Kibaou's grimace. "He knows better than anyone just how bad bosses can get. He knows the reason there's three thousand Swordmasters in the Army is because they don't have what it takes to venture out. The way the Army was originally set up, it gave them something they could do without much risk. As it is, even with the Army's resources, they couldn't possibly catch up to the clearing group in large numbers, not for a year at least."

He'd worked out the numbers himself, months before. Between skill and level gaps, and the sheer expense of gear, no one below the upper mid-levels was going to be doing any clearing soon enough to matter. Unless the fiasco of the Seventy-Fifth Floor stalled clearing entirely, Kibaou's idea was a pipe dream, and the man had to know it.

"Why, Kibaou?" he asked quietly, searching that face for any sign of the bullheaded but not totally unreasonable man he'd once known. "What happened to you?"

For a long moment, Kibaou only stared back at him, defiant. For those endless seconds, Kirito thought the older man was going to cling to his delusions, no matter the cost. That he really had lost all sense.

Then, finally, Kibaou slumped in his chair. "What happened?" he repeated bitterly. "More like, what didn't? You were there, Beater, when bad intel killed most o' my guys. Then I heard Joe was a PKer, an' probably set us up in th' first place. Took me months ta pull m'self together again, y'know?"

Oh, yeah. Kirito could guess, between his own past, what happened to the Black Cats, and the fallout of Kizmel learning the truth of her world. If he and his partner hadn't taken as long to get back to work, it was because they had more practice.

"Then, just when I thought I had a chance to get back in th' fight, Kobatz went Leeroy Jenkins on me, an' got some o' our best guys killed." Kibaou stared down at his lap, suddenly listless. "I thought there was still a chance. But Thinker wasn't listenin', an' some o' the men were takin' the whole 'greater good' thing way too far…." He sighed. "It wasn't s'posed to happen like that."

"Then why, Kibaou?" Yulier demanded, voice trembling as she leaned over the desk. "Why did you throw Thinker into a place like that?"

"It wasn't s'posed to happen!" Kibaou snapped back, suddenly surging half out of his chair to meet her glare. "We were just s'posed to talk, an' then it got kinda heated, and then—then th' teleporter activated, and… dammit, I didn't know what ta do, 'cept push th' plan to get back ta clearing. But the men are goin' wild, an… I dunno what to do."

"Then fix it!" she snarled in his face. "You sent Thinker somewhere, so go and get him!"

"I can't!" he roared back—and fell back into his chair, as if he'd expended everything he had left in that shout. "I can't," he repeated quietly. "I dunno where that teleporter goes, an' we can't get back to it ta try it again."

"You can't?" Kirito said, blinking. Kibaou didn't look like he was lying—not that he'd ever been any good at it. "Why not?"

Kibaou made a sound that was half snort, half sigh, and clicked his teeth. "Go see fer yerself, Beater. Lowest floor, even under th' dungeons. Yulier can show ya the way, an' I'll tell anybody who'll still listen ta me ta leave ya alone." He slouched deeper into his chair. "Just watch yer back. Dunno if even you can beat what's there…."

Kirito didn't think he'd heard anything that ominous since the Fifty-Seventh Floor. Well, aside from the pre-boss meeting on the Seventy-Fifth. Still, he exchanged silent looks with Kizmel and Philia, and beckoned a reluctant Yulier back to the tower's staircase. If Kibaou had—again—lost control of the sentiment he'd stirred up, getting Thinker back was probably the only thing they could do. Short of calling in the KoB and DDA to tackle the rogue Army groups, anyway.

As he reached the door, though, Kibaou spoke up one more time. "Blackie? …Thanks. Fer savin' th' guys Kobatz didn't quite get killed. I owe ya fer that, at least."

"I just realized," Kizmel said dryly, as Kirito body-slammed an Army tank clear out a stairwell window, "that Kibaou didn't actually surrender." She sidestepped the tank's partner, let him trip on a stair, and casually kicked his other foot out from under him. Letting him roll comically down, she continued, "Perhaps we should've pressed the issue before we left?"

Brushing nonexistent dust off his hands, her husband resumed the trek down into the lowest levels of the Black Iron Castle. "I don't know that it would've mattered. It doesn't look like he's really in control of what he set off. Maybe some of the rogues are genuinely loyal to him, but I'd guess a lot of them are taking this as an excuse to go wild."

She nodded thoughtfully, not even blinking as Philia stopped to snatch something from the belt of groaning Army man now at the base of the stairs. Honestly, many of the Army Swordmasters they'd run into reminded her of Titan's Hand, if slightly less murderous. It seemed Kibaou, in his rush to expand the guild, hadn't vetted the new recruits very well.

"He's willing to talk," Yulier put in, snapping her whip to discourage someone coming out of a side door. That one, at least, had the sense to quickly retreat, and close the door behind himself. "It's a start. And frankly, I'm more worried about what we'll find in the basement. What could Kibaou have unleashed down there, in a safe zone?"

What, indeed. Kizmel had seen enough of Aincrad's horrors, both intentional and created by Kayaba's errors, to be more than a little worried herself. A Safe Haven was supposed to be a perfect protection. She'd seen with her own eyes, on the Fifty-Seventh Floor, that such was not always the case.

I pray it's nothing like the Necro Plague. If that had affected more than just the one floor, the entire clearing effort might've collapsed.

Not wanting to unduly frighten Yulier, she kept the thought to herself, following in the silver-haired woman's wake as they descended another staircase into what ought to have been the lowest basement of the Black Iron Castle. There, the four of them passed through a hallway that was largely open on one side—giving a clear view of the cells of the Black Iron Castle's dungeon.

Kizmel quickly pulled Kirito in close, silencing his yelp of surprise with one hand and drawing her cloak over them both with the other. Philia may not be recognized, she thought, glancing into the cells, and Yulier has only ever been a jailer to them. I have no desire for Kirito or myself to be recognized here.

Not with the angry muttering and occasional cackling coming from behind the cell bars. She wasn't surprised to see Philia abruptly make use of her own Hiding skill, turning translucent in the dim light of the dungeon. Not when she could plainly see a sullen redhead and her motley, equally sullen crew in one row of cells. Definitely not when the next row was mostly filled with giggling and mumbling, and one man in a skull-like mask who endlessly, silently practiced thrusts.

Rosalia and Titan's Hand were bad enough. XaXa and the other mad survivors of Laughing Coffin still gave Kizmel nightmares, all too many nights.

Once they were past the cells, approaching a heavy iron door that every instinct screamed to her was ominous, Yulier turned back to them. "I'm sorry," she said quietly. "I should've warned you about the orange players here. They can be pretty disturbing."

"We know," Philia said with a shiver. Casting a look over her shoulder, her hand twitched toward her Swordbreaker's hilt. "We put most of those guys in there."

"…That explains a lot." Yulier shook her head, materialized a key from her inventory, and opened the door. "Well, this is the farthest I've ever been. What's down there, only Thinker, Kibaou, and a few of Kibaou's personal guard know."

Kirito peered into the dark stairwell, eyes gleaming vivid green. "…Doesn't look like it goes down below the Safe Haven, at least," he said after a moment. "Let's see what we've got. Kibaou's probably easy to spook these days, but still… I don't like this."

That, Kizmel suspected, was the general sentiment. The stairway reminded her all too much of Fallen Elf architecture: narrow, and lit only by dark blue torches not quite bright enough to show the etchings on the walls with any detail. At least, not without a closer look than she was willing to give them. Only the fact that the walls were wrought iron instead of stone kept remembered terror at bay.

The stairs led down into a single, straight hallway, with no side doors at all. Lit by more of the dark blue torches, it ended with a broad, obsidian archway. The arch itself was lit by slightly brighter torches, bright enough to make clear the words carved into it. Latin characters, whose meaning Kizmel could not grasp yet found instinctively foreboding.

[Lasciate Ogni Speranza, Voi Ch'entrate].

Beyond that vaguely ominous inscription, she could see a wide, circular room. Like the archway, it was built of stone rather than iron; gleaming, much like Fallen Elf architecture, yet bearing an indefinably different gloss. Stone monoliths ringed the center, each mounted with a torch—not of more blue fire, though, but an eerie, pure-white flame.

In the center, on a low dais, Kizmel spotted a shimmering light, very much like the teleporters of human cities, except this one wasn't bright azure. Instead, it was a deep, disquieting red.

All of that was quite enough to set even a veteran Knight's nerves on edge. Even more….

"Heya, guys! Had a feeling you'd be showing up, sooner or later. You're always right in the middle of it, when stuff like this comes up."

The huge sword, bigger than any even most frontline tanks would've considered, was unmistakable. The lavender hair, even more so. The figure that was generous enough to make Kizmel faintly jealous had certainly stuck in her memory. Even if the woman had swapped her immodest armor for what her friends would've called a "business suit".

"Strea," Kirito breathed, as the NPC sauntered out from behind one of the monoliths. "What are you doing here? …And what's with the suit?"

"Oh, this?" Strea propped one hand on her hip, striking a pose that made Kizmel grateful she had ample proof of Kirito's fidelity. "You remember Klein asked me why I wasn't wearing one, last time we met? I still don't get it, but I figured it'd be a nice change!"

There was a joke there, Kizmel was certain. When the situation was less dire, she intended to find out what.

Yulier turned a bewildered look from Strea to Kirito. "I'm sorry, I think I'm missing something here. You know this girl? Who is she, and what could she be doing here? How could she have gotten past Kibaou's people?"

Kizmel cleared her throat. "Philia mentioned her, when we met with Vanel, but I'm not surprised you missed it…. Vice-Commander Yulier, meet Strea, agent of the Cardinal system. I'm not entirely clear on the details myself, but she is closer to what you would call an 'AI' than I am. An NPC, acting in the interests of the system when Kayaba's strictures prevent Cardinal from correcting errors directly."

A fact which, in that moment, chilled her blood. If Strea had appeared, then Kayaba found the current situation interesting enough to prohibit Cardinal from simply repairing the damage. Given that the last time that had occurred, Aincrad had almost been swallowed in an invasion of the undead….

"Strea," Kirito called out, taking a couple of cautious steps closer to the teleport chamber. "What's going on? If you can tell us," he added, not quite able to keep a sour note from his voice. "We're here for a rescue mission, so…."

"Right." The lavender-haired girl nodded, leaning casually against the archway. "Here's the short version: the system is undergoing an emergency patch, and that's broken a few lines of code here and there. One break was in the security around the Hollow Area."

"Yeah, we know that part," Philia said, impatiently tapping the hilt of her Swordbreaker. Kizmel was obscurely relieved to not be the only one not entirely comfortable with Strea's presence. "Vanel told us. The patch broke security, so PoH and some others got through, and Kibaou accidentally trapped Thinker down there. Right?"

"Vanel broke cover?" Strea whistled. "She must be worried. That girl's playing a dangerous game. If Cardinal decides she's overstepping… um. Yeah. That's about right. Plus, with the Echo having gotten in there, Cardinal's rewritten their quest to take into account the real Sanctuary. And I think PoH's exploiting some of the Hollow Area's mechanics for a power boost…. Bad stuff going on down there."

Yulier closed her eyes, and took a deep, shuddering breath. "Then Thinker's in a lot of trouble. We have to hurry—he's an excellent administrator, but he's never been on the frontlines. He hasn't even been in the field for more than a little Cor grinding in months. PKers, he's not up to handling." She opened her eyes, turning her gaze on the agent of Cardinal. "You're here to do something about it, too, right? If only about what this 'Echo' and the PKers are up to."

Strea straightened, taking a step into the middle of the archway. "Not exactly. I told Team Kirito before: my duty is to maintain system stability, no more, no less."

The reminder sent another chill through Kizmel. Strea had indeed said that, more than once, during the plague of the undead on the Fifty-Seventh Floor. At the time, she hadn't given it much thought, since the NPC's actions had clearly aligned with her team's own goals. At this moment….

"And having players and NPCs rampaging through a developer area that can potentially crash the whole game is pretty bad for 'stability', isn't it?" Philia ventured, eyes narrowing. "I mean, 'crashing' is kind of the exact opposite of stable."

"Cardinal's measures within the Hollow Area itself are outside my purview," Strea replied, shrugging. Something about her smile unnerved Kizmel. "My instructions are to prevent the introduction of additional unstable factors. Probably while other measures are taken, but again, not my purview."

"Additional unstable—?" Yulier cut herself off, shaking her head. "Never mind. I'm sorry, Strea, we don't have time to talk, so if you're not going to aid us—"

She started to dash toward the teleporter chamber, only to almost fall over when Kirito's arm suddenly flung out in front of her. Choking from the impact, the silver-haired woman turned a shocked stare on the Black Swordsman, but he only shook his head. His gaze, like Kizmel's, was focused on Strea.

On the way the "agent of Cardinal" had suddenly tensed.

"I see," Kizmel said, nodding slowly as the pieces fell into place. "You have no intention of allowing us through, do you?"

Yulier inhaled sharply, but Strea only gave a wry smile, and lifted one hand above and behind her right shoulder. "Sorry, guys," she said, drawing her enormous sword. "But I have my duty. No more unstable factors are allowed into the Hollow Area. Nothing personal."

"Nothing personal?!" Yulier choked out. "Thinker is trapped down there! PKers and a rogue quest are threatening to crash the game! We have to stop them!" Shaking off Kirito's arm, she yanked out her whip. "I don't care what orders you have, I'm going through!"

"Yulier, don't—!"

She ignored Kirito's warning, and flung herself toward the teleporter chamber. Mid-run, her whip lashed out, catching Strea's blade and wrapping around it. Cardinal's agent glanced down at it, as if momentarily surprised—and in that moment, Kirito and Kizmel leapt into action themselves.

This is a Safe Haven, the elf girl thought, in the moment it took for her Rage Spike and her husband's Corkscrew to cross the few meters to the archway. We don't have to hold back—

The next thing Kizmel saw was a bright crimson flash. She felt a terrific impact, heard Kirito yelp, and Yulier scream in surprise, and then her face collided with an iron wall. The impact dazed her, leaving her barely able to even register the Tumble icon under her life bar.

"Sorry, guys," she heard, through the ringing in her ears. "My stats are stronger than they were during the Necro Plague. Nobody goes through. System stability must be maintained. But hey, look on the bright side! Kibaou won't be sending anyone else through, either. You can rest easy on that one. So… how 'bout you get back to clearing, and leave this place to me?"

Less than a full day as Vice-Commander of the Knight of Blood, and Rain was already wishing Cure Crystals could be used on headaches. Bad enough that their founder had turned out to be Kayaba Akihiko; that alone would've had the KoB in a tizzy for days, if not weeks. The resistance she'd already been running into from Knights who resented her being appointed as the new vice-commander just made it all the harder to straighten things out.

At least she had her own office, a floor below Asuna's in Castle Kreutzen's tower, which meant Rain could keep out anyone she didn't absolutely have to deal with. That didn't make dealing with those she did need to any easier. Asuna had had to glare sternly at Daizen once already, when he'd hesitated to discuss guild finances with her. Godfree was less overt, but his passive-aggressive suggestions that of course she couldn't be expected to be on top of things yet, having only just joined the guild, was driving her nuts.

I don't think Godfree even wanted the job, Rain groused silently, climbing the stairs to Asuna's office. It's just the principle of the thing, I guess. Fine great, but he's got no business standing on "principle" a day after he tried to start a fight over Kizmel!

Speaking of the elf girl, Rain was really hoping the meeting she'd been called to—just incidentally getting her away from a meeting with Team Leader Uzala, who had apparently decided to go with the sucking-up approach—would have better news. After a day of trying to put together just one reliable team, she needed a morale boost.

Walking in on Asuna banging her head on her desk, opposite a very weary-looking Team Kirito, dashed those hopes. Probably not a good sign that Fuurinkazan isn't even here. Oh, boy.

"So, let me get this straight," Asuna was saying, between thumps. "Cardinal is using the glitch allowing access to the Hollow Area to progress the Echo's questline. And at the same time, it's keeping us from following that questline? …How does that make sense?"

Kirito's smile was rueful and humorless. "Ever see an anti-virus program declare itself a virus and try to delete itself? Cardinal is smart. A lot smarter than normal AI. But it's not like Kizmel. It's still limited to its programming. If it hits a paradox, it doesn't care."

Ooh, so not good. Clearing her throat to announce herself, Rain stepped over to the window by Asuna's desk. She was still feeling her way into being the fencer's second-in-command; taking an appropriately dramatic pose against the setting sun seemed a good way to support her boss' position. "So… bad day, guys?"

Asuna only groaned incoherently, dropping her forehead onto her desk. Philia let out a sound that wasn't very intelligible either but didn't sound complimentary, and flopped into a guest chair. That left Kirito and Kizmel to have a silent conversation with facial expressions, ending in the elf girl arching one eyebrow at her husband.

Apparently losing the vote, Kirito sighed, shoulders sagging. "Well, nobody died, so I guess you could say it could be worse. First thing? Kibaou is, more or less, backing down—like I thought, he snapped under pressure, gave marching orders to the people he'd been cultivating, and found out he didn't really have control over what he'd set off."

It was Rain's turn to groan. She hadn't been on the frontlines during the early days of anti-beta sentiment, or when the ALS self-destructed against the Twenty-Fifth Floor Boss, but she'd certainly heard the stories. Between Argo's reports and tales Kirito himself had told her, Kibaou had a bad habit of overestimating the control he had over a situation.

"So," Kirito continued, rubbing at what looked to be a bad headache of his own, "Yulier is back in the Black Iron Castle, trying to negotiate a compromise with Kibaou. But a lot of Kibaou's 'loyalists' turned out to be out for themselves, so there's still a big chunk of the Army causing trouble on the lower floors. They're not crazy enough to go orange—yet—but it looks like they're going to be making a real nuisance of themselves in town."

"Which is why Fuurinkazan is staying in the City of Beginnings for now," Kizmel said, picking up the tale. Giving Kirito's hand a quick, reassuring squeeze, her accompanying smile quickly turned to a rueful grimace. "Suffice to say, we met a makeshift orphanage there. Klein wishes to make sure they're safe, until the Army's rogue elements can be brought to heel. Or at least until we're able to reach our objective."

Rain's headache was getting worse by the second, and she found herself wishing she could join Asuna in pounding her head on the desk. Too bad it would've looked all kinds of bad for both KoB leaders to do that. "I can guess the rest. The teleporter Thinker used isn't working anymore?"

It wouldn't have been surprising, after all. A quick glance out the window told her the [Maintenance In Progress] barrier still enclosed Ark Sophia, meaning Kayaba was still patching the game. Fixing access permissions on that teleporter would've been easy, once he knew there was a problem.

"Worse," Philia put in. Slouched in her chair, the treasure hunter had just about the most disgusted expression Rain had ever seen from her. "Strea."

"Strea?" Rain blinked at the apparent non sequitur. Chewed on it for a second. And finally winced, remembering what the NPC had said the last time they'd met. "Oh. Cardinal's got her guarding the teleporter?"

"And boosted her stats to at least Level One-Twenty," Kirito confirmed with a sigh. "Dual Blades, a Knight with decades of combat experience—none of that matters. She's faster than any of us, and way stronger. After she hit us, we didn't even bother trying again. Without some kind of exploit, nobody is getting past her."

"Which means," Asuna said, her first coherent contribution to the conversation, "we're stuck." Finally lifting her head, she pointed out the window, at the glimmering barrier locking away the rest of the Seventy-Sixth Floor. "We can't do a thing about clearing until the 'maintenance' is done. Our biggest problems otherwise are all in that 'Hollow Area'. Right now, there's nothing we can do except keep fixing the KoB."

And that, Rain knew, was made even harder by the lack of progress elsewhere. Without a goal, the KoB were going stir-crazy, with nothing to focus on but each other. If this kept up—

The office door abruptly, and a hooded cloak bounded in, trailed by a frazzled Fultz. "Hey, now, it ain't all bad," Argo the Rat proclaimed, with a shadow of her usual grin. "Hey, Kii-bou, Kii-chan, Aa-chan! Got Team Kirito's report, an' I got a little news o' my own."

Hopefully that was good. With Argo, Rain was never quite sure. Besides which…. "How much, Argo?"

The Rat gasped dramatically, putting a hand to her heart. "Ya wound me, Rain-chan! …Don't worry 'bout it, Yulier's got me on retainer fer this one. An' I even gave her a discount; I got my operatin' expenses, but I'm not gonna gouge when th' fate o' the world's at stake."

Argo the Rat. Giving discounts. Rain had a sudden premonition of impending doom.

The info broker bounced over to Asuna's desk and parked herself on a corner of it. "Awright, so, Strea's gone all Lord British on ya, right? But we know from th' zombies that Kayaba'd rather let players handle things. So I figured, there's gotta be another way down there—'sides, the Echo couldn't have used that teleporter anyway, an' I kinda doubt PoH did.

"So I put out feelers, lookin' fer anythin' else that mighta popped up recently on lower floors. And y'know what I got?" Argo paused dramatically, hands on her hips, but to Rain's relief didn't push it too long. "An old quest came up with somethin' new. You guys remember the Gateway from the Twenty-Sixth Floor?"

That rang a very faint bell for Rain. It'd honestly been ages since she'd even thought about that floor; she'd reached it well after the drama on the floor below it, after all. But Kirito and Kizmel both suddenly looked thoughtful. "Now that you mention it," the Black Swordsman said slowly, "we never did find out how that questline was supposed to end. I mean, we knew there were supposed to be more gates, but I think we only ever found one more of them. Which, come to think of it, never activated properly. The quest NPC accepted it as a failure, we got the rewards, and moved on…."

Now Rain remembered. "That was tied in with that order of dragon riders we sometimes hear about, right? Huh… you know, my Chronicle might have something in it about that. I haven't checked it since… y'know. It's been a busy day."

"Ya ever get that thing filled in, I will totally pay ya top Cor fer the story, Rain-chan." The Rat grinned at the look on Rain's face, before quickly sobering. As much as she ever did, anyway. "Gotta warn ya guys, though, this ain't single-party stuff. A quest boss popped on th' Twenty-Sixth Floor, tougher than anythin' there's got a right to be, an' word is th' other Gateway Kii-bou found has one now, too. Safe bet they won't be th' last."

Probably not. But it's something we can fight. We could use that, after the last couple days.

Energized, Asuna pushed herself up, the cool confidence of the Commander of the KoB pushing away her tired frown. "Then it sounds like we have a place to start. Argo, please give me everything you have on it—I'll make sure copies get to everyone relevant. Kirito-kun, Kizmel, Philia, you should all get some rest after today. I'll let you know when we're ready to move."

Kirito nodded, some life having returned to his own posture. Kizmel, though, frowned. "Will you be ready to move soon, Asuna? Just passing through the Castle, I could see the KoB is still… unsettled."

"We will be," Rain told her, with a confidence she… mostly felt. "While you guys were checking the Black Iron Castle, Asuna sealed the deal with the Legend Braves. And I spent the day getting my own party together—that girl Fuurinkazan sent our way, Kumari, is going to be a big help. The guild still needs work, but we can start doing small stuff right now." She smiled at her old teammates. "Leave it to us for a couple days, guys. You always do half the work; take a break for once!"

She was proud that she could say that, and prouder still at the sheepish agreement she got from Kirito and Kizmel. Vice-Commander of the Knights of Blood wasn't quite what she'd expected to become, but she was leading the way, and people trusted her to do it. After over a year of trying to move on from the disaster that was her first raid, she was right where she wanted—needed—to be.

Rain couldn't help but notice, though, that Philia looked more worn out than the others. I hope us taking the lead for a bit will give her a chance to rest. I know she's got more energy than anybody but the Rat, but Philia's obviously been pushing herself too hard….

The sense of melancholy in the air was thick, as Philia crossed the sand in Kirito and Kizmel's wake, returning to their cabana for the night. There just hadn't been anything to say, after leaving Castle Kreutzen and teleporting back to the little island. They'd done what they could, and it hadn't been enough.

Kirito opened the cabana's door, letting the girls in ahead of him. Philia couldn't help a small smile at his habitual chivalry—taught, she thought, by all the time he'd hung around Kizmel and Asuna before she ever met him—but it didn't last long after entering the silent, empty living room. What was usually a comfortable retreat after a day of clearing just… wasn't, this time.

Rain's only going to be staying out later than she used to, the treasure hunter reminded herself, unequipping her boots and padding over to one of the living room armchairs. But not coming home all together… it feels kinda empty. Especially after a day like today.

Kirito and Kizmel claimed the couch together, quickly cuddling under a fur blanket. A far cry, Philia thought, from how awkward the swordsman had been with the whole thing months earlier, even after they'd finally tied the knot. Then again, even back then, Kirito usually hadn't cared much when the day had been bad enough.

"Well," he said now, as the silence grew heavy, "today at least wasn't as bad as yesterday. Nobody died. But man, I can't remember the last time I felt so useless. Thinker's still stuck in the Hollow Area, we've got nothing about Griselda's husband, and I don't even want to think about what PoH's doing. And knowing Strea's working against us this time…."

Philia winced. That had been an unpleasant surprise, all right. The showy NPC had been a terror when on their side, limited to player-equivalent stats. Back then, she was pretty sure she could've taken her. Now she's made me feel like a level-one noob.

"It wasn't all bad," Kizmel said softly, leaning her head against Kirito's shoulder. "We have a lead on the Hollow Area now, if tenuous, and if the Army is still in chaos, Kibaou is at least willing to talk. I believe we should take Rain's advice, and let the KoB worry about things for just a little while." She sighed, Kirito's hand having come up to lightly trace one of her long, pointed ears. "I, for one, still need time to rest after yesterday."

Seeing the way the light streaming through the window from the setting sun painted the couple, like something out of a painting, Philia's throat suddenly felt tight. Unable to sit still, she pushed herself up and headed toward her room. "Rest is good," she said over her shoulder. "Think I'll call it an early night…. Don't stay up too late, guys."

She barely heard their replies, only noting absently that it wasn't so long ago that the double entendre would've left Kirito a sputtering, blushing mess—and maybe Kizmel, too. Either they'd gotten used to it, or it really had been that bad a day.

Philia was starting to think it had been that bad. Sitting heavily on the edge of her bed, she didn't even glance at the collection of rare blades and other treasures that decorated her room. Kizmel died yesterday, after exposing Kayaba. Kirito was one of the only ones who could've kept the raid from collapsing. He was the one who knew Kibaou well enough to talk things through today.

Asuna's already got the KoB bouncing back. And Rain… she's settling right in as the vice-commander, and she's even got a team shaping up. Plus that book of hers that might just have the key to making progress on the Hollow Area.

…What've I done lately?

Throughout the day's adventure back in the City of Beginnings, Philia had been in the background, just following the others' lead. Thinking on it, it'd been like that for awhile. She was the go-to girl when it was time to hunt treasure, but otherwise, it was starting to feel like she was just along for the ride. Even before Asuna recruited her, Rain had had her dream of being a hero.

Philia… had nothing. Outside of holding her own in boss fights, she realized, she just hadn't been doing much of anything. In a crew of heroes, she was just… there.

She wasn't doing nothing at all. She did do her part in a fight, even against the Skull Reaper. But compared to even the reluctant heroics of Kirito, that just didn't feel like enough anymore. He, all of them, were doing something only they could do, and she wasn't.

You'd think something like the Hollow Area would be right up my alley, she thought bitterly, flopping back on her bed. A developer's room, especially one turned into a quest area, should have loads of good stuff. But I haven't got a clue. Rain's the one with the handy book, Argo got the leads on the gateways, and nobody is getting past Strea—

Her train of thought hit that, and bounced. Wait. The Echo couldn't have used that teleporter, either. Argo thinks it was the gateways, but wasn't there something else…?

Pushing herself upright again, Philia swept two fingers through the air to open her menu, quickly tabbing to her inventory. The page she shared with the rest of Team Kirito, to be exact, containing all the items any one of them might need at a moment's notice, or were part of ongoing quests.

Like the crystals they'd picked up in the quest where they'd first heard of the Echo.

She ignored the red mock-Healing Crystals; those they'd found out the hard way were incendiary, and not damage-discriminating. No, she was after the black ones. The ones that looked like Teleport or Corridor Crystals.

Philia felt a chill as the onyx crystal materialized in her hand. Both from the eerie look—and feel—of the crystal itself, and the voice in the back of her head telling her that what she was about to do was a very bad idea. But, she told herself, quickly re-equipping her boots and her Swordbreaker, I can't just sit here doing nothing anymore. Besides, forget everything else. If PoH is after the Sanctuary, and has something like that copy-Jade Key we found in Nazzoth's place, we're on a timer. If he gets to the Sanctuary, we lose.

Holding up the crystal, before she could talk herself out of it—or talk to Kirito and Kizmel, who'd tell her the same thing—Philia called out, "Warp!"

The voice command was definitely appropriate. Instead of the clean, blue flash of a normal teleport, she got to watch her bedroom twist and distort around her, accompanied by a staticky screech. There was no pain in SAO, but she felt pressure over her entire body.

It felt like it lasted a couple of minutes. It was probably only ten seconds at the most. She'd never know, because she had no time to reflect on it when the experience was over.

Philia popped back into normal geometry in a stone room, with as far as she could tell no color at all. Totally monochrome, right down to the black flames "illuminating" the room. Her first thought was that it looked like an inverted copy of the teleporter chamber Strea was guarding, complete with stone monuments. Black torches instead of white, stark white stone that somehow managed to be more disturbing than the other chamber's obsidian… possibly because, on that white stone, it was easier to see inscriptions on the monoliths.

Taking a careful, anxious step away from the teleporter dais, she peered closely at the nearest monolith. She didn't recognize the script; it wasn't Japanese, Roman, or even one of SAO's elvish alphabets. Whatever it was, it was angular, sharp-edged, and gave off a primal sense of horror.

This is supposed to be a developer's room, right? Philia swallowed, took a trembling step back, and realized with a start that there was nothing on the teleporter dais, not even a monochrome rendition of an active teleporter's glow. Then you'd think it would be just… barebones. Clean. Not… not set up to look like a legit game area. …Maybe this was a planned room, and just got dummied-out?

Shivering—partly from the tension, partly from the physical chill she'd only just noticed—she brought up her menu. The first thing she noticed was the area map was glitched; she could see the room she was in, but the edges were strangely fuzzy. The location name was no better, a jumbled mix of katakana, Romanji, numbers, and random symbols. Worse, it wasn't even static, instead constantly randomizing itself further.

This was a bad, bad idea. Swallowing hard, Philia tabbed over to her friends list, and tapped Kirito's name. His status read as normal—but when she tried to bring up the private message prompt, all she got was an unintelligible error message. Oh, no.

She forced herself to breathe. She'd survived the teleport. The chamber was beyond creepy, but it was also empty, and she could only see a single entrance. She had camping gear and a good supply of field rations. If she had to, she could hold out until her friends found another way to the Hollow Area—if that really was where she'd ended up—

Boots screeched against stone, giving Philia a split-second's warning that someone had been in the chamber already. She spun, drawing her Swordbreaker, just in time to see a figure with a glowing sword erupt from behind one of the monoliths. The Sonic Leap was fast, almost as fast as Kirito might've launched it, but the angle was just weird enough that Philia's own still-lifting blade ended up perfectly placed to catch it with a hasty Uppercut.

The backlash still blew Philia back a good two meters, slamming her back into one of the monoliths. The virtual breath was knocked out of her, but she'd taken hits like that before; she used the rebound to drive her Swordbreaker at her assailant in a flat thrust.

Her aim was true, and even without the backing of a Sword Skill her STR was enough for her blade to stab deep into her opponent's gut and shove them back. She heard a faint chiming noise at the same moment, but was too busy to pay it any mind, her opponent already leaping back and away. In a flutter of cloth, they jumped back behind another monolith; Philia only had time to see she'd at least taken a good five percent off their HP with that brief hit.

In a room full of stone monoliths for cover, it was like a game of cat and mouse. But Philia had sparred with Sachi, and knew an ambusher's fighting style well. When her attacker leapt from the other side of the monolith, she was ready, unleashing a simple Horizontal—simple, but backed by her Swordbreaker's stats and her own STR. The skill flung the attacker clear across the room, tumbling behind another monolith.

In the busy minute or so that followed, Philia couldn't quite get a good look at her opponent. In the teleport chamber's strange lighting, all she could see for sure was that the other fighter was wearing light armor and a short cape, and was wielding a swordbreaker of their own.

It couldn't have lasted more than a minute or so, before Philia responded to a Snake Bite that almost took her right arm off and did cut her HP by fifteen percent with a brutal Roundhouse. The kick catapulted her attacker across the room, buying her a precious few seconds. Seconds she had no intention of wasting.

They're a PKer, they're trying to kill me—I've had enough!

Philia drew back her Swordbreaker at shoulder-height, parallel to the stone floor. Free hand just below as if to stabilize the blade, she let her sword take on a red glow, a roar like a jet engine growling to life. As her attacker recovered their footing and launched another Sonic Leap, she thrust her Swordbreaker straight ahead, the crimson lance of the Vorpal Strike tripling her reach and piercing through her attacker's chest over two meters away.

In that crimson flash, she finally saw her foe's face. She saw the blonde hair and blue eyes, and her heart stopped.

Frozen, Philia could only watch in horror as her own face glared at her, and shattered into blue glass shards.

Author's Note:

Not going to go into everything that delayed this chapter for so long. Health, hurricane, health, etc., etc. But I'm back, and hopefully I'll stay that way—headaches permitting.

Single biggest problem, honestly, was plain old writer's block. That triple-threat cliffhanger last chapter? Great for a dramatic ending, not so great for a coherent follow-up. Took me some time to work out how to address each plot point, if only briefly, and trim down the cast involved in any given scene, all without things feeling too contrived. Not sure I pulled that off.

Also not helping was the lack of any immediate physical tension here. I mean, come on. Clearers against low to mid-level players, in a safe zone? Bug, windshield. Maybe kinda cathartic, but not very dramatic. And I could not think of a better way to handle Kibaou—canon, he's not stupid. Bullheaded, aggressive, yes. Stupid, no. Had trouble drawing out his antagonism. Fortunately it's also canon that he tends to set off things he can't control, and be smart doesn't mean willing to instantly surrender unconditionally. Hopefully I at least got across the point that he's willing to be reasonable, but has not completely capitulated.

Credit, and my deepest thanks, to Saerileth for looking this over and giving me the critical advice I needed to finally get this chapter into some semblance of order. Credit also to Saerileth for a few key paragraphs smoothing out the rough edges where now-deleted scenes and whatnot once were. (Credit also for inspiring me to use the gist of those scenes elsewhere, helping me iron out some of the rest of this arc.)

Going to be honest here: if I ever want to finish the Aincrad arc, and if I don't want every chapter to be hideously dragged-out with minutiae—a problem I think this chapter suffered from to some degree, and I know I've been having with Oath of Rebellion lately—I'm going to have to handle this arc mostly by focusing on the highlights. Obviously there'll be a detailed conclusion to my latest cliffhanger, but I'm simply going to have to jump from one significant event to another, skipping most of the little details, or this will never get anywhere.

Hm… I think that covers the important self-critiquing here? I'll leave the rest to you guys to judge, in full knowledge that this chapter's nowhere close to the previous in terms of quality. And I'd like to take the time to express my amazement that, since my last update, this story has reached—and surpassed—the 2,000 Favs mark on FFnet. When I started this story as a side project over six years ago, I never dreamed it would become this popular. Thanks for sticking with it this long, guys, and I hope you continue to get some slight enjoyment from here on. (And I promise, once the subplots have been tied up and parred down a little, we'll be getting back to the real point of the fic. There hasn't been nearly enough KiriMel fluff lately!)

So, yeah. Ten months late and a hundred Cor short, but here it is. Good, bad, die in a fire? Let me knows, guys, and see you in the next one (which is not as well-planned as I thought this one was, but should still be easier to write!). -Solid