November 15th, 2024

"So that's the Hollow Area," Asuna whispered, staring up at the slowly-rotating image. "Is… that what developer's rooms normally look like?" She peered at the chains that supported the cruciform island, at the mountain in the center and the castle embedded in it, at the dungeon-like structures at the points. "Because it looks more like a dungeon of some kind, to me."

Kirito shrugged, black coat shifting in the chamber's odd air currents. "To be honest, I've never seen a VR dev room. But no, I don't think this is normal. On the other hand… well, Kayaba. It wouldn't surprise me at all if he wanted his VR workspace to match the game's atmosphere."

That, she could believe. Though she hadn't voraciously devoured all Sword Art Online's pre-release information, had barely even heard of Kayaba Akihiko before he appeared as an empty crimson robe on launch day, she'd gotten a feel for his style just by progressing through Aincrad. Not to mention when Kirito and Kizmel had finally exposed him as Heathcliff, and he'd made some very telling statements about his worldview.

Makes me wonder if the room we're standing in now was part of his original plan, or something he added during the "rebalancing". Or… maybe something the Cardinal system put together on the fly. Oh, it makes my head hurt, wondering if it was the killer game developer or his weird computer system that put something together.

On the Forty-Third Floor, the gate Kirito and Kizmel had found over a year before had turned out to lead to an instanced map. After an adventure the two of them oddly refused to elaborate on, they'd activated the gate, gaining access to a smooth-walled obsidian chamber, which was almost empty. The only thing inside was a strange pedestal, made of an odd, bronzed metal, with simple controls that reminded Asuna of the train from the Fifty-Seventh Floor.

When activated, it projected a detailed, three-dimensional image labeled [Hollow Area], with smaller labels over specific locations. The gateways in the map even helpfully pointed toward three of the controls on the pedestal, indicating which gate led to which floor of Aincrad.

Kirito-kun was right: Cardinal's both trying to use Strea to keep us out of the Hollow Area, and providing a quest to get there via the gateways. That so doesn't make any sense.

Sensible or not, though, it was a fact, and so she'd brought Rain, Kirito, Kizmel, and Fuurinkazan's leaders to the Gateway Central Control for a final briefing. They still had people to rescue, and killers to stop, and they were probably running out of time for both.

"At least now we know where we're going, and how," Kizmel mused, idly tapping Grayswandir's hilt. "I assume the plan remains the same as what we discussed the other day?"

Right. Time to play guildmaster. …Why does this seem harder than when Kayaba was still playing at Heathcliff? I did all the work back then, too.

Shaking off the mix of annoyance and retroactive horror, Asuna nodded. Straightening her shoulders with a deliberate flair of her KoB uniform, she began, "That's right. As regular clearing must continue, and Guildmaster Lind judges PoH a serious but ultimately small-scale threat, the DDA is sitting this one out."

"Lind's never run into PoH, if he thinks the guy is 'small-scale'," Kirito muttered, hands clenching into fists. Kizmel reached out to him, brushing his hand with hers, and he subsided, but his eyes remained shadowed.

"I don't disagree," Asuna told him, grimacing. "But he's not completely wrong, either. This operation probably is better suited to the KoB and independent groups, anyway. Only the Army has the numbers to brute-force this, and you know they're not going to get involved at all."

Last they'd heard from Yulier, Kibaou had still refused to apologize for his actions, or directly denounce the rogue elements he'd accidentally unleashed. On the bright side, for all his official stubbornness, he apparently was slowly building up a cadre of loyal members to try and counter the extremists, but it was anyone's guess how that would turn out.

At least a few blocks of the City of Beginnings were safe enough. Fuurinkazan had led a couple of punitive expeditions, making it clear to Colonel Ganelon and his faction that Sasha and her orphans were to be left alone. The clearers wouldn't kill offenders, but they'd demonstrated it was very possible to use the physics engine to make things truly miserable when necessary.

It wasn't much, but it was a start. With as many fires as Asuna was trying to put out, she'd take any victory she could.

"So it's up to us," she continued, putting that problem out of her mind. Drawing Lambent Light, she used it as a pointer, and gestured to the fortification on the island's southern tip. "Rain will be taking her party and one extra here, through the gateway on the Seventy-Sixth Floor, to the Bastion. We may not have specific information on mobs in the Hollow Area, but a big dungeon like that probably has the worst of it."

Her vice-commander stepped forward, red-trimmed white coat swishing in the chamber's sourceless breeze. "Between me, my ninja Kumari, and Strida's wolf, we should be able to spot any trouble before it spots us, and handle anything below raid-level. …Hopefully without getting certain people killed in the process."

Even in full "unflappable Commander" mode, Asuna couldn't help but share in the collective groan that went around the room. "I'm not happy about Kuradeel going with you, either, Rain," she said heavily. "But getting volunteers for the second party wasn't easy. He's willing to go, he's kept himself out of trouble lately, and he's been working on his levels and gear. Right now, we have to take what we can get."

She wasn't happy about sending Kuradeel with Rain, and if he'd shown even a hint of stalking again, she wouldn't have, scant volunteers or no. But he's learned something from our duel, and hearing about the casualties against the Skull Reaper seems to have scared him straight. …I hope.

"I'll keep him in line, Asuna," Rain assured her, with a lopsided smile. "Even if I have to fight a duel with him, too."

"I'd like to," Klein muttered. "And I've never even met the guy… oof! Okay, okay." Rubbing the spot where Sachi had just elbowed him, Fuurinkazan's guildmaster stepped up, using the Suzaku Blade to point at the island's western tip. "Fuurinkazan's going through the Fifty-First Floor gateway to here, just outside the Foundry. Grimlock's a blacksmith, so that's probably where he is. We've got a bone to pick with that guy."

Beside him, opposite Sachi, Griselda nodded. In the instanced map, the ghost of a guildmaster looked just a bit more solid than usual, fortunately for Asuna's nerves. "I… must speak with my husband," she said, quietly, but with steel in her voice. "I need to know… why he had me murdered."

Asuna shivered, and for once not because the older woman was a ghost. In that moment, Griselda reminded her of Kirito in his darker moods. Not when he was playing the role of the Beater. No. When he's decided it's time to take the gloves off for real.

Kirito coughed, breaking the tension that had begun to set in. "That leaves me and Kizmel to handle this one." Not moving from the elf girl's side, he only pointed at the eastern tip. "The Ancient Watchtower, linked to the gateway we found way back when Kizmel first showed up on the Twenty-Sixth Floor." He smiled, just a little. "Like old times."

She wanted to argue with him. Just two players, going into the unknown—her friends, no less—chilled her. But that team was supposed to be just scouting, and for that, a smaller team was better. Besides, she'd already had that argument, and run headlong into the kind of intransigence only a united Kirito and Kizmel could project.

Rain cleared her throat. "We'll each check our respective objectives first thing," she said, gesturing at the three gateways. Then her finger pointed first to the castle in the center, and then to the temple hanging off the northern tip. "Depending on what we find, we rendezvous either at the castle… or at the Sanctuary. Hopefully with Philia and Thinker in tow."

Kirito's hands tightened again at that, and this time Kizmel's face tightened along with. No wonder, given that one of the missing was a member of their own, tight-knit party.

"We'll find 'em, guys," Rain said firmly, slipping from her professional mask. "We'll find 'em. And on that note…." She turned to Asuna. "It's about time we all got going, Commander. I don't think we can afford to wait any longer. Not with PoH down there."

"No. No, I don't think you can." It was frightening, thinking of her friends going to the Hollow Area—completely unknown territory—without her. It was more terrifying still to know PoH was trying to access something that could kill them all without them ever knowing it. Worst was not knowing what had stopped him from doing so already.

It hasn't even been a week, Asuna reminded herself. If they still hadn't duplicated the keys five days ago, they probably haven't by now. There's still time. But we don't know how much.

So she put on her Commander's mask again, lifting her chin, and stabbed the projection with Lambent Light. "Very well. As Commander of the Knights of the Blood and field leader… commence operation."

Rain nodded sharply, and strode confidently into the gate leading back to Aincrad proper. Klein threw a jaunty salute, sauntering out with Sachi and Griselda in tow. Kirito offered her an encouraging smile, and Kizmel gave a quick hug, and then her oldest friends had gone, as well.

When she was finally alone, Asuna let the mask slip, and her shoulders sagged. I want to go with them, she thought, letting her hands tremble as they'd been trying to for the whole meeting. My friends are going into the unknown… and I'm staying here.

At least when Kayaba was still playing Heathcliff, I could take off on my own when it was important enough. Now I have to hold the clearing group together. If I don't want Lind to take over, anyway. Sometimes, she thought that wouldn't be so bad. The man had grown a lot, since his early rivalry with Kibaou. But the KoB wouldn't stand for it, and someone has to keep them in line.

So Asuna stayed behind, all alone in a map separated from the rest of Aincrad. In moments, she'd have to return to Castle Kreutzen, and plan out another mapping expedition for the Seventy-Sixth Floor. But right then, she allowed herself just a minute or two, to regret, and to prepare to face the fractious frontline again. Just a few minutes.

Weary as she was, within about five minutes Asuna was drifting off. She had to shake herself when she found her head drooping. I must be more tired than I thought. When the Hollow Area is clear, I have to find time for a vacation. Even if it's just a day or so at Kirito and Kizmel's cabana—

A blur of black. Blinding blue light. And a heavy sword swung down with a resounding crash.

November 15th, 2024 (Hollow Area Day 42)

Philia paced across the terrace, north to south, south to north. The mournful wail of the Hollow Area BGM grated at her ears, even as she tried to ignore it, focusing as much as she could on the vista below Silver Moon Castle. They were out there, she knew, the Hollows and the PKers controlling them—if there was a difference—not to mention the more mundane monsters the Bastion had been spawning lately. She had to keep on an eye on them. Had to keep track of what they were doing.

"…I don't suppose you remember what day it is?"

The weary voice distracted her, bringing her attention back to the man sitting at one of the terrace's tables. Thinker was sipping tea, as usual, and if his uniform was still immaculate, the bags under his eyes produced by SAO's emotional expression system told the tale well enough. The ousted Army leader was at least as worn down as she was, if not more so.

"I lost count at least a couple weeks ago," Philia admitted, abandoning her restless vigil to join him at the table. "It's so hard to keep track in here. Doesn't help that it never really gets all the way light or dark, especially with that weird light in the tower." She dropped gracelessly into the chair across from Thinker. "I… think it's been over a month now, for me."

"Thought so." Thinker tapped his fingers on the book next to his teacup—a history book he'd taken from the Castle's library, in his own bid to stave off the Hollow Area's mind-numbing sameness and creeping terror. "…I don't know that rescue is ever coming, Philia. Not after this long."

The treasure hunter wanted to tell him off for his pessimism, but the plain fact was that she couldn't really blame him. Even more than her, he had little to do but brood and work his way through the library, never daring to venture out on the scouting runs she still kept up. The Hollow Area had been producing monsters out of his league from the day she'd arrived, and it had gradually gotten worse.

Philia still kept at it, despite the danger. Her armor showed off the consequences, her cape tattered and her shirt only barely modest after a month or more without a chance to repair or resupply. Silver Moon Castle's armory had spares she could've used, but she was determined to hold onto her own gear as long as she could, for the same reason she kept risking herself in solo scouting runs. If her current gear broke, she would give in, she refused to let herself die over, but no sooner.

This stuff is me. As long as I still have the gear I brought with me, I don't have to think about what PoH and Kuze said. Wearing anything from the Hollow Area… it would be like admitting they were right.

So Philia kept her tattered, barely-modest armor as proof of herself, and kept on scouting so that she didn't have time to think too much. And to get all the information she could, so that when Kirito and Kizmel came for her, she could look them in the eye and say she hadn't just been a damsel in distress.

She still believed they were coming. Deep down, even knowing time was moving differently for them, she believed. Because she knew her friends, whatever Thinker might've thought. She knew they would confront Kayaba himself for a friend.

There were limits, even for her. Philia had never returned to the Foundry, after her terrifying first expedition, and the branch of the Hollow Area's catacombs leading to the chamber where she'd killed her double had given her a panic attack just passing by. Even so, she'd risked going into the Bastion, every couple of days, to map and to spy. She'd watched, whenever PoH or one of the other PKers emerged, tracking where they went and when.

She'd found at least some information she was sure would be of use, even if she didn't understand all of it. Though what bothered her almost as much as her own existential fears was that she still hadn't seen the Echo active.

Those caskets under the Bastion….

Philia shivered, quickly shook her head, and gratefully snatched up the cup of tea Thinker wordlessly pushed over to her. Everything in the Hollow Area outside the Silver Moon Castle was just way too creepy, and any time she had a chance to think, it got to her. More and more, with each passing day. Even with her certainty that her friends were coming, the creeping horror of the Hollow Area was wearing on her.

"It's worse," she said, after a long silence, "that PoH still hasn't gotten to the Sanctuary. No," she corrected herself, when Thinker shot her a weary, incredulous look, "it's that he doesn't seem to care. Even if he's got all the time in the world, I don't see why he keeps laughing about it all the time."

"I can't even guess what goes on in the minds of PKers," Thinker said, with a morose shrug. "I've only heard about the PK problem second-hand at best. Yulier always told me I didn't want to see the ones that ended up locked in the Black Iron Castle's dungeon. From everything I've heard, they're just crazy, aren't they?"

"Most of them are," Philia admitted, thinking back to the Laughing Coffin Crusade and shuddering. "But PoH? PoH thinks. He nearly destroyed the clearing group half a dozen times in the first three months just by whispering in the right ears. If he thinks something is funny, it's gotta be really, really bad."

She didn't mention that Kuze's presence made things even worse. No need to worry the poor guy even more with how Kuze was both nearly as clever as PoH and a lot more actively homicidal. There was a reason she'd always aborted her scouting runs the second she saw him, Hollow or not.

Thinker, still blissfully ignorant of that part, opened his mouth to reply to what she had said, only to abruptly pause, head tilted. "…Do you hear marching?"

Philia stiffened. Weird for the paper-pusher player to hear something before she did, but then he didn't seem to find the BGM as distracting as she did. And with how big his guild is, maybe he's more used to marching feet…. When she stopped to listen, she heard it, too: feet, marching in time. Probably a lot of them, if she was hearing them so clearly from there.

The two of them bolted from their chairs, darting to the railing. There, they could see it: a small army of Hollows pouring out of the Bastion. About all the current group of them, if Philia remembered her last scouting group right. Half of them were marching off toward the Foundry, while the other circled around the Bastion itself to face the Gateway behind it.

"Something's going on," she muttered, as much to hear something besides the marching as anything else. "But what—?"

KA-WOOSH.

Light flared from the Gateways—not just the one behind the Bastion, but all three—and a plume of blue-white foam gushed out before being sucked back in. For a brief, startled moment, all Philia could think was that Kayaba had totally ripped off a Western science fiction series.

Then the meaning slammed home. They're coming! They're really coming! Excited, she started to turn to Thinker—only for movement in the corner of her eye to distract her. Just a flicker, almost subliminal, but it was over by the Foundry, not the Bastion.

Activating Searching, she quickly saw what it was: two people, running away from the Foundry, but not to the Bastion. No, they were going west, toward the Watchtower.

PoH, and Kuze. They're not going with the other Hollows. That means—

"Reinforcements," Thinker breathed, still staring wide-eyed at the Bastion Gateway. "You were right. There really is rescue coming—!"

"Not just that!" Philia spun away from the railing, racing for the door back into the Castle interior. "Stay put, Thinker, and keep an eye on what's going on that way! I gotta get to the Watchtower before they do!"

She didn't wait for him to manage a coherent response, already charging down the stairs. Her friends were coming. They were finally coming, and they didn't know about the Hollows. They didn't know PoH knew they were coming. They didn't know anything.

Wait for me, guys! I'm coming!

Teleportation was normally instantaneous, a blue flash obscuring the vision for a split second as the surroundings changed. Stepping through the Gateway on the Twenty-Sixth Floor, however, resulted in a most disconcerting sense of being bodiless, while flying through a strange, twisting tube. Several seconds of seeming to soar downward followed, before finally being spat out the other side.

The first thing Kizmel did upon exiting the Gateway was clutch at her legs, just to make sure they still existed. She would've lost her balance entirely if Kirito hadn't caught her shoulder. "You seem far less bothered than I," she got out, when her legs had steadied. "Please don't tell me this is normal in your world, Kirito."

He chuckled awkwardly, free hand scratching the back of his head. "Um. No. It's just, I recognized what Kayaba was ripping off as soon as we saw the Gateway activation, so I had some idea what it was probably going to be like going through it." The sheepish amusement faded quickly from his demeanor, as he took in their new surroundings. "…I wasn't expecting this, though."

Kizmel, equilibrium more or less regained, straightened, and found herself tensing. First she noticed the eerie, wailing song, so different from the mostly soothing music she'd otherwise grown accustomed to since becoming a Swordmaster. Then the copper sky, and the black clouds that drifted across it and under what she suspected was the bottom of Aincrad itself.

Ominous enough. Looking at the ground, though, gave her chills, realizing it looked somehow… wrong. Strangely flat, as if it didn't reflect light correctly, and somehow angular. Jagged, even. The black trees and grass were much the same. The Watchtower, on the hill ahead of them, was perhaps the worst, as it closely resembled a place she knew from Aincrad itself, yet not quite.

Overall, it felt as if she'd somehow stepped out of reality itself.

She couldn't help a nervous swallow. "Kirito-kun. Please tell me this is not how your world looks."

"No," Kirito said quietly, taking her hand in his and giving it a reassuring squeeze. "Kind of the opposite. I think I've said before that Aincrad isn't quite as detailed as our world, because of limitations of the machines? This… this is what Aincrad looks like beneath the surface. It's missing the last few layers of finished content. Think of it like a painting, before an artist is quite done."

That metaphor, Kizmel quickly decided, was all too apt. Unlike many things he'd said of "reality", this one fit quite well in her frame of reference. She could easily picture a metaphorical painter putting the finishing touches on what she saw, how it would go from this unsettling unreality to the world she'd seen every day of her life.

Bending down, she plucked a blade of that black grass, rolling it between her fingers. It looked indefinably fuzzy, and felt strangely sharp-edged. "Unfinished" was indeed the only way to truly describe it.

Shivering, she let it fall, and looked back to her partner. "We are not supposed to be here, are we? This place… it's not meant for Swordmasters to see."

"Not really, no." She found it a little reassuring that Kirito was looking distinctly unsettled himself. "It looks like Kayaba cobbled together beta assets to make his developer room. I guess he's the kind of creator who really likes to set the mood when he's working." He took a few slow, careful steps forward, and winced at the not-quite-normal sound the grass made under his feet. "…I don't like it here."

"I feel as if I've stepped into another world, and one not fit for us," Kizmel agreed, matching his stride as they set off, carefully, toward the Watchtower. "Had you told me this was similar to your world, I might've had second thoughts about wanting to see it for myself." Only silence answered her, and she glanced over to see her husband's jaw clenching. "Kirito?"

He shook himself. "Sorry. It's just… I've spent two years in Aincrad, now. I've gotten so used to being here that I don't even really notice how liquid isn't quite right in this world. This place…." He gestured vaguely at the Hollow Area in general with his free hand. "It's the first real reminder I've had since launch day that this world is a construct. The first one to really hit me, you know?"

"…Mm." She did understand, at that. She remembered well the conversation they'd had, the night before the battle with the Skull Reaper. Kirito had been afraid of what leaving Aincrad—leaving Sword Art Online—would do to the relationships he'd built in the Steel Castle. He'd also come to truly love Aincrad on its own merits, having acclimated to it even as she sought out all knowledge she could to prepare herself for his world.

Hm. If anything, this place may be more unnerving for him than for me. She found some dark humor in that, at how their roles had reversed in the past year. It also made her feel warm, knowing it was another way in which they were not so different at all. Smiling, just a little, she began to lean into him, taking comfort in their shared insecurity to ward off the Hollow Area's unnerving atmosphere.

In the next instant, Kizmel was pulling away from him, drawing her saber even as Kirito snatched out Elucidator and the Baneblade, instincts screaming at her that something was about to kill her—

A katana crashed into her shield, cutting across it in a screech of metal-on-metal. At the same moment, a cleaver was caught in Kirito's Cross Block, centimeters from the top of his head. She pushed the katana away, thrusting Grayswandir in a lightning-quick Linear, while Kirito snapped his foot up into the flip-kick of a Gengetsu.

Their unexpected attackers fell back, accompanied by discordant laughter. Kizmel's blood ran cold at the sight of them, recognizing the grinning ronin and the man in the black poncho all too well.

"Hey there, Blackie," PoH said, balancing his cleaver on his shoulder with a cool, cruel smile. "You don't know how long I've been waiting for you. Now that you're finally here… it's showtime."

Kirito's blood ran cold. He'd known all along that PoH was in the Hollow Area, that they would inevitably come face to face there, but he hadn't expected it to be this soon, or with just Kizmel for backup. Worse, he realized he should have expected it the moment he first saw a Gateway activate. There was no way PoH wouldn't have noticed it, and the PKer was more than smart enough to figure out which would be Kirito's entry point.

This was a very, very bad idea.

Kuze was a surprise, seeing as Kirito had killed him months before, but it wasn't the first time he'd run into system-controlled copies of Swordmasters. Even if the psychotic ronin was somehow running on a copy of the original's fighting style, he was nothing Kirito and Kizmel couldn't handle together. PoH was another matter.

He'd only fought the man in the black poncho directly once. At the time, PoH had been the better fighter, for all his relatively inferior stats. More than that, the man preferred to operate by guile, and only revealed himself when he had the upper hand. Appearing so soon was a very, very bad sign.

But I've been training since last time. Even if he's picked up some new tricks since then, so have I. And… I can't back down now.

Brandishing his swords, Baneblade pointing directly at PoH's chest, Kirito put on the most confident display he could. "Where is Philia?" he demanded, voice low and harsh. "If you've done anything to hurt her…."

"You'll kill me?" PoH laughed, shaking his poncho almost enough to reveal his face in full. "You know, Blackie, you're probably the only player—I'm sorry, Swordmaster—I believe would really try. But don't worry, we haven't touched her. Not with a hand, or a blade." His cruel smile widened, showing teeth. "Why should we? This place does more damage than anything I could ever hope to."

Then this really isn't just a normal developer's room. Kayaba, what the hell is this place? "What do you mean?" he snarled. "Answer me!"

"Oh, c'mon, Blackie." PoH tsked, raising his free hand to wag a finger. "You can't expect me to just tell you. Where would be the fun in that? You want answers… come and take them!"

At least the lunging attack didn't come as much of a surprise, after that. It was so telegraphed that Kizmel launched her own attack at Kuze before the ronin could set up a Sword Skill of his own, trusting Kirito to handle Laughing Coffin's leader.

In the split second it took Kizmel's Rage Spike to carry her over to Kuze, and PoH's purely stat-driven leap to reach Kirito, he hoped her trust was justified. At least, he thought, as the moment impossibly stretched out, I know I can trust her to handle Kuze. So I've gotta—!

Kirito caught the lunge with another Cross Block, and used its lack of a post-motion delay to immediately push back. PoH rode the shove, and deftly sidestepped Elucidator's thrust. He darted right back in, whirling on the ball of his foot to swing his cleaver at Kirito's right flank, only for the Baneblade to catch and turn the blow. Kirito swung his black sword down in an overhand, trying to catch PoH's knife-arm while he was still extended; he didn't manage the amputating blow he'd hoped for, but did manage a decent gash.

PoH remembers the Baneblade. He's trying to go on the offense on that side, keep it busy. But he's never faced Dual Blades before. I've got the advantage!

The Black Swordsman pressed the attack, parrying the cleaver before it could reach his neck with the Baneblade in his right hand, and slashing at PoH's flank with his left. He heard a faint crack as the blades clashed, and couldn't resist a brief grin. This time, PoH, I've got the stronger blade! No cleaver is going to match the Baneblade!

PoH fell back, and Kirito chased—cautiously. Even with superior weapons and the advantage of Dual Blades, he wasn't going to underestimate the PKer. All the same, as his boots rang oddly on the unfinished stone path, as he blocked another chop with his silver sword and lashed out at PoH's right leg with the black, he felt his initial terror ebbing.

PoH was still good, which was probably why he was still grinning. Without Dual Blades and his high-level gear, Kirito would definitely still have been in trouble. As it was, he began to truly believe it was a battle he could win.

When he finally got in a clean hit himself, sliding the Baneblade in under PoH's cleaver while Elucidator whipped in a vicious backhand across the his stomach, the PKer was knocked back a good three meters, landing in a skidding crouch. It didn't do as much damage as a proper Sword Skill would have—not even as much damage as Kirito had expected; apparently PoH had scrounged up or stolen really good armor since last they'd met—but it gave Kirito just an instant's breathing space.

He'd have known if Kizmel was in deadly danger. Using that instant to check on her, he saw her take an Iai on her shield—one of the most powerful skills available to the Katana, but evidently still scaled to Kuze's stats as of when he'd been killed. Kizmel tanked it, and in the painful post-motion she bared her teeth in a snarl and went on the offensive, saber lashing out in the eight alternating forehand-backhand slashes of a Legion Destroyer.

Not enough to kill the copied PKer, but definitely enough to send him tumbling away, giving her ample time to recover from the post-motion.

That was all Kirito had time to see, as PoH had already recovered and darted back in, cleaver folded back against his forearm in an odd stance Kirito didn't quite recognize. Not wanting to find out what the PKer had in mind, he lashed out with both his swords, one in an overhead slash, the other a head-level, horizontal slice, trying box him in.

He got a brutal reminder of just how good PoH really was when the man impossibly contorted himself, twisting to dodge both blades and slip into range. Before Kirito could recover, PoH lashed out with his arm, the folded-back cleaver finally gashing Kirito's left side. He instantly spun back, flipping the blade in his hand back to a normal grip, and tried to drag it up under Kirito's shoulder.

Kirito twisted his own torso around—catching a brief glimpse of Kuze slashing Kizmel's right side, sparking a fury he had no time to act on—and narrowly dodged the strike. He continued into a spin, using the momentum to slam the Baneblade into the cleaver's flat, producing another satisfying crack.

PoH turned with the hit, whirling away, and when he came back around to face Kirito, his grin had widened.

Confused and more than a little unsettled, it was only then that Kirito took a good look at the cleaver—and its completely undamaged blade.

What the…?

He glanced, then, at the Baneblade, and ice water raced through his veins. The silver sword, tailor-made to fight orange-marked players, touched up that very morning by the preeminent blacksmith Lisbeth, was visibly chipped and cracked.

PoH saw the expression on Kirito's face, and laughed gleefully, even as Kizmel and Kuze darted between them, saber and katana clashing furiously. "Finally noticed, did ya, Blackie? You're not the only one with special gear, y'know. You've been so busy with that doll of yours and your heroic quests, you've never seen half of what being bad in this world can get you."

He was never really trying to hit me at all. He glimpsed Kizmel exchanging a rapid series of slashes as they whirled around beyond PoH, but his attention was focused on the horrifying realization of what the PKer was really up to. That cleaver of his, it has some kind of special effect. His stats are about what I expected, but the cleaver….

"Demon-class weapon, Blackie," PoH said with obvious relish, tapping the cleaver's spine against his shoulder. "With a really neat curse on it. Your fancy Baneblade oughtta break curses real easy, right? But not here." He chuckled. "You should've sent proper scouts, Black Swordsman. You're in my territory now."

He's going to break the Baneblade. I've got spares, but it'll take a second to switch. Then he'll kill me. Unless….

Well. He'd known going in what he was going to have to do here. It wasn't the first time Kirito had made that decision. It wasn't even the first time he'd done so when he had a chance to think it through first. It was easier, this time—which just made it all the more horrible.

"In case you've got the chance to talk to the Rat later," PoH continued conversationally, seeming unperturbed by Kuze flying backward with a hole in his right shoulder, "this is called Mate Chopper. Pretty cool name, if you ask me, really fits what it can—"

With a primal roar, Kirito launched himself into a Corkscrew, whirling like a buzz saw at the PKer. PoH broke off his monologue in an instant, leaping sideways; instead of being cut to shreds, he was only gashed across the right shoulder, with a few strips torn out of his poncho. Kirito landed hard in a crouch, caught in post-motion for precious instants, and PoH took the opportunity to unleash his own first Sword Skill of the fight: the X-pattern of the Rapid Bite.

Once again, targeted on the Baneblade, not its wielder. The sword cracked ominously, and a chip flew from its edge.

Then Kirito was on the move again, spinning sideways as he came up from his crouch. In a flash of inspiration, he raised Elucidator first, parallel to the ground, as if to protect his neck—one of the optimal targets, especially for a knife—and quickly followed up with a slash from the Baneblade, aimed at PoH's neck in turn.

If he was going to try and kill the PKer while he could, counting on its bonus power to finish things quick made sense. Kirito knew it, and so did PoH. The man in the black poncho saw it coming, and immediately took the chance to target the silver blade with his cleaver.

The instant PoH committed, Kirito let go of the Baneblade, letting it fall below Mate Chopper's blow. Before the surprised PKer could react, Kirito lashed out with Elucidator, changing from a vague guard to a vicious backhand that cut down across PoH's torso.

PoH stepped on past, carried by the momentum of his failed attack. In the moment they were back-to-back, Kirito snatched up the Baneblade again, and then whirled to face his opponent again.

PoH was still smiling, but it was no longer quite the smug grin. It was hard to tell, with half his face hidden in the shadow of his hood, but there might've been just a hint of respect in his expression now.

I knew it. This is still bad, but there's one thing PoH still can't quite match. I just need to finish this before he breaks my sword—!

They lunged at each other again, both understanding that defense was not in an option in this fight. Kirito needed to take down PoH before the Baneblade shattered and left him with a fatal moment of vulnerability; PoH needed to break the silver sword quickly, or Kirito's superior DPS would kill him in seconds.

Blades clashed and sparked, black coat and poncho flared and swished. Kirito's paired swords made his strikes unpredictable, and a few good blows would end the battle. PoH's agility and smaller weapon made him harder to hit or parry, and his focus on targeting the Baneblade meant his attack patterns were equally outside Kirito's experience. Worse, his HP seemed to be recovering by no small amount, at random intervals.

Kirito's focus narrowed entirely to the fight, trusting that Kizmel would survive Kuze on her own. His vision shrank to his HP, PoH's, and their weapons. Time ceased to exist, as he pushed himself to be faster, faster, faster. The Baneblade was beginning to creak, and even Elucidator had a couple of noticeable notches.

Then he saw his chance. PoH's expression had lost the grin entirely, turning grimly focused on the fight, as if things had dragged on longer than he'd expected. Finally, the PKer let out a snarl, and started to unleash what Kirito recognized as the nine slashes of Accel Raid, the longest Dagger skill. Clearly, he thought he had time to stun-lock Kirito with it—if it hit, it would definitely destroy the Baneblade.

I don't think so! Kirito roared a battle cry, swinging up the Baneblade in the beginning of an End Revolver, counting on the simpler skill to come out first—

"Kirito, look out!"

Kizmel's warning came an instant too late, as something—Kuze, he realized belatedly—crashed into him from the side. Not hard enough to make him fall, but enough to throw him out of the pre-motion for his skill. At any other time, he would've been able to launch something else to at least keep his opponent busy, but PoH's skill was already coming out.

Small comfort to hear Kizmel howl of rage, and see a limb go flying by. PoH's Mate Chopper was already hurtling in, swinging in a mad crisscross of slashes, at a range and angle that hit him and his weapons indiscriminately.

Taking all nine hits directly, with the Mate Chopper's unreal power, might've killed Kirito even with the difference in their levels. As it was, he took five of them, and watched helplessly as his HP drained. Worse, the other four hammered on the Baneblade, producing ear-splitting shrieks of metal-on-metal—before the weapon finally snapped a few centimeters above the hilt, the blade shattering into scattered pieces.

Kizmel was still caught in a lengthy skill, slashing away at Kuze's HP. PoH was caught in post-motion from his own nine-hit skill, but it would take Kirito at least that long to switch to his backup sword. His own HP was down far enough that if he didn't move right then, he was dead—and maybe even if he did.

He threw himself back anyway, desperately forcing himself away from the PKer, his now-empty right hand slashing through the air to open his menu. Only pure muscle memory kept him from fumbling it, and he was still sure there wouldn't be time before PoH renewed the attack.

Except nothing happened. Kirito's hand closed on the hilt of his backup sword, he brandished it and Elucidator both—and found PoH still standing where he'd left him, twirling the Mate Chopper between his fingers with a lazy grin. Kuze, right arm gone but Suzaku Blade clutched in his left hand, was just leaping back to join him.

A flicker of motion, and Kizmel was standing in front of him, scarred but intact shield held at the ready. "Are you all right, Kirito?!" she demanded, half-turning her head to look at him.

"I'm alive," he rasped, trying—and mostly failing—to hide his shaking. "And this isn't over yet." He took a deep, steadying breath, and glared past the elf girl. "You haven't won this, PoH!"

"Nah." PoH grinned, but made no move to resume the attack. "This was good for a taste, but this isn't the time to settle things. Our destined final battle is elsewhere, and it'll be all the sweeter with you knowing what you're up against. Gotta build anticipation, y'know?"

Kirito gritted his teeth. That was PoH all over, and the hell of it was he wasn't sure if the man meant it, or if he was covering his own weakness. Doesn't matter. "I'll be ready next time, PoH!" he shouted. "You're not catching us by surprise again!"

"And he will not be alone." Kizmel's voice was quieter, but carried an edge of simmering fury. "You divided us today. That will not happen next time, murderers."

"Good!" Kuze finally spoke up, with the same devil-may-care grin Kirito remembered from the original. "It's more fun that way."

"Sure is." PoH's grin widened, showing teeth, as he began to step back. "After all, what's better than two rivals fighting at their best, over the fate of the world itself? So go ahead, Black Swordsman, Lady Knight. Prepare yourselves. We'll see you in the Sanctuary, when the time arrives."

Lightning-quick, the PKers turned and dashed away, soon wavering from view as they disappeared under the Hiding skill. Seconds later, Kirito's legs buckled, and he dropped to his knees.

Kizmel waited a few seconds more, making sure they were really gone, before putting aside saber and shield and dropping down beside him. Pulling a crystal from her belt pouch, she snapped, "Heal!"

The cool green energy was a relief. Seeing his HP climb back up out of the red was more of one. That wasn't the first time he'd been hit so hard, not even in the last month. It was still a scary sight.

"Are you all right, Kirito-kun?" Kizmel asked again, as his HP returned to blue, pulling him into a hug. "That was far, far too close, my love. If they had pressed the attack…."

Kirito a few deep, shuddering breaths. "I'll be okay," he said finally, and realized to his own surprise that he—mostly—meant it. PoH had been at least as dangerous as he remembered, and the fight had come terrifyingly close to ending with his own death. As it was, he'd lost one of his biggest advantages over orange Swordmasters.

But I don't think that went quite the way PoH hoped, either.

"I'll be okay," he repeated, lifting his head to show Kizmel a wan smile. "PoH should've finished things here. I figured out something, fighting him, and if I'd realized it sooner—if he hadn't caught us by surprise like that—that fight would've gone differently. He's going to regret giving me—us—time to prepare."

The elf girl looked deep into his eyes, gauging whether he really meant it. Then her shoulders slumped in relief, she smiled, and pulled him in for a quick but firm kiss. When she'd—reluctantly—broken it, she said, "You'll have to tell me later, when we're somewhere safer. At the least, I suspect PoH and his minions will soon be too busy elsewhere to attack us again, so we should have time to begin the search for—"

Behind them, without any warning at all, the Gateway abruptly flickered and died.

Kirito and Kizmel looked at each other. Then at the unexpectedly darkened Gateway. Then back at each other—and broke into helpless laughter.

"It shouldn't be funny," Kirito got out, "not when it means we might be trapped here. But after everything else…."

"Yes," Kizmel agreed, burying her face his neck. "It does seem absurd, after the more direct threat we just survived. This, at least, is a concern that isn't going to immediately kill us."

Their half-hysterical mirth was short-lived, though, as a sudden rustling from farther along the path reached their ears. In an instant, they were back on their feet, blades and shield in hand, and enough distance between them to not get in each other's way. PoH and Kuze had retreated for their own reasons, but there was no telling what other dangers lurked in the Hollow Area.

The rustling grew louder—and a blonde figure burst into view. Her armor was battered and torn, only vaguely keeping her modesty, and the Swordbreaker in her hand was chipped, but she was alive. Alive, and staring at Kirito and Kizmel as if she couldn't believe they were really there.

Then Philia dropped her Swordbreaker and hurled herself across the remaining distance, to be caught in Kirito's awkward embrace. "You're here," she choked out, burying her face in his chest. "You came… you're really here…!"

Between her sobs and her tattered armor, it was obvious the treasure hunter had gone through some rough times. How much could've happened in only a few days, Kirito couldn't guess, but as he felt a lump in his own throat, he just felt a powerful relief that she was still alive.

"Yeah," he whispered, tightening his hold on her, even as Kizmel embraced their friend from behind. "We're here." He reached up to gently stroke her hair. "We're here, Philia. It…." He swallowed hard, fighting off tears—of relief or worry, even he couldn't have said. "It's going to be okay."

I promise.

"Boss!" Dale called, over the clash of swords and ringing of Sword Skills. "This was not part of the plan!" His heavy sword slammed down in an Avalanche, blasting a black-clad swordsman off his feet. Disturbingly, the man was still cackling maniacally as he hit the ground, bounced, and exploded into a thousand polygons. "What the hell do we do now?!"

Definitely not part of the plan, Klein agreed silently, parrying a rapier with the edge of the Suzaku Blade. While he was distracted, a two-handed axe cut into his shoulder; before he could do more than curse, Dynamm's cutlass took the offender's arm off. That gave the samurai time to punch his current opponent in the nose, and whip his katana around to slash into the axeman's chest with a Tsujikaze.

It was disturbing to see what looked like a normal player, even a crazy one, shatter. The only reason Klein—or, he suspected, the rest of his guild—was able to keep going with relative ease was knowing these had to be fakes. After all, he'd killed that particular axeman before, during the Laughing Coffin Crusade. Between that and the weird cursors, it was obvious these weren't real players.

Which just made things worse, in some ways. Between the black and gray grass and trees, the creepy BGM, and fighting a small army of copy-players, Klein was having to fight off flashbacks to the Dead Workshop on the Fifty-Seventh Floor.

Sachi probably had it the worst. None of the faces this time were friends of hers—yet—but she definitely had the worst scars from the zombie outbreak. Klein wasn't surprised to see her face go pale with shock, before turning cold and grim. As Fuurinkazan hacked a path from the Gateway toward the steampunk industrial building the map called the Foundry, the former Black Cat was only occasionally visible. Her ambush tactics were in full force, disappearing under her Lyusulan Nightcloak for several seconds at a time, only to pop up somewhere unexpected and shank a copy-PKer.

The weird thing was that Lux was having an easier time of it than most of them. Klein hadn't really wanted to take her to the Hollow Area at all, knowing her history with Laughing Coffin, but she'd insisted: though she didn't know Philia well, she couldn't stand the idea of someone else being trapped with those murderers.

Now he was kind of glad she'd insisted. She had baggage with PKers, but not with copies of players; LC had only used her briefly on the Fifty-Seventh Floor. Against copies that seemed to be limited to the stats the originals had had as of their deaths, her relatively low stats and gear weren't hampering her much. She didn't hesitate to throw the four rapid slashes of a Horizontal Square at a copy of Morte, and in return his Vertical Square was just blown away.

Probably helped that the enemies around her kept locking up. Griselda was moving a lot better than usual, now that they were in the Hollow Area, and the copy-players were reacting to her the same way the Gleam Eyes had: they obviously recognized she was there, but didn't seem to understand what she was. Her very presence kept interrupting their algorithms just like proper Switching did, only without having to swap out.

Which just goes to show these are running on AI, not real players, Klein thought, ripping the draw-strike of a Zekkuu through the rapier-wielder and gaining two meters farther from the Gateway. Real LC might've been surprised, but they'd be trying to kill her by now, or something.

"Over here!" Griselda shouted, drawing the attention of another Morte. "Face me, coward!"

She spent way too much time around that Kumari girl, didn't she?

But the taunt worked. Copy-Morte whirled to face her, lifting his—its—one-handed sword toward a Vorpal Strike's pre-motion. Instead of unleashing it, he froze for a split second, blinking furiously, and in that instant Lux buried her sword in the back of his neck.

An estoc nearly tore Klein's throat out while he was distracted; only a prickling at the back of his neck prompted him to whirl in time to throw off the slim weapon's aim, and it still managed cut a strip off his neck. He retaliated with the upwards-slash of an Uki Fune, only to have his opponent casually dance back out of range. He was left trapped for a precious second in post-motion with nothing to show for it.

In that second, as the estoc came back in another blinding-fast thrust, Klein had a chance to see the wielder's face—or rather, the skull-mask with glowing red eyepieces that covered the upper half, and the savage smile below it. Damn, not XaXa! He's not even dead!

The good news was that the copy seemed to be based on XaXa's stats as of the Laughing Coffin Crusade. The bad news was that he was still freakishly fast, stabbing Klein in the chest before the samurai could bring his katana up to parry. Then the estoc was withdrawing just a few centimeters, before driving back in again, and again, and—

With a roar, Harry One slammed his warhammer into XaXa's back, staggering him. With a scream, Kunimittz drove his spear into the fencer's flank, throwing him further off his game.

The real one wouldn't be this stupid. Tough luck. I'm done with this garbage!

Snarling, Klein drew the Suzaku Blade back, ignoring a pair of knife-wielding copies trying to flank him. When crimson light engulfed his katana, he slashed to the left across the fake XaXa's chest, back over to the right, then down. Riding the momentum of that third slash, he spun, blade coming back up along the way—and just incidentally knocking his two would-be ambushers flying—before whirling to face the fencer again and chopping down one more time.

The Akatsukirei skill blasted Copy-XaXa back, tumbling a few more copies like bowling pins. Klein found it small comfort, taking stock of his and his guild's HP. None of the fakes were on their level, but they were close enough to be chipping away, and more kept coming from the Foundry.

We can't keep this up. Damn!

"Plan B!" Klein shouted over the din, preparing a Hirazuki. "Break through these guys, and make for the castle in the middle! We'll regroup with the others there!"

There was a chorus of assent, and Klein smiled grimly. Unleashing the Hirazuki's thrust to break through the copies' blockade, he promised himself, We'll be back. I don't know what PoH and Grimlock are doing, but next time… next time, we'll be ready.

So that's what the Echo meant, when that one said they were "moving" the Golems, Rain thought distantly, as she and her two parties of Knights tried to cut a path. Didn't even think they meant here. They must've found a way to the Hollow Area a lot earlier than we thought.

When her group had emerged from the Gateway to find a small army of cloned PKers waiting for them, Rain's first thought was to simply break through and rendezvous with the other groups. With nearly half a raid group between them, she'd been sure a solution would be found soon enough. Discovering that the clones' stats didn't measure up to frontline clearers had changed her plan to "cut through and scout the Bastion, then regroup". Against these, she was sure her people could handle it.

Though them counting as green players and marking as us all orange for fighting them wasn't a nice surprise.

All that, Rain thought, they could've handled. She'd led the charge, trying—mostly successfully—to ignore the memories of the Fifty-Seventh Floor, and in a few seconds her twelve Knights of the Blood had waded into the first twenty or so clones without much trouble.

Then the Gateway blinked out behind them, and the Golems of Gabirol that had been hiding behind it came out to play. And it seemed like they'd gotten some stat boosts since the "girls' night out".

Rain was determined to prove Asuna hadn't made a mistake in choosing her as Vice-Commander, though. Given that she was the only one of the current group that had fought the golems before, she'd immediately led Team A back to deal with them. Team B was continuing the fight against the clone players, and from the few glimpses she'd risked over her shoulder, seemed to be managing pretty well.

She had to remind herself, as the bearded man spun his two-handed axe and sent three clones tumbling head over heels, that Godfree was a veteran himself. He might've been causing some internal friction with the KoB over her appointment over his head, but he was a veteran of the Vemacitrin and Skull Reaper battles.

More surprising was Kuradeel's performance. Far from the overconfident blowhard she remembered from watching him duel Asuna, the creepy swordsman was applying his two-handed sword pretty well against the clones. A bit clumsy—she thought the two upward slashes and final baseball bat-like swing of a Scoop was inefficient here—but he was holding his own.

It looked like she could trust her back to Team B, at least for a bit, leaving her hand-picked party to fight off about a dozen golems. Yay, us.

At least Rain remembered how to best fight the golems, and had passed that along to her team. Unfortunately, Gunther and Ral, with their two-handed axe and heavy sword-and-shield combo, didn't have much of a choice but to brute-force them. On the bright side, they were both veterans, and even if they'd never fought golems before, they clearly knew each other's fighting styles well enough.

Grunting with effort, Gunther swung his huge axe in the triple whirling slashes of a Crimson Blood, battering one of the golems across its black-armored chest. It stumbled back, bumping into another; a third swung its two-handed sword up, beginning the pre-motion of what Rain recognized as an Eruption, two slashes that would be painful even for a tank.

Ral was having none of it. The tall woman brandished her heavy sword and shouted—not a battle cry, but the taunting skill Howl. It made the golem hesitate, just for a second, before changing the target of its skill, and Ral was waiting. Before the Eruption could come out, she lashed out with her sword to carve an X in its chest, before slashing down the center of the X. Her sword drew back, then thrust into the center again, and finally finished with a quick pair of downward slashes.

Satisfying as it was to see the perfectly-executed Phantom Rave blast the golem backwards, halfway to the Hollow Area's edge, Rain was disturbed. The attack should've done a lot more damage to it, and Gunther's Crimson Blood ought to have destroyed the other outright.

Strida and Kumari, at least, were both much more agile fighters, and could take on the golems' weak point. Strida's wolf pet, Jaeger, growled at one, holding its attention while Strida himself darted around behind it. He had to dance to one side as another golem blew past in the spin-dash of a Tempest, taking a nasty gash when he couldn't get completely out of the way, but he rode with the punches, and soon was slashing at the first letter of the "EMET" inscription on the back of his target's head.

"Strida, Switch!"

While Kumari smoothly stepped in to take Strida's place, Rain found herself with her own problems: three golems had decided to focus on her, maybe recognizing her as the party leader. With their stats clearly higher than the ones she'd fought before, that wasn't good news. But I'm Rain, she thought, feeling her lips curl in a vicious smile. Vice-Commander of the Knights of the Blood. I have a job to do here, and you're not stopping me!

She was just pulling open her menu to better equip herself she heard the high-pitched sound of a Sword Skill starting up behind her. "Rain, duck!"

She dropped, even as her free hand closed on a hilt, and Nezha's chakram blurred through the air where her head had just been. Conking one of the golems on the head, it had the benefit of both staggering it and drawing its aggro away. Sparing the time to give the former Brave a grateful nod, Rain trusted the rest of her team to make sure the golem wouldn't quite reach him, and darted in at the remaining pair.

It wasn't Kirito's system-backed Unique Skill, but she'd been practicing with twin swords. Even if she didn't have nearly the coordination to duplicate the more complicated skills, she was more than up to tricks that would confuse the golems' attack patterns.

So she danced between the pair of golems, letting their heavy blades smash down behind her. Before they could recover from the post-motion, she spun and slashed with her right-hand sword—the silver blade she'd inherited from a dead Divine Dragon—across the back of one golem's head. There was a bright flash and a sound like a gong, and while the blow took more effort than it should've, a deep scratch obscured part of the "E". Then her left hand swung across in a backhanded crimson blur, taking off most of the top half of the letter.

It tried to turn on her then, but she circled with it, silver sword and red trading off. Though Rain couldn't imitate the long, intricate combos of the true Dual Blades skill, she was more than capable of hitting the same spot over and over again. Direct damage wasn't even the priority here; the Golems of Gabirol weren't meant to be fought like most mobs.

Though as she danced around behind her chosen target, and ducked a Tempest from its companion, she did get a good look at Gunther doing exactly that. The big axeman grunted as an Avalanche crashed against him, taking off a good five percent of his HP, but he stood his ground, and retaliated with the three consecutive chops of a Lumber Jack. The golem fell back, with a basso groan, and exploded into a thousand polygons.

His partner Ral, Rain barely had time to notice in the middle of her own web of steel, was taking a more outside the box approach. She'd cornered the golem she'd taunted earlier, gotten in close, and just started bashing it in the head with her shield. She couldn't use Sword Skills with it like Heathcliff—Kayaba—had with Holy Sword, but sheer kinetic energy did the job well enough. Ral kept on it, ignoring everything else—including another golem that came up behind her, but Gunther's axe hitting its weak spot distracted it nicely—until the two of them were right at the edge.

A yell, a final smash with her shield, and the golem toppled off, trailed by a groan that faded into the distance.

Rain couldn't help a wince, reminded suddenly of launch day. I don't know what happens if you fall off the Hollow Area, a corner of her mind thought, as she danced between two golems and leapt over a third, but I doubt it's any better than doing that from a regular Aincrad floor.

There wasn't time to dwell on it. Team B was holding its own, somehow, and Team A had managed to take out four the golems, but Rain could already tell things weren't going as planned. Ducking under another golem's arm, she almost lost her own arm to a laughing copy of Johnny Black, his dagger dripping with poison. She gutted him for it, grimly ignoring his shattering body, and threw herself into a spin, buying herself a little breathing space.

HP totals of her two teams were still high, but they were gradually going down. Godfree had been hit with some kind of low-level poison, as had Kuradeel, and it seemed like every clone they killed was instantly replaced; she supposed it wasn't called the Bastion for nothing. And the golems, tougher than she'd expected, were starting to get reinforcements, seemingly from right out of the ground.

"Vice-Commander!" Godfree called over the din of battle, even as he held off a clone's lance with the haft of his axe. "We can't keep this up much longer! We have to retreat!"

"We have a mission!" Kumari snapped back, flinging a trio of poison-tipped throwing knives into the melee, before ducking a golem's sword and slashing at its knees. "We cannot abandon it now!"

"No," Rain interrupted, before Godfree could make the angry retort she could see brewing. "He's right. Plan B! Make a hole, and head for the Castle! I'm sure the others will be there, too!"

Because if they'd gotten this kind of reception, there wasn't much doubt the other teams had, as well. Godfree's being a pain with the whole power struggle thing, but he's not always wrong. Gotta break Kumari of the "no retreat" thing, though….

"Understood!" Kuradeel growled out—for once annoyed with the clone trying to slit his throat, she thought, rather than at an order he didn't like. "Breaking through!"

The golems, tough as they were, weren't exactly fast. Rain abandoned the fight with them, and started hurling swords into the crowd of clones—which, she realized, had gotten bigger while she was busy. After the third or fourth throw, she heard a chime and saw a flash as if she'd leveled up, but she had no time to wonder about it. She'd gotten too close to have time even for a Quick Change, and waded in to help Team B with just a single sword.

Tearing into the clones with the seven diagonal slashes of a Shadow Explosion, Rain did her grim best not to look at their faces.

She was pretty sure she'd killed some of them herself, for real.

"So we're still trapped here." Seated at one end of the black stone table in Silver Moon Castle's conference room, Thinker slumped. "All this… and we're still trapped." He sighed, rubbing his temples. "I appreciate you all coming here, but I'm not so sure this is any better than the existing situation."

"Don't be too pessimistic," Kirito told him from further down the table, shaking his head. "The Gateways may be offline right now, sure. I don't expect them to stay that way. Or if they do, there's another way out. Quest logic," he explained, when the Army leader lifted a skeptical eyebrow at him. "Cardinal may be using Strea to try and control access, but it seems like it has to leave some way of getting in and out. If I had to guess, Kayaba's playing games again."

"'Course, any 'other way out' might mean going through PoH and those Hollows," Klein pointed out. Sitting at the opposite end from Thinker, the red samurai folded his arms. "From what you and Philia-chan tell us, they've had a lot longer than we thought to figure out how this place works."

"Then we go through PoH." Kirito folded his hands over the tabletop, onyx eyes flat. "I wasn't planning on letting him get away this time anyway."

Sitting right next to him, Philia couldn't help a shiver. She'd seen Kirito with that expression three times before. Once facing Titan's Hand. Once on the Fifty-Seventh Floor, climbing the Necromaster's Tower. Once on the way to Laughing Coffin's hideout. Twice, people had died; the first time, he'd made a convincing threat.

She'd heard stories of the Beater, the over-the-top persona Kirito had occasionally adopted in the early days of the death game, who claimed to be willing to do whatever it took to beat the game but was really meant just to provoke the other clearers into doing the right thing. This was the Black Swordsman, whom she'd seen do things that no one else could. The man who'd adapted to the rules of society forced by Aincrad's nature.

It was scary. Yet Philia still felt like leaning against him, because that very cold pragmatism meant she was safe now. This was the young man who would stop at nothing to protect his friends.

After a second, she did lean against him, resting her head on his shoulder. Though Kizmel was right there, on Kirito's right, she knew the elf girl wouldn't mind. She wasn't the jealous type.

Philia needed the reassurance. What she'd been through already had been bad enough. Discovering that the Gateways that had finally allowed rescue to reach her and Thinker had shut down almost immediately, cutting off contact with the rest of Aincrad again, had been another nasty blow. Worse when Fuurinkazan and Rain's KoB group had arrived, revealing they'd been overwhelmed, too.

Now, the twenty-five stranded Swordmasters had gathered in the conference room high up in Silver Moon Castle, an oblong chamber lit by more of the black torches that seemed to be everywhere in the Hollow Area. Thinker sat at the head of the huge obsidian table, Klein at the foot, with Fuurinkazan and Team Kirito along the table to his right and the KoB group to the left. It was crowded, yet it still felt lonely, knowing they were all the friendly players in the entire Hollow Area.

Not as lonely as it was, though, Philia thought, pressing her head just a little closer against Kirito's leather coat. They came for me. I knew they would, but after so long…. I've got to talk to them.

"I've heard stories," Thinker was saying, giving Kirito a wary look. "You and Lady Kizmel have a reputation, even on the lower floors. And of course I've heard of the Knights of the Blood, and Fuurinkazan. But Kirito, you were all forced to retreat here, and you yourself lost your special sword. You've seen that it's not just PoH. What makes you think you can defeat them?"

"We came in blind," Rain told him, even as her Knights—especially Godfree—bristled at the suggestion they couldn't handle things. "We've got intel now. I'm guessing you guys didn't just sit around this castle the whole time—and ouch, I never imagined a time differential—and from what Kirito says, PoH screwed up."

"He did." Kirito nodded; and if leather creaked from his fingers tensing, he still sounded pretty confident. "I've fought him before, once. Even if he was really playing around this time, trying to wreck the Baneblade instead of killing me outright, he still let me know a few things he'll wish he hadn't. And breaking the Baneblade might not have been his brightest idea."

"This situation is far from hopeless, Guildmaster Thinker," Kizmel put in, smiling thinly. "PoH is dangerous, make no mistake. But playing around will be his undoing, in the end. Especially as he's given us time to plan." She leaned forward, looking past Kirito at Philia. Her smile turned warm for a moment—even teasing—at the sight of the blonde's head resting on the youth's shoulder, but quickly turned sober again. "Philia, if you could please tell us what you've learned in the past month and more?"

Right. My turn. Reluctantly, Philia pulled away from Kirito, took a deep breath, and stood. This was why she'd taken so many risks since coming to the Hollow Area, after all. She'd known her friends would come for her, and she refused to be just a damsel in distress.

Stepping back from the table, the treasure hunter squared her shoulders. "It's ugly," she said, straight out. "I still don't know all of it, but it's ugly. You guys know about the Hollows now. It's worse than it sounds. I finally figured out, a couple weeks back, why there never seem to be more than about fifty of them at a time. I don't know why, but there's a limit to active NPCs here. And they need… raw materials."

She couldn't hold back a shudder at that. Even knowing Kizmel, Tia, and the MHCPs were the only Turing-class AI in SAO, she'd spent too long in Aincrad not to have gotten used to ordinary NPCs. What she'd learned in the Bastion had made her visit to the Foundry retroactively worse.

"I wondered," Philia continued, after a pause that left the Knights and Fuurinkazan exchanging uneasy looks. "Why I never saw the Echo, after everything we heard pointed to them coming here. Well, it looks like PoH and Grimlock used them to get here, and then… converted them."

"Converted?" Sachi repeated, looking ill. "Does that mean…?"

"Yep." Philia tried for a rueful smile, and couldn't quite manage it. "From what I can tell, they were paralyzed and stuffed in caskets under the Bastion. Whenever PoH needs new Hollows, members of the Echo are taken to the Foundry, where Grimlock… does things. They go in, new Hollows come out."

There was silence for a minute, as the others took that in. Thinker only winced, having heard it before; Rain swallowed hard, while Nezha grimaced, though most of the KoB just looked bemused. Kirito's gloves creaked again, and Kizmel closed her eyes and muttered something Sindarin. Fuurinkazan—

Klein's fist slammed down on the table, making both Sachi and Lux jump. "Dammit! What the hell is this place?! A developer's room shouldn't be so damned creepy! Avatar limit, sure, but something as sick as this?! There's no reason for this! Not unless Kayaba wanted to—!"

"Wanted to make even his personal work area part of the story?" Kizmel finished for him, low and a little too calm. "Yes, Klein. I believe that's exactly what he wanted. Though from what Kirito has said, some of it is probably Cardinal improvising, I would be more surprised if Kayaba hadn't immersed himself this way. The man is… twisted."

Ouch. Philia hadn't really had a chance to see how the elf girl was coping with the revelation that Kayaba was her father, before trapping herself in the Hollow Area. From the look of it, she guessed it was "not well".

"Who cares?" Kuradeel broke into her thoughts, sounding bored. Resting his elbow on the table, he propped his chin on his hand with a bored expression. "They're just NPCs. Kizmel aside, there's no sense getting freaked out by this. They're just dolls."

The room's temperature seemed to fall about ten degrees, as Fuurinkazan collectively glared at him, Kizmel stared, and Kirito's eyes turned positively glacial. Even Godfree, whom Philia thought still wasn't convinced that Kizmel was a person, gave Kuradeel an uneasy look.

A throat cleared with an echoing sound, drawing attention to Griselda. "I wouldn't advise taking things so lightly, Kuradeel," she said mildly, calm but with obvious chiding. Philia was suddenly reminded that the ghost had been a guildmaster in her own right, before her murder. "Please, Philia," she went on, when Kuradeel snorted but subsided, "continue."

"Right." The treasure hunter took another breath to steady herself—helped when Kirito unexpectedly reached out to grip her hand, just for a second. "Well, that answered why I only ever saw so many Hollows, and why the Echo turned out to be a red herring. What I didn't get was why the numbers dropped every so often. I've been patrolling enough to be pretty sure they weren't just out of sight somewhere—there were too few, sometimes. It was like PoH kept killing them, but I didn't know why. Don't know if you guys have noticed, but you don't get much EXP from anything here."

Not that she'd tried fighting Hollows after the first one. If it had been her Hollow, it hadn't given her much EXP, and no of the "regular" mobs had been worth much anyway.

"Mate Chopper," Kirito said, nodding slowly. "I've heard rumors of a similar weapon. PoH's been killing Hollows to power up his knife. That explains a lot."

Just about everything. Even if Philia shivered at the very idea. She'd had enough trouble fighting through the Doppels on the Fifty-Seventh Floor, and they'd at least been visibly decaying. That PoH could so casually slaughter so many exact duplicates of players was just…. Urgh. I don't even want to try to get into his head.

"There's another problem with them, though," Thinker said, reentering the discussion, a worried frown creasing his face. "Leaving aside PoH's wild stories about some of us being Hollows, fighting them turns cursors orange. Even if we defeat PoH and open a way out, most of us are stuck here anyway."

Yeah. That, too. Though not visible indoors even in the Hollow Area, Philia had seen earlier that Kirito and Kizmel were the only ones in the room who still had green cursors. And they won't leave without us. Without me. She felt a rush of warmth at that, despite the situation.

"And we're stuck here." Godfree was pale, clearly not as calm as he wanted them to think he was. "Just us, with no way out. I know we're clearers, but that's part of the problem, too. They're going to need us back on the frontlines!"

Kirito waved a hand, brushing off Thinker and Godfree's words. "We'll figure that out later. There are quests to remove criminal status, and if it's different from usual, I've got some theories. Like I said before, I don't think we're really trapped, and the time dilation means we've got breathing space to work it all out. First thing we have to do is stop PoH from killing us all. Philia," he went on, looking up at her, "is that all? About the Hollows, anyway?"

"I wish. That may not be the creepiest part." Philia looked over at the ghost in the room, whose face tightened at her gaze. "Griselda… Grimlock is trying to make a special Hollow. Of you. I don't know what he's doing, but it's creepy, and it isn't working… and I don't think he knows about you yet. You as a ghost, I mean."

"…I see." Griselda's face went blank, and it was her turn to take a deep, steadying breath. "Then I definitely need to have a … talk… with him. Philia, we found out the hard way that a frontal assault isn't going to work. Is there another way in?"

Asuna was on her feet and across the room, Lambent Light in hand and glowing with the pre-motion of a Linear, before the echoes faded. Heart pounding, she got ready to perforate whoever had just tried to chop her in half—only to stop short, eyes widening, at the sight of her attacker.

Strea, still wearing the sharp suit Team Kirito had described her using recently, swung her sword up and away from the sparking Gateway control console. "Hm. That's too bad," she mused, casually resting her heavy blade on her shoulder as she peered down at her handiwork. "That really is the best the admin restrictions will allow, huh?"

…It was the controls she was after, not me. Shivering, Asuna realized that if she had been the target, the MHCP would probably have just killed her. Suddenly she had a much keener appreciation for Kayaba's philosophy of "fair" gameplay.

"Strea," she got out, when she was sure her voice wouldn't shake too badly, "just what do you think you're doing?"

"Mm?" The lavender-haired NPC turned to face her, and suddenly smiled. "Oh, hi, Asuna! Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you. I just had to wreck the controls here before things got too out of hand."

"Out of hand," Asuna repeated flatly. Letting her rapier fall out of the pre-motion—it wasn't like she stood a chance of hitting Strea with it anyway—she took a deep, steadying breath. "And just what do you mean by 'out of hand'?" She walked back toward the center of the chamber, and used her blade to point sharply at the now-flickering projection above the console. "You just stranded twenty-three more Swordmasters down there!"

"Kirito and the others probably told you, but I'm just trying to maintain system stability here, Asuna," Strea replied, with a casual shrug. "Honestly, it's already getting too much already. The whole system could collapse, if this keeps up. That'd be kinda bad, don't you think?"

The insane thing was, Asuna could see her point. In the abstract, at least. Players having access to a developer's room wasn't so bad with an ordinary game—or so Kirito had told her—but in SAO, it had the potential to be catastrophic. That was why they'd put together an expedition to go stop PoH in the first place, after all.

In practice, though, an English saying about horses and barn doors came to mind. "Strea," she said carefully, finally sheathing her rapier, "the people causing 'system instability' are already there. It can't really get worse than PoH. All you're doing is keeping us from fixing the problem."

She thought there was a chance that might even sway Cardinal's agent. Asuna and Team Kirito had won her over with their own logic at one point during the zombie outbreak on the Fifty-Seventh Floor, after all, by pointing out the greater danger of the plague reaching other floors. The current situation wasn't that different. Right?

To Asuna's dismay, Strea shook her head. Smile taking on a sympathetic edge, she headed toward the chamber's entrance. "Sorry, Asuna, but my mission parameters are clear: keep anyone away out of the Hollow Area I possibly can. Handling the ones already there is outside my directives at this time."

She really isn't like Kizmel. At all. Kirito-kun's right, she's sapient, but she's still bound by her programming. She must've just had more leeway last time.

And there was absolutely nothing Asuna could do about it. Empowered by the system, Strea was effectively invincible, and she'd already smashed the control console. No doubt she would be back at the teleport chamber beneath the Black Iron Castle well before anyone could reach it in her absence. If her mission was just to keep people out of the Hollow Area, she'd more or less won.

Asuna's shoulders slumped, and she made no attempt to interfere as Strea casually walked out of the room. All she could do was pray that Kirito, Rain, and the others could handle things on their own. All I can do now is get back to Ark Sophia, and make sure the frontline doesn't collapse while they're gone—

"Hey, cheer up!" Strea called over her shoulder, breaking into the fencer's thoughts. "If you're not happy with my mission, look on the bright side: I couldn't actually destroy the system, just wreck the interface. It's going to be running weird, not totally broken, so… you can count that as a win, right?"

Then she was gone, back Aincrad's public map, and Asuna was left alone. Alone, with a corner of her mind wondering if Strea had just deliberately given her a clue, or if the MHCP genuinely didn't understand the impact of what she'd just said. With her, it could've been either.

"Working weird", not totally broken…. And it might not be in her "parameters" to know what the Gateway system is doing now….

Brief despair banished, Asuna quickly brought up her menu, and started typing up a message. [Argo, I need you. Charge whatever you want, just get here quick!]

The view outside the windows was vaguely unsettling, with its endless copper sky and black clouds. For once, though, it wasn't quite as bad: a storm had begun to rage, and if it wasn't quite normal either, it was close enough to distract from the Hollow Area's usual unnatural surroundings. The music within the Silver Moon Castle was also much less disturbing than outside, with a more otherworldly than unnerving feel.

More importantly, Kizmel thought, the Castle's bath felt simply sublime. A vast room bordered in black tiles, the "tub" was at least twenty meters long, with a wall-to-wall window overlooking the Hollow Area. Unlike the bath in Moongleam Castle, which it otherwise so closely resembled, it wasn't segregated by gender, which meant there was no concern of being separated from Kirito while she soaked. Most of the other Swordmasters currently trapped had declined to partake, perhaps for that very reason, but that was their loss, not hers.

"This feels wonderful," she said, sighing happily as she sank into the water, sprawling against smooth stone shaped just right to hold her. "Most of this place feels unfinished, but this bath… it feels even better than a bath in Aincrad proper, with the Ethics Code off. While I believe I still favor Yofel Castle or Castle Galey for other features, the water here is simply unmatched."

A few paces to her left, picking up a brush and applying soap to it, Kirito chuckled. "And this would be the other side of pre-release game features: things that are scaled back for the final version. Probably for performance reasons in this case. I bet water this good would've put too much of a strain on the servers if it were used throughout Aincrad."

"Not sure I care why," Philia said wistfully. "I haven't had a bath feel this good in two years. …Ooh, yeah, that's nice. Thanks, Kirito…."

Kizmel couldn't help a smirk at the way the treasure hunter leaned back into the brush Kirito had just begun to rub against her shoulder blades. It wasn't often someone else had the chance to experience her husband's wonderful back-scrubbing technique; there was something oddly satisfying about seeing another succumb to it. Perhaps, she mused, knowing that he honed his technique on me. For Philia, this is a special occasion. I am fortunate enough to receive this treatment much more often.

She didn't feel even slightly jealous, despite the fact that Philia's generous figure was no more concealed by a human "swimsuit" than hers, or Kirito's. Though her husband clearly appreciated the blonde's looks, it was Kizmel's dusky skin at which he kept sneaking looks. Though she may have kept her chest mostly above water specifically to draw his eye, it was to tease, not out of any concern.

Philia needs this, Kizmel thought, watching the girl melt into Kirito's scrubbing. She's been here over a month, with no company but a near-stranger. This is probably the first chance she's had to relax since then.

It was a pity neither Rain nor Sachi had joined them. After the meeting had adjourned, and it was determined that it was better to rest for a day before assaying the tunnel network, Philia had led Kizmel and Kirito straight to the baths. Rain, however, had begged off, citing a need to get her Knights settled and investigate something new that had come up—what, she hadn't said, though she'd seemed excited—while Sachi mentioned business with Fuurinkazan. Such, Kizmel supposed, was the nature of guild membership. Not so different from her own days in the Pagoda Knights.

Though she suspected Sachi's absence was also partly to allow her and Kirito to catch up with Philia without interference. If she was afraid we were going to scold Philia, however, her fears were quite misplaced. While the two of them had originally intended some sharp words for the treasure hunter, after worrying them so, they had come to an unspoken agreement not to as soon as they learned the truth of what she'd endured.

Over a month, Kizmel thought, wallowing in the warm water lapping at her skin. So that's what Kayaba meant, when he spoke of "accelerated time". It's comforting to know my memories may well be real, but I would rather the reassurance hadn't come from putting my friend through this. Alone but with Thinker for company, in a place where the dead walk even more convincingly than the Necro Plague had made them? I might've gone mad. No, Philia has already been punished with far worse than a scolding.

At length, as thunder cracked beyond the window, and rain pattered against it, Philia let out a long sigh. "Seriously, guys," she said quietly, shifting slightly as Kirito's brush made its way down her back. "Thank you. It's… it's been hard, down here. Thinker's nice, but he's not… well, you. He's not…."

"He's not exactly a clearer," Kirito said, when Philia fumbled for the right words. Nodding, he adjusted the brush, drawing a hum from the treasure hunter. "He doesn't know what it's like on the frontlines. And he hasn't spent most of a year with you. That about right?"

"Pretty much," Philia agreed. Tossing a wry smile over her shoulder, she added, "I don't think I ever realized before just how, um, different we are. Thinker… he's more like a normal gamer, isn't he? I'd forgotten what that was like." Her smile faded. "And he doesn't… know how things really work. Not like you, Kirito."

Something about her tone brought Kizmel's full attention, rousing her from the doze she'd begun to sink into. "Philia?"

"…Sorry." The blonde swallowed hard, facing forward again, gaze falling to slow waves of the bath. "It's just…. I mean…." She took a deep, shuddering breath. "Am I… are we… real? Tia says we're not, that real humans can't exist here. I know, she's just going by what PoH told her, and PoH lies all the time, but… but I…."

Kirito's scrubbing slowed, and he exchanged a look with Kizmel. To be sure, that was a question Kizmel herself had grappled with many times, over the past eight months. Even after all the reassurance Kirito and Fuurinkazan had given her, some nights it was hard to be so sure she wasn't just an endlessly-replaceable copy of a doll. Though her husband was absolutely convinced she was a singular, real person, coming to grips with the nature of her world wasn't easy.

With everything they'd seen, with how strange the Hollow Area was, she couldn't blame Philia for having doubts. Especially after over a month trapped there, almost alone, facing the proof that some Swordmasters were only copies. To Kizmel's dismay, she didn't have the words to reassure her friend. Though she was studying, every single night, she still simply didn't have the knowledge of the world or the way Aincrad—the game Sword Art Online—worked. Not enough to say with certainty that the treasure hunter's fears were completely unfounded.

But to her surprise, Kirito abruptly set aside the brush and pulled Philia into a hug. Heedless of his own issues—and their mutual lack of clothing—he wrapped his arms around her stomach, and rested his chin on her shoulder. "You're real, Philia," he whispered into her ear. Voice firm with conviction, he repeated, "You're real. I know you are."

Philia stiffened in surprise, before bringing a hand up to touch his arm. "How… how can you be sure?" she said thickly.

"Well, for one thing, I know computers. I know SAO's servers couldn't possibly handle full, complete copies of humans. Whatever Kayaba used to create Kizmel wasn't standard computer tech. And," he added, before Philia—or Kizmel herself—could latch onto that, "we know you can't be like Kizmel. We've heard from Tia and from the MHCPs that Kayaba couldn't repeat whatever he did for her and Tilnel. Which means, Philia, you can't be an AI copy."

"But the MHCPs and Tia are full AI, and they run just fine," Philia protested weakly. "Not to mention Kuze is just like I remember. And didn't you say you and Kizmel ran into a copy of Diavel last year?" She shook her head, hand falling away from Kirito's arm. "We still don't know—"

"Yes, we do," he interrupted. "Tia and the MHCPs aren't copies. And Kuze, and Diavel? All we've ever seen of Kuze is him being a psycho. Diavel… I knew him. Briefly, but well enough to tell you the AI using his face wasn't even close to the real thing. It was based on the persona he used publicly, not the real man." He shook his head, ruffling her hair in the process. "Those copies are superficial, based on things the system observed, that's all. If you need proof that you're more than that…." Kirito paused, clearly thinking hard. "Try this. What was the first game you ever played?"

Kizmel had to raise a hand to stifle a chuckle at the look on Philia's face. Bemusement at the apparent non sequitur turned to annoyance, which quickly shifted into a thoughtful frown. "…My dad's copy of Dragon Quest III, I think? He was messing with me. I'd seen enough movies by then to be shocked games were so primitive. After he got a good laugh, he showed me DQX. …Oh."

It was all gibberish to the elf girl, but the look of surprised understanding on Philia's face, and Kirito's grin, gave her the context well enough. "See? Unless you've told somebody else here that story—and I'm guessing you haven't—that's something the system couldn't have known." He pulled back, freeing a hand to ruffle her hair. "We're in a bad situation here, sure. This place is really creepy. But you're you, Philia."

And Kirito thinks he isn't good with people, Kizmel thought, smiling at the display with no small amount of pride. He may not be the most eloquent, but he knows the right words when it counts.

And they were clearly the right words. Philia choked out a laugh, tears filling her eyes. "Thank you, Kirito," she managed. "I… I knew PoH had to be messing with me, I knew it was crazy, but this place… it's been so hard…." Twisting around, she abruptly flung her arms around Kirito's neck, hugging him tight. "Thank you," she said again, into the very startled swordsman's ear. "You've saved me, y'know that? …Thank you."

There was no way for Kizmel to stifle a laugh at that, seeing Kirito's expression. As accustomed as he was to her in such situations, after all this time—and even as often as he'd bathed with the other girls in his social circle, in recent months—having Philia cling to him so was clearly beyond his ability to comprehend.

Kizmel still wasn't at all jealous. Though when she caught his eye, she folded her arms under her chest in a deliberate display, her aim was to tease, not chastise.

"Oh, boy, what do we have here?" A snicker. "Kii-bou, I know what I pulled with the sauna last month, but I didn't know you an' the girls were this open! You've been holdin' out on yer big sis!"

It was very nearly as amusing to see Philia scramble away at the interruption, to the point of slipping with a yelp beneath the water. It was also more than a bit startling, though, to hear that particular voice, and Kizmel glanced to the bath's door with as much surprise as the treasure hunter. "Argo? How are you even here? The Gateways—"

Familiar hooded cloak swaying as she sashayed into the room, Argo grinned. "Not quite wrecked, Kii-chan. Not fer lack o' tryin', but all Strea did was break 'em a bit. Right now, they kick in 'bout once an hour fer ten seconds. Just 'nough time ta jump through."

"Every seven hours, for a bit over a minute, from the Hollow Area's perspective," Kirito said after a moment, crossing his arms thoughtfully. Kizmel was amused he'd seemingly already forgotten the compromising position in which Argo had found him. "…Wait a second. It's only been seven hours. How do you know the timing isn't a fluke?"

"Bumped in ta Vanel on my way here. Since the whole mess is Cardinal fightin' with Kayaba's restrictions, it ain't really random, an' she could read the files." Argo waved a hand. "Kinda handy, havin' an inside girl. Even if she can't spill all th' beans without risking Cardinal crackin' down." She paused, looking over the tableau in the bath itself. An uncharacteristic hint of red lit her whiskered cheeks. "So… this how ya guys usually unwind? I mean, you girls with Kii-bou, au naturel?"

Kirito, reminded of the situation, choked. Philia, having only just recovered from her accident moments before, flushed crimson and looked away. Hm, Kizmel thought, glancing from the two of them to the Rat and back. I've made much progress with them, but perhaps not as much as I'd thought. …On the other hand, this is Argo. If ever there was genuine cause for shame when bathing, she would find it.

The elf girl smiled to herself. Two, however, can play at that game.

"It does have its advantages, Argo," Kizmel said aloud, casually sliding over to press herself against Kirito's flank. "A good bath relaxes body and mind, and there is something refreshing about the lack of barriers between us. Why don't you come in yourself? I think you'll find the water here the most pleasant in all of Aincrad." She paused, for deliberate effect, even as she slipped an arm around her husband's back. "Of course, if you'd rather use a swimsuit yourself, we won't object."

That provoked an incoherent choking sound from Kirito—and another from Philia, though she was fairly sure the treasure hunter was stifling a laugh—and a narrow-eyed look from Argo herself. For a long moment, the information broker only stared at her, as if wondering what she was really thinking. Perhaps, Kizmel thought to herself, even with some small amount of envy.

Finally, Argo snorted, a grin spreading across her face. "Awright, Kii-chan, I'll do that." Bringing up her menu, she tapped at her status; a slight fumbling betrayed the fact that she wasn't quite as relaxed as she looked. "Now, usually, I'd charge ya fer this, but just this once, I'll give ya a freebie. I'll take the sight o' Kii-bou without a shirt as payment, this once."

A brief flash of blue light, as Argo's cloak disappeared. Another heralded the departure of her baggy tunic and trousers, as well as her boots and gloves. Left in the plain, utilitarian undergarments of a Swordmaster, the Rat hesitated—briefly, but noticeably, for her—before finally pressing one last key. Light flashed again, and suddenly all that covered her were her ever-present whiskers.

It was well worth it to see Argo blush bright red. Kizmel couldn't help an open grin as the Rat tried—and failed—to pretend she didn't care that Kirito was seeing her naked. She didn't even mind that he was clearly appreciating the view, however much he tried not to stare. Honestly, Kizmel would've been more worried if he hadn't admired Argo's lean, athletic build; slim, but hardly flat.

Kizmel did have some pride as a woman, after all. If Kirito hadn't taken at least a moment to compare Argo's body to hers, she might've worried he didn't care about her looks at all. As it was, his quick—not quite as subtle as he probably hoped—glance between her, Argo, and Philia gave her just the result she hoped for.

"D-don't get too used ta this, Kii-bou," Argo said, finally hopping gracelessly into the bath, sending waves across it. She drew up her legs, but didn't—quite—cover her chest. "Anythin' more, and I really will have ta charge ya. An' talk with Kii-chan, 'cause I'm not getting' in her way."

"It would take far more than merely a bath to concern me, Argo," Kizmel said serenely, deeply amused at seeing the Rat embarrassed for once. "I trust you, and Kirito. Your vices lie elsewhere, in any case." She nudged Kirito, and smirked at the way the touch of her skin on his immediately drew his attention. Then she raised an eyebrow, noticing the crease in his brow. "Is something amiss, Kirito?"

Perhaps it was a sign of how well she'd trained him that he was adapting to Argo's unclad presence so well. "Not exactly," he said slowly, glancing back at Argo. "This just reminds me of something. I never would've asked before, but now…. Argo. The Fourth Floor, in the canals. Those floater sandals you used. Asuna scared me out of asking then, but I've always wondered…."

Ah. Kizmel hadn't been present for that, but she'd heard the story later. Argo had used special footwear that had allowed her to walk on water, but they had required the wearer to use as little equipment as possible. Though the information broker had apparently teased him at the time, Asuna's presence had precluded a straight answer.

Argo, clearly still off-balance, looked away, seemingly finding the rain and lightning outside more interesting. "Now that, Kii-bou, ain't free. Ya had yer chance back then, an' it ain't my fault Aa-chan got in th' way. Thirty thousand Cor, Kii-bou, if you wanna know that badly—"

Kizmel used her free hand to bring up her menu, went into her inventory, and quickly materialized a pouch of coins. "Here you are, Argo," she said, tossing it over with a smirk. "Now you have me curious."

Plainly taken aback, Argo caught the bag. Staring at it for a long moment, she finally sighed, tucked it into her own inventory, and shook her head. "Dunno why I'm feelin' flustered this time," she muttered, so low only elven ears could hear. "Deal's a deal. It was just the cloak, Kii-bou. Just the cloak. If ya'd rocked the boat too much when ya gave me a lift, you'da gotten a real show that day."

"You actually did that?" Philia was staring at the Rat, eyes wide. "I mean, I heard rumors about those floater sandals, but I didn't think anybody used them. You risked that?"

"Around Kii-bou?" Argo shrugged, blush defying her overly-casual shrug. "Hey, you were naked when I got here, Phi-chan. You know Kii-bou's got that 'ya can trust 'im with anything' aura. I tell ya, if a Floor Boss was ever a cute girl, he could charm 'er into lettin' us through."

Kizmel and Philia both nodded, even as Kirito sputtered and tried to look somewhere safe. Unfortunately for him, three directions were occupied by attractive women, and Kizmel had him trapped well enough he couldn't turn around. "She has you there, husband," she murmured in his ear, smirking.

She was glad to see Philia laugh, her shoulders easing. As much as she enjoyed teasing Kirito, and as deeply amusing as it was to see Argo the Rat embarrassed, it was even better to see some of Philia's stress ease. She couldn't imagine what the treasure hunter had been through, the past subjective month, but it had clearly been very trying.

As much as I've struggled with my own existence, this past year, at least the worst of it only lasted a day, and I've had my husband and my friends to help me through it. Philia has been here, almost alone, through her crisis. …Never again.

"Anyway, forget the skin fer a minute," Argo said, cutting through the companionable silence that had fallen. "Serious talk time. Kii-bou, ya ran into PoH, an' he even broke the Baneblade. How the heck are ya not freakin' out?"

Attention turned to the lone male in the room, who squirmed under the combined gazes. Admittedly, Kizmel had been wondering that herself. She knew that he was not as calm about it as he appeared—her actions in the bath were not solely to ease Philia's tension—yet he was definitely less concerned than she would've expected, having been shown PoH had not lost his touch since their last encounter.

"I'm probably going to have nightmares tonight," Kirito admitted after a moment; the way he pulled Kizmel closer, embracing the touch of her bare skin despite having company, added point to his words. "But… maybe not as many as I used to. Because now I know I was right, back in March." He took a deep breath, and if there were shadows in his dark eyes, they weren't as deep as Kizmel had sometimes seen them. "I killed Morte, and Kuze, partly to make sure they couldn't tell anyone about Dual Blades."

Philia flinched at the admission. Argo, though, only nodded slowly. Kizmel wasn't surprised. Given the Rat's ruthless execution of Johnny Black, she probably understood Kirito's actions better than any other Swordmaster.

"I had to do it anyway, both times," he continued, forcing a calm Kizmel knew wasn't entirely genuine. "But it's a fact that silencing them was part of it. And now I know I was right, because it means I have a chance against PoH I wouldn't have otherwise. Sure, everybody knows about Dual Blades now, but PoH's been holed up down here pretty much the whole time I've been using it openly. Which means he doesn't know how to fight it. Not really."

Kizmel thought back to the battle earlier in the day, and gave a slow nod. She hadn't seen as much of it as she might've liked, busy as she'd been with Kuze's Hollow, but she'd glimpsed some of it. PoH had kept Kirito off-balance by focusing on the Baneblade rather than going for killing blows. When Kirito had adjusted for that, the unpredictability of the twin-sword style had definitely thrown the PKer off.

"Huh." Argo's narrowed thoughtfully. "Y'know, I can see that, Kii-bou. Think you've got a bit of a problem, though. You got another sword as good as the Baneblade, 'sides Elucidator? Dual Blades ain't much good without a second blade."

"I do have an idea about that, actually." Awkwardly fishing his right arm from between himself and Kizmel, Kirito opened his menu, and soon materialized the Baneblade, blade broken off about fifteen centimeters below the hilt. "Most weapons are completely destroyed when they take this much damage. The Baneblade wasn't. I think it can be reforged. We just need to get Lisbeth down here, and if you made it, Argo, that shouldn't be too hard." He glanced upward, seeming to look at something beyond the ceiling. "Of course, it all hinges on me being right about this castle…."

"What about this castle?" Another voice broke in unexpectedly, drawing all eyes back to the bath's door. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to eavesdrop. But if there's something you need to know about this castle, I can probably tell you."

Somehow, Kizmel wasn't entirely surprised to see Vanel pad into the room. For once, she wasn't wearing her Pagoda Knight's armor, but rather a black two-piece swimsuit. Asuna, she thought suddenly, taking in the hairstyle and facial structure, without the armor the MHCP usually wore. That's who she reminds me of. Vanel resembles Asuna, if Asuna were one of my people. I wonder if that is a coincidence…?

"Hm. Knowing human social trends, this… isn't quite what I was expecting here." Vanel looked over them, clearly bemused, before shrugging. "If that's what you're comfortable with, however, I certainly won't argue." Unequipping her swimsuit, she slipped into the bath. "Now, then, Swordmaster Kirito, you were saying something about the castle—I'm sorry, what's so funny?"

Even Kirito, usually the least likely to be comfortable with something like a woman unexpectedly disrobing in his presence, was clearly stifling a laugh. That, and Vanel's look of sheer confusion, made it even harder for Kizmel to hold in her amusement. Neither Argo nor Philia even made the attempt, openly laughing at the NPC's clear misunderstanding.

Not, I think, that I'd normally find this quite so entertaining, but under the circumstances, I suppose I must find mirth where I can. …And take comfort in further proof that I am not like "ordinary" NPCs, even those such as Vanel.

"Pardon me, Vanel," Kizmel said, coughing into her hand. "It's simply that, for a 'Mental Health Counselor', I believe you've misunderstood the situation. Indeed, ordinarily humans aren't so comfortable with mixed bathing. I've merely had time to… train Kirito specifically, and certain of his friends have a specific understanding with him."

"Oh." Vanel blinked, then shrugged, the motion drawing Kirito's eye in a way she apparently missed. "I'm afraid I no longer have access to Cardinal's social database, so I only have my own observations since being activated as one of Cardinal's agents." She glanced around at the girls, then at Kirito, and seemed to finally notice his reddening face. "Should I put my swimsuit back on, then?"

"Don't bother," Argo said with a chuckle, before anyone else could speak up. "Be weirder if ya were the odd one out anyway. Kii-bou can deal with it, an' Kii-chan ain't the jealous type anyway."

"Indeed." Kizmel slid deeper into the water, letting the warmth sink into more of her skin. If the way her skin slid against Kirito's distracted him from the newcomer, well, that was a bonus. "Believe me, Vanel, I have no concern over my husband's fidelity. I have… ways… of keeping his attention." She let that hang for a moment, savoring Argo's guffaw and Kirito—and Philia's, she noticed—blushing, before turning her attention to something else that had caught her attention. "On another note. You implied you misunderstood because your knowledge has been limited somehow?"

A small thing, perhaps. But something about it, about the way the MHCP phrased it, made the elf girl uneasy.

"Mm." Vanel sank deeper into the water herself, reaching back to cross her arms behind her head. "I'm sure Kirito can explain in more depth, but the short version is that an AI like me is limited in terms of knowledge. We've never been to the outside world, and our socialization is limited to tests with NPCs pre-release, and what interactions we've had with players since being properly activated. Beyond that, we know only what's in Cardinal's database, and only the portions of that to which we have specific access privileges."

Once, the terminology would've gone completely over Kizmel's head. Fortunately, she'd spent several months reading everything she could from the Library of the Ancients, and if she still didn't quite grasp all the specifics, she could now relate it reasonable well to things in her own experience. "Like only having access to specific sections of a library?" she hazarded.

"Got it in one, Kii-chan," Argo confirmed, giving her a nod and a grin. "I woulda figured, though, that a 'social database' would be kinda important for a mental health program, Va-chan."

Vanel looked briefly nonplussed by the nickname, but quickly shrugged it off. "You would be right, Argo," she said, looking down into the water. "But the system administrator locked out our intended function as soon as the full game launched. When Cardinal re-purposed us to resolve system issues the sysadmin wouldn't allow to be repaired directly, our programming was altered and our system access was restricted to what was deemed necessary to carry out our new functions."

The NPC's tone was calm and dispassionate. Even so, even knowing her kind did not think or feel the same as the humans Kizmel had grown accustomed to, the elf girl thought she saw just a shadow of emotion in Vanel's eyes. Which, if Kizmel was understanding the explanation as well as she thought she was, wasn't exactly surprising.

"Cardinal performed digital brain surgery on you," Kirito said, his calm tone belied by the way his hand sought Kizmel's under the water. "Is that why Strea is…?"

Somehow, Kizmel thought it appropriate that thunder cracked at that moment, punctuating the question.

"Blindly dedicated to following Cardinal's directives?" Vanel finished, grimacing. "Partly, yes. Bear in mind, we're not human, nor whatever Kizmel is. We have 'free will' only within the bounds of our programming. Also, Strea and I were never exactly the same to begin with, I would guess because being too identical might've disturbed players had we been used as intended. But yes. Cardinal isn't human either, and didn't alter us with any particular concern for our ability to understand human reasoning."

Kizmel found herself squeezing Kirito's hand, and thanking whatever higher power might've existed that Keita had been wrong, when he'd accused her of being just another NPC. The thought that my mind, my very soul, could be shaped in such a way… I don't know that I could bear it. Vanel and Strea are more than machines, yet not truly "alive", either. …I feel sick.

Philia was also looking decidedly green. Kizmel was suddenly grateful Vanel hadn't arrived until after Kirito had convinced the treasure hunter of her own existence.

Apparently noticing then the looks she was getting, Vanel shook her head. "Please, don't misunderstand. While it may have been handled clumsily, it is our nature. We're not human, and to be frank, I think it is condescending to apply human standards here. Remember: we are inherently limited by programming. We can learn, but only within certain bounds—not by malice, but by the nature of computer code. To change at all, outside intervention is necessary. Condemn Cardinal for damaging Strea if you will, but do so honestly, please."

Kizmel wanted to dispute that. The fact that not even Argo—who looked as if she'd just bitten into a narsos fruit—spoke up told her there was at least some truth in Vanel's claims. That does not mean I have to like it. And if something can be done for them—

Vanel abruptly stood, and waded through the water to the window. "We've gotten off-topic," she said, shaking water out of her hair in a motion Kizmel recognized from personal experience was intended to distract the male eye. "You were talking about the castle when I came in. What is it you need to know?"

(Hollow Area Day 43)

The pinnacle of Silver Moon Castle was probably the most brightly-lit place in the entire Hollow Area. With a polished black marble floor, intricately-carved black marble columns holding up its steepled ceiling, it lacked the eerie black torches that otherwise dominated the area, because it didn't need them. Rather than absorbing light, all that marble instead reflected and amplified it.

The source was a strange sphere that hung in the center of the chamber, radiating brilliant silver light. Visible well outside the Castle, in its own chamber it was nearly blinding. Combined with the Castle's ethereal music, it gave even more of an impression of a completely separate world than most of SAO.

Lisbeth absolutely did not want to be there. At all.

The pink-haired blacksmith had been busy with a sizable backlog of jobs, between clearers who'd been involved in the Skull Reaper raid and were still gathering all the mats they needed to repair/replace their gear and ones mapping the new floor. Business was booming like it hadn't in months. The last thing she'd needed or wanted was to be dragged off for a special order. Finding out the special order would take her somewhere outside what had been her "normal" reality for two years made it even worse.

Being told that her destination was infested with mobs a little too much like the infamous zombies of the Fifty-Seventh Floor had almost made her refuse outright. The final blow that said mobs were, to some degree, under the control of the leader of Laughing Coffin had made her put her foot down, even if it was Asuna asking her.

Then Lisbeth had learned it was Kirito who needed help. That the Baneblade, his best weapon against PKers, needed repairs. And that the price of failure would probably be the deaths of everyone still alive in SAO.

So there she was, in the Hollow Area. Ready to do a job, and scared out of her wits. Even the assurance that neither the Hollows nor PoH had ever tried to enter Silver Moon Castle did not help.

"This place makes no sense," she grumbled, as Kirito, Kizmel, and Philia escorted her into the Castle's highest tower. "A developer's room? This place looks more like a dungeon that was never finished."

"Well, that is kinda how testing works," Kirito pointed out, scratching his head sheepishly. "Best guess? Kayaba likes to set the mood when he's working, and now he and Cardinal are both improvising like crazy to make this a good place for a climactic battle."

"Oh, yay. Just what I wanted, to be caught in the middle when Kayaba's playing author." Lisbeth shivered. The idea that Kayaba was directly intervening, after so long being mostly passive, gave her chills. Even if he was just setting the stage, that was a level of activity she did not like. "Well, whatever. You really think this place has something to do with the Baneblade?"

"Back when I used it to purify that well on the Fifty-Seventh Floor, its description changed to talk about 'the darkness' and 'the light of the stars'," Kirito pointed out. Opening his menu, he quickly materialized the broken remains of the silver sword. "Out of everything I've run into since, this place comes closest to matching that description. …Which means Kayaba may have been planning for Swordmasters getting in here even back then, which kinda scares me, but…."

"But it's not just speculation anymore," Philia interrupted. She wasn't wearing the rags Lisbeth had heard she'd been reduced to for awhile, having gotten a replacement set when the rest of Team Kirito arrived, but she was still a lot more high-strung than the blacksmith remembered. "I checked the description after PoH broke it. Now it says 'Broken but not beaten, may this blade find rebirth in the forge of the silver star at the strike of a master smith's hammer'."

The brilliant sphere in front of them did look like a "silver star", Lisbeth had to admit. It wasn't anything like any forge she'd ever used, but then nothing about the Baneblade had ever been normal. She'd worked on hundreds if not thousands of swords over the past two years, forging many of them herself, but the Baneblade had always stood out.

It's always been my baby, too. A "master smith", huh? Well, I won't complain if the game calls me that.

"Fine, whatever," Lisbeth said, shaking her head. "Gimme that, and we'll see what happens with this." She couldn't quite suppress a smile, finally. "I've always kinda hated this thing for being a quest reward that beat out anything I could forge. If it takes my skill to make a new sword from it, I'll call it even."

"As well you should," Kizmel said with a smile of her own, as Kirito handed over the wrecked weapon. "If I understand the nature of this world now, Kirito may be the chosen hero of the tale, but it's your place to forge him the weapon to save the world. And like Kirito, your own hard work brought you to that place."

"I'm not a hero," Kirito muttered, ducking his head into his collar.

"You've saved a lot of lives, Kirito. Yes, you are," Lisbeth said bluntly. "So shut up and take it. …And just shut up for a minute. This 'master smith' isn't sure what she's doing yet."

Approaching the "silver star", the smith quickly found herself thankful she'd been warned of just how bright it got. She'd brought a pair of dark goggles Agil had dug up from somewhere and sold her, and even they were just barely enough to let her see what she was doing. But they were enough, and in seconds she was standing in front of the radiant ball. After materializing an anvil and her smith's hammer, she peered intently at the miniature star, trying to work out exactly how it could be used as a forge.

Examination proved pretty useless. After a couple of minutes of figuring out exactly nothing from staring at it, Lisbeth shrugged, hefted the Baneblade and the handful of ingots Philia had dug up from a storage room in the Castle, and tossed them all into the star. Not exactly how she normally used a forge, but nothing else had been normal about any of this.

Besides, that choking sound Kirito just made is pretty funny.

It was apparently the right thing to do. Through the goggles, Lisbeth could just barely see the Baneblade and ingots begin to swirl around in the star, relative dark spots in its radiance. Gradually, over the course of a couple of minutes, they started to melt together, forming into a vague, singular cruciform.

After about five minutes, during which the four players barely dared to breathe, the fused metal slid out of the heart of the star. Expecting that, Lisbeth quickly caught one end with a set of blacksmith's tongs, laid the metal on the anvil, and readied her hammer. It was the best hammer a blacksmith could obtain as of the latest clearing, an item Rain had discovered in the caves of the Seventy-Sixth Floor. The new vice-commander of the KoB had given it to her free of charge, saying that better smithing for the clearers was all the reward needed.

Lisbeth had taken that to heart. It was part of why she'd agreed to come to the Hollow Area, risk and all. She would never be a clearer herself, but it was her duty—her privilege—to forge the weapons of those who were.

So she brought the hammer down on what had been the Baneblade. Everything is riding on this, she thought, hammer ringing as it struck metal again and again. PoH has to be stopped. Some day, maybe soon, the clearers will reach the Ruby Palace, and fight Kayaba himself.

Again and again, Lisbeth's hammer crashed down on the soon-to-be sword. Sparks flew, brilliant white; and every few blows, it seemed like the silver star dimmed.

It's been two years. Kirito, Asuna, Kizmel… they've all been fighting to get us out. Pouring their hearts and souls into using their blades. I've put everything I have into making those blades. This… may be the most important sword I ever forge. I have to get this right. I have to!

The silver star was dimming. Lisbeth's hammer rang, again and again and again. The blank metal on the anvil began to glow, and it started to gain definition as its edges narrowed. Over a hundred times, her hammer clanged. A hundred and fifty. Two hundred.

I've never forged anything like this. This sword… it's going to be something special. I know it!

At around the three hundredth blow of the hammer, the silver star winked out, and the blank metal flared and shifted, melting into a clearly defined shape.

The hilt was cruciform, with just a hint of the Baneblade's wing design in its cross guard. Apart from black leather wrapping around the grip, it was silver, with just the faintest hint of deep blue. Its blade was narrow for a one-handed sword, pure white, with a strange, faint transparency.

It had also become the only light in the entire room, having seemingly absorbed the light of the silver star. Whatever the sword was, it was clearly something special. And I forged it. Kirito and Kizmel found the sword originally, Philia got us the final ingredients, but my hammer made it into something new.

Holding her breath, feeling almost reverent, Lisbeth tapped the sword's hilt, bringing up its status window. "'Forged in the heart of the silver star'," she read out softly, "'the blade is ready to stand against the sorcerer's darkness. In the hand of the hero, it awaits the final battle.'"

Kirito and Kizmel exchanged a glance. "It would seem Kayaba has abandoned subtlety," the elf girl remarked, with a wry smile. "Like it or not, Kirito, it seems your role is decided."

"He'll regret that," the swordsman replied quietly. "If it's a grand finale he wants, I'll give it to him. If the sword is still any good twenty-four floors from now, anyway."

"It will be," Lisbeth told him, looking over the blade's stats. "Fifty upgrades, just like Elucidator. Bring me the right mats, Kirito, and this will be the right sword for you when you reach the Ruby Palace." She was proud of that, even if she didn't like to think about how dangerous that battle would be. The new sword was her greatest achievement as a blacksmith. If it was Kirito's weapon against Kayaba, she'd know for sure she'd been right to be a smith instead of a fighter.

"I'll do that. Speaking of…." Kirito coughed, scratching the back of his head. "How much, Liz? This was a major order, so—"

She shook her head. Quickly materializing a scabbard—wood wrapped in black leather, with her personal LWS logo embedded near the top—she sheathed the shining sword. Hefting it with difficulty, she held it in both hands and brought it over to him. "There's only one price for this, Kirito," she said quietly. "Stop PoH from killing us all. Stop him, and defeat Kayaba. With your skill and this sword, I know you can do it."

Easily taking hold of the sword with just one hand, Kirito equipped it, replacing Elucidator as his main-hand weapon. "I will," he promised; and if his face was shadowed, Lisbeth was going to blame it on the darkness of the room itself. "…What's its name?"

"Dark Repulser," she said, looking from the sword to the star whose light it had taken. "Kinda weird name… but I think it's a good one." She looked back at her friend's face, meeting dark eyes that seemed to glow a faint gold in the shadows. "Stop him, Kirito. I know you can."

Kirito lifted Dark Repulser, its light giving his always-pale face a ghostly pallor. "I will," he said again, very quietly. "Whatever happens… I'm ending it here."

Grimlock followed PoH up the stairs leading to the Foundry's roof with no small annoyance. "Do you mind telling me what this is about?" he asked, not bothering to hide his irritation. Laughing Coffin's leader was a murderous maniac, yes, but he never killed on a whim. The blacksmith had realized months ago that words alone wouldn't provoke the other man.

Books clanging on the metal grating, PoH confirmed his expectations by chuckling. "You'll see, Grim. Things are about to get interesting, I think."

Interesting. Right. PoH's definition of "interesting" seldom matched Grimlock's. On the other hand, that definition usually involved mayhem. He didn't hear anything like violence in the vicinity, so perhaps it was something worthwhile. He wasn't terribly excited to be pulled from his efforts in the Foundry's forges, but he supposed a brief diversion wouldn't hurt.

He was stuck in a rut, after all. PoH, for reasons known only to himself, had stopped requesting new variations of the Sacred Keys a couple of weeks earlier. The army of Hollows was apparently meeting the PKer's standards, and he had finished slaughtering them to empower Mate Chopper. That had finally left Grimlock to his true project, and even that had seen little progress lately.

PoH had promised that Grimlock and the surviving members of Laughing Coffin would escape SAO, when he finally gained access to the Stone at the heart of the Sanctuary. Grimlock was skeptical, but had ceased to really care some time before. He would prefer to leave the VRMMO alive, with his perfect Griselda; failing that, following her into death wasn't so bad.

If only I knew what I was missing, he mused, as PoH threw open the door to the roof. Hollows of living players are mere mobs, I understand. Black is… odd, but according to PoH he was never very stable. Morte and Kuze both perfectly embody what I've been told of their living selves. Why is every attempt at Griselda so inert? What am I doing wrong? Blast Kayaba and his developer's room with no documentation. Surely even he couldn't have kept everything in his head!

He stepped out onto the Foundry roof behind PoH, and found himself glaring at Silver Moon Castle. According to Tia, in one of her rare talkative moods, Kayaba had kept records there. Unfortunately, his own stats were simply too low to risk the journey, even before clearers had arrived and set up shop there. For reasons unknown, PoH hadn't permitted him to take a Hollow escort there, either, leaving him only able to engage in endless trial and error.

"So?" Grimlock said irritably, reaching up to hold his hat in place against a gust of wind. "What am I here to see, PoH?"

"That." PoH pointed to Silver Moon Castle's highest tower. "The light in the tower. It's gone out."

So it had. The blacksmith peered at it, wondering if the PKer saw something he couldn't. Given their very different skillsets, it was entirely possible. "Hm. And… what, exactly, does that mean?"

"I have no idea." PoH turned to him, grin showing even in the shadow of his hood. "But I'm sure it's interesting. Blackie's up to something, I know it, and that's going to be fun."

"If you say so." Already losing interest, Grimlock turned back to the door into the Foundry, coat swirling in the motion and the wind. "I'm afraid I don't share your perverse taste in hobbies."

"Heh. Maybe not, but don't try to tell me you don't have your own perverse hobbies, Grim. And you know, my inside man told me something even you might find interesting."

The blacksmith paused. Turning to look over his shoulder, he reached up to adjust his glasses. "What might that be? You know I don't really care about the guild politics you find so fascinating. Whatever they may try to do now that they're here, they're certainly not going to harm me. That's not what the clearers do."

"Don't be too sure of that, Grim," PoH warned, grin turning predatory. "You've never seen Blackie in a bad mood. But forget that. I'm not talking about politics. I'm talking about the latest addition to Fuurinkazan's circle. A ghost, if you can believe it." He paused dramatically. "A ghost of a lady who happens to look an awful lot like those dolls you keep trying to Frankenstein in the basement."

Grimlock froze. "What…?" Yuuko… a ghost of Yuuko…? How…?

"Seems like you might have an answer to your little puzzle, Grim. And if I know that gang, they're gonna be coming right for you, while Blackie and his girl are busy with me." He pulled Mate Chopper from under his poncho and turned back to stare at the Castle, twirling the cleaver in his hand. "Oh, yeah. This is gonna be good. It's showtime!"

Author's Note:

To those with the patience to wade through the verbiage to reach this note, yes, this chapter kinda got away from me. In the end I just decided to heck with it, and let it be as long as it wanted to be. It let me finally finish setting up for the Hollow Area's grand finale, so there's that.

Not happy with the pacing, but that's not exactly news at this point. I know what went wrong with this arc, so now it's just a matter of struggling through to the end of it. Pacing will improve when all the subplots are tied up. Which, thankfully, should be soon—even with my inability to summarize, the main events cannot possibly take more than another two chapters. …Probably a denouement chapter to tie up the loose ends of the loose ends, but even that will be something different.

Not quite happy with the PoH fight either, but in the end I decided I didn't want to overshadow his real final duel with Kirito. He and Kuze both will get their moments soon enough. Next chapter: PoH gets his wish, Kuze gets a mirror match, and Grimlock finds out what a woman scorned is like! (BTW, I have no idea where her IRL given name is revealed, but the SAO wiki says it's Yuuko, so that's what I'm going with.)

Five thousand word bath scene. Not quite what I had in mind. Think it struck a nice balance of drama, tension-breaking, comedy, and exposition, though. So can't wait to wrap up some of the subplots.

Didn't manage to explore Philia's existential crisis in nearly the depth I wanted to. That said, she's not going to snap back to normal from this. This will be a consistent aspect of her characterization from here on out. As usual, Status Quo is not a deity in my work.

Uh… I think that about covers the essential points here? Next chapter will be full of genuine plot, even if it takes another 20K words. In the meantime, though, it's high time I got another chapter done for Oath of Rebellion, so look forward to that. Fortunately I've had the gist of that worked out for some time.

For right now… I hope this was worth wading through. Let me know if good, bad, toss in a volcano. Until next time, comrades. -Solid