Sword Art Online: Asgard
Six
Lux was trying very hard not to hyperventilate. Assuming you could even DO that while in a full dive VR environment. It was exciting enough adventuring with her idol, Kirito, but this new dungeon was scary as hell.
"You okay?" Leafa asked mildly, smiling at her.
"Those trolls and elves were pretty tough," Lux admitted. She checked her stats, "Good rewards though. I think I leveled too."
"Everyone healed up?" Kirito asked the group briskly. "We should try to advance as quickly as possible..." he added.
"Aren't we rushing through here just a bit?" Youko noted dryly.
"Well, the last time Cardinal spontaniously added a section of ALO," Klein explained to the group, "there was a time limited quest that nearly destroyed the whole game."
"What." Youko blinked.
"Not joking," Klein added.
"We don't know if there's a similar timer on this dungeon, but I don't really want to take that chance," Kirito explained.
"Or some OTHER booby trap," Asuna added wryly.
"Makes sense," a still slightly pale faced Youko conceded. "The Minotaurs are next, right?" she asked, frowning.
"According to the map Argo got us," Asuna said as the group set off again.
Lux tried to stay calm as they advanced, carrying her sword at the ready. 'I hope these aren't the half naked type of minotaur,' she thought.
"RAWRRR!" the leading beast cried, wearing a loin cloth and nothing else.
'Yes, half naked,' Lux winced. Well, at least the enemies wouldn't have any added armour bonuses against their weapons...
"Yui, don't look," Asuna added to the little sprite.
"Yes Momma," Yui agreed as the group attacked.
Lux watched with some envy as Kirito used Excalibur to cut down monsters so easily. The sword really was overpowered, even against these high level monsters. That, and Liz' hammer, which seemed to actually scare the monsters away from her. Well, Lux would just have to manage...
Kirito, Asuna, Liz and Klein were the lead group, while Sinon fired her bow from behind and the others provided support. Silica and her dragon Pina were healing as well, while Lux and the others used magic and tried to guard Sinon.
Arrows arched over them then plunged into the attackers, even as they roared in anger and pain. "It's charging!" Leafa warned.
"Right," Lux moved into it's way as the much larger monster ran at her. 'Well, at least it's a big target,' she thought as she slashed at it.
The Minotaur cried out in pain and staggered sideways, Silica scurried in and stabbed it with her dagger, even as Lux finished it.
"Nice!" Silica grinned even as more arrows flew over them.
Youko was finishing off a healing spell, bathing the front line fighters in magic. "Whew," she sighed, studying the fight intently.
Lux groaned as she chugged a healing potion. Youko seemed awfully concerned about Asuna, oddly. Maybe she was one of her SAO fangirls?
Up front the last minotaur was defeated, and everyone quickly assessed their wounds and gear. "Got another Valkyrie piece. Boots," Klein noted. Without asking he traded it to Liz.
"Thanks," Liz noted then equipped them.
Then her pants vanished.
"Eeeeeeeek!"
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Youko bit back a laugh as Liz quickly switched back to her original boots. She had heard that sometimes game equipment conflicted with each other, but she'd never seen it in real life before.
"Oh, yuck it up," Liz grumbled.
Youko checked her inventory, raising her eyebrows at how much in-game money she'd gotten in the battle. Assuming her gear held up well, she was coming out ahead even if they died in the dungeon later on.
She ran through the group's health bars, as well as checking buff/debuff stats. No one was in the red, but Klein and Liz were low. She cast healing, along with Asuna. She then chugged a mana potion, making a face at the taste.
"Uhm, is everything all right?" Asuna asked quietly as she gently drew Youko aside.
Youko smiled wryly at her daughter, "I'm fine, really." She paused and added, "In fact, I'm a little surprised at how fun this all is."
Asuna gave her a very hard to read look. "This is just TOO weird," she sighed, then wandered off to stand by Kirito.
"Are you two okay? Asuna doesn't usually act this odd," Lux noted quietly.
"She found out that I'm actually her mother in disguise. She's not taking it well," Youko deadpanned.
Lux looked at her blankly a moment. "Never mind," she decided to just drop it.
Youko smiled wryly. Never lie when the truth will do, her grandmother used to say.
"All right, everyone. Let's carry on," Kirito said after they had cleared out any treasure chests as well as dropped loot.
Youko wondered why there were halls connecting each 'room' in the dungeon. Were they a buffer to give parties a chance to get ready for battle? Or were some of them trapped too? Thankfully they hadn't hit anything.
"Hold on," Youko remembered.
"What?" Kirito asked.
"Fire monsters next chamber," Youko reminded everyone. "We need to re-cast the fire resistance and damage buffs."
"Good idea," Leafa agreed. "The earlier buffs we cast should still be in effect, but no reason to take chances," she noted.
Leafa, Youko and Asuna all cast various buff spells, bathing the group in light. The hardcore former Sword Art Online players had mostly not grasped the in-game magic system, instead focusing on weapons and attack power.
'Which is not the worst idea, but...' Youko thought wryly, 'if you don't win a fight VERY quickly, you can run out of health and die.'
"Leafa, Asuna, if you have any cold or ice spells, can you use them before we attack?" Klein asked. "It's gonna get real toasty for Liz and I, up front."
"Will do," Asuna nodded.
"This is gonna suck," Liz grumbled.
And with those heroic words the group rushed into the next chamber.
0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0
Argo the Rat was still trying to grasp the pure SCALE of ALFheim Online.
I mean, YES Aincrad had also been huge. But it was also broken up into somewhat reasonably sized floors. A smart, agile information broker could, within reason, quickly explore a floor, map out quests and such, then write up a guide on it within a few days.
Alfheim, tho, was HUGE. And a massive open area that stretched across a simulated continent. At first glance, Argo had thought there was no WAY she'd be able to go back into business here. Thankfully, she had discovered that each character race had it's own region and city, giving her a opportunity to research one at a time.
And some maniac had even brought AINCRAD into this game.
(Argo strongly suspected it was Kirito's fault. It was the sort of thing she figured he'd do. Plus, he probably wanted to finish the whole thing, including the 100th floor.)
She had Argo Guides for the first twenty floors in the consignment shops, already, and was working on the next set. Annoyingly she had lost the original versions when the first Aincrad was destroyed, but re-creating them hadn't been that hard. And it was a relief that Aincrad in general was no longer deadly.
A soft chime informed Argo that Agil had logged in. She had been waiting on him, as she was hoping he'd had gotten more information on the Asgard level.
Agil maintained a player owned shop, not far from Lizbeth's forge and armory. He mostly bought and traded semi-rare items and weapon drops. For a profit, of course, tho his service spared you from going out to fight monsters for the stuff.
"Argo!" Agil smiled as she walked in.
"Agil. Still ripping off the elite players?" Argo teased.
"Would I do that?" Agil looked innocent and Argo laughed.
"I passed the briefing you gave me on to Kirito and the others," Argo reported. "Did you get anything more out of Ymir?" she asked.
"Nothing detailed," Agil shook his head. "They don't even know for sure which monsters will turn up in that dungeon. Cardinal apparently re-wrote at least part of it."
"Huh," Argo blinked. Wryly she asked, "Was Cardinal this much of a dick in Sword Art Online, or did we just not notice it?"
"I suspect we were too busy to notice," Agil admitted.
To be continued...
Notes: Having seen Alicization, I REALLY wanna figure out a way to bring chibi-Cardinal in as a character. Somehow. Because she's ADORABLE, in a weirdly wrong sort of way.