Chapter Summary: In this chapter, we learn a bit more about why Rukia and the others came into the game, before we see Kirito continue his journey in becoming an Alchemist.

Chapter Fifteen…

Becoming an Alchemist – Part 2

Beta: Old man of the mountain/Darklord331

21th of November 2027:

It was the day after Kirito saw four extra people entering the game. He was shocked. Who would have thought that anyone would do such a thing, being trapped in a game with no way out. He had to wonder what was going on in the outside world for this to happen. Whatever the case, he hoped that they would keep a low profile. Sure with around eighty thousand people in-game it wouldn't be strange for people not knowing everyone, but hearing that new Players have appeared?

That would create problems.

As if people learned about this, they would regain hope that people in the real world have found a way to get them out, when they haven't. This couldn't happen, as Players have only started to realize the truth that they were trapped in the game. Having some hope would reopen old problems that shouldn't be reopened.

Anyway, after meeting these new people, Kirito went to the new Adventurer's Hall to see what it was like. It was a decent enough place. It was a huge three story tavern, the first floor had a bar, tables, dirt board, a snooker table and a few other things where people could meet up and talk. The second floor was a place with many rooms. These were meeting rooms, for players to have talks to other players or guild meetings, so other people can't hear them. The third floor was where Players could get their quests. There were three bulletin boards with leaflets on them, and there was a long counter along the wall for Players to accept the quests. Finally, stairs were going up to the attic, but for now at least, it was locked.

The most interesting part of the Adventurer's Hall was a new NPC waiting at the bar. It was a monster-like NPC. This race was known as Vulpin, a fox-like creature, about four and a half tall. It was wearing a black cotton-padded tunic, dark blue trousers, and a dark green cloak.

This new NPC was named Reynard and it was the quest giver for the next game wide quest. For this quest, the Players needed to collect resources to build a stable and at least three houses that would be found outside the town. Many people wondered why this NPC would want a stable to be created when they learned about this quest. But all the Vulpin said was that he would be explained later on, as he didn't want to say anything until he knew things worked out. But he did admit that it would help them greatly to move about in the future if this worked out.

In a way, this was something Kirito would suspect a normal person would say. As until something was built, and things were set up, no one would know if something would go the way they wanted to. So it was best not to say anything until they wanted, was set up and ready. However, many people were suspecting that once the stables were done, with the rewards of being able to use the stables, they might get mounts to use to get around.

This interested the Players, as the floor was huge and took a long time to walk from one point to another. So having a mount of some kind would be very useful. So most Players were happy to do this quest. But not for Kirito, he preferred to become an Alchemist and level up. More so if the rumours about becoming a Warrior were true.

It was said that once they become a Warrior, a Player's level would be reset to level one. But thankful their stats remain as they were, just their levels were reset. It also takes them longer to level up, as the Exp needed were higher. Kirito wasn't sure if these rumours were true or not, as he didn't spend time with people and talk about this. He just heard things in passing so not sure, so he had to wait and see.

Anyway, his plans were simple: go to the training area and train for a few hours before going to the Thief's Guild and accept the quest. It took all night to decide on this, but as Zangetsu pointed out, if he didn't take the quest someone with bad intentions could lead to all sorts of problems. Ones that they didn't need right now. For that reason, Kirito was going to take the quest.

Anyway, after training in the Fighting Pits, he got his final free Strength Stat. Kirito got a notice that ten Strength Stats was the max he could get. But before he could leave, Zangetsu came up upon seeing him and said, "Ah, Kirito, just the person I'm looking for."

"How can I help you?" asked Kirito, wondering what his teacher was looking for him.

"Not here," Zangetsu told his student, "come with me."

And with that, Zangetsu led Kirito to one of the rooms on the second floor of the Adventurer's Hall. As they got into the room, the young teen saw that Rukia and the others from yesterday were there.

"What's going on?" Kirito asked, when he saw these four. Why would they be here, what did his master need?

"Kurosak, are you sure about this?" asked Hitsugaya, "He's just a child. We shouldn't pull him into this."

"I know, and normally unless I had any other option, I wouldn't pull him into this. But we have no other option." Zangetsu told Hitsugaya, "He is the only Beta Tester I know and he is my student, someone I trust. Not only that, but he has knowledge of the floors up to the tenth floor. So, he is the best person to help us."

"Fine…" Hitsugaya said with a sigh, not liking the idea of someone like Kirito being pulled into their mission. He was young. Sure he had involved young people before, but that didn't mean he liked the idea, but he had to because they had no other option. For this case, part of him didn't think that they got to the point of dragging in someone as young as Kirito into what he was about to be dragged into. But at the same time, Kurosak was right, the young man had information about the first ten floors that could be very useful, information that could help them a lot.

"Well, first off, let me introduce you to my best friend Yasutora Sado, or he prefers to be called Chad." Zangetsu introduced his best friend to the teen. "Next, let me explain about what's going on. You see, Captain Hitsugaya and I are old comrades, we used to be part of the same task force before I left them years ago."

"Task force?" asked Kirito, wondering what force he was talking about.

"Listen, before I continue, you have to understand something important. What I'm about to tell you, you can't tell another person, no one, not your friends, not your family, no one." Zangetsu warned his student. "Do you understand? If you tell them, not only could this put you into danger, but them too. If you don't want to know more, you can leave, and we can find help in another way."

This caught Kirito's interest. What was so important that it could put him and those he told in danger. Part of him wanted to leave and not get involved. But there was another part who wanted to know. He wanted to find a way to thank his teacher for all his work that he has done, not only for helping him to learn more kendo over the last year or so, but for helping the other Players when no one else was going to do anything. If learning this information and helping them was a way to pay that debt, he was willing to help however he can. It's not like he was the type that would tell secrets to others anyway.

So, after thinking it over only for a few moments, Kirito said, "I understand and I still want to help you if I can."

"Okay, but know this: There's no going back after learning this" warned the kendo teacher. "You, me, and everyone here were or are part of Japan's Self-Defense Forces at some point in our lives; more precisely, we were in the Special Forces Group."

This shocked Kirito. Not once did he imagine that his teacher was part of the Defense Force, or the Special Forces. No wonder that whatever he was about to learn was important enough to be kept secret. But thinking about it, why was the Special Forces so interested in getting involved with this?

Sure, Kiriro suspected that the government might send someone into the game to help out, if they could agree upon it that is. Politics did hold many things up, like helping and sending people to places where they could do things to help, but because of politics and keeping things friendly, they didn't. This is why he hated politics. So he had to wonder why the Special Forces were here.

"You still can still leave, you haven't heard anything that can put you at risk yet?" Zangetsu told the teen, but Kirito just nodded and so Zangetsu continued, "Okay, here we go, from here on out you can't leave when I start telling you stuff." Here Zangetsu pursued for a few seconds to make sure Kirito could leave if he wanted.

Seeing how the young teen not leave, Zangetsu sighed. Part of him wanted the kid to leave so that he wouldn't be put into danger. He was young and innocent about the world. Once he learned some of the stuff he was about to learn, he wouldn't be innocent of the world. But at the same time, he was proud of him, too, for being brave enough to enter the unknown like this.

"Anyway, this Special Forces, this Task Force, wasn't your normal type, we were part of the Defense Force that no one knew about. A group called Gotei 13." explained Zangetsu, shocking Kirito. "There are thirteen divisions, with…"

"Kurosak!" Hitsugaya stopped Zangetsu with a look that warned the other man not to say more, "This young man doesn't need to know all the inner workings of our organisation. Just tell him the parts that matter."

"I wasn't going to tell him everything, not that stupid." Zangetsu told the captain, "Anyway, Gotei 13 mission is simple, to protect our country and the world from danger."

"But isn't that what the Self-Defense Force does anyway? Protect our country." asked Kirito. Shocked that his teacher used to be part of this group. Although he was confused as to why a secret Special Task Force was forced to do this when the normal Defense Force was meant to do this in the first place. So far, other than knowing that these people were part of a secret group, nothing could be considered dangerous.

"Yes, but only when we're attacked, Gotei 13 on the other hand takes a different route." explained Zangetsu, "Gotei 13 works in the shadows, where we deal with threats before they become a threat and make sure that Japan and the rest of the world don't learn about certain things. Things that they aren't ready for or are too dangerous for people to learn."

"Like a Shadow OP operation?"

"Yes, something like that."

It sounded to Kirito that his teacher and his friends were some sort of spies who did things that normal people wouldn't normally do. So he could understand why they didn't want people to say anything. If others knew he knew about this group, they might think he knew things he didn't and would do whatever they had to get information from him that he didn't have. But still, what did this do with him and them being here, though?

Yes Kayaba, was a problem and a threat, but why would a secret Task Force come here for? It made no sense. So, Kirito asked, "But why are you here? I understand that Kayaba is a threat, but why would they send your group here? Why not someone else?"

"I just learned this yesterday, but it would seem that Kayaba was part of Gotei 13." explained Zangetsu, "That he was part of the Twelfth Division, a division that does research, develops new technology and tools for the rest of Gotei 13, before he left."

"Really?" Kirito asked in shock, not suspecting this news.

"Yes, in fact, the FullDive that you know of was first developed by Kayaba, in Twelfth Division." explained Hitsugaya, "It was designed to help us with training. A realistic way to train, without any of the dangers that we might face. Think about it, whilst you're laying on a bed, you would be in the V.R world, in a place like the USA or Russia. As long as we know the layout of the area is, a building or a town, you could be training anywhere. Training in areas that would otherwise be unreachable to us. We could train anywhere in the world without leaving our headquarters, so we would be ready to face whatever our mission is. As long as we have the right information, we can program the V.R with different scenarios, so we could be ready for anything we could think could happen during a mission."

Kirito didn't think of using V.R like that. To use it to train. Then again, this new FullDive system only has been around for two years, so no one really knew what you could do with it. So far, they have only been playing games with it, they didn't think about using it to train. But now, Kirito felt a bit silly that he or no one else thought of this before, as Sword Art Online allowed the player to use the skills that they had in the real world in the game. Something until now no one thought was possible.

"So, if you used to work with Kayaba, do you know why he did all this?" asked Kirito, hoping to learn why the man he used to look up to did what he did. "In fact, why did you allow him to sell FullDive to the public?"

"As for the FullDive, we had no problems with sharing the technology. It was believed that it couldn't do any harm for the public to have it, in fact it could help the public and allow them to have some fun with it." explained Hitsugaya, before his face turned dark, "As for why he did what he did, we have no idea to be honest. Up until about six years ago, he seemed fine, one of the best 'Technicians' that Division Twelve had. Unfortunately, though, he was attacked on a mission and since then he changed, leaving Gotei 13 and helping with the FullDive and creating Sword Art Online."

"What do you mean by being attacked?" asked Kirito, "Why would a Technician be attacked? You said that Division Twelve was a place where people research, develop new technology and tools."

"There's more to a Technician than just researching, developing new technology and tools." this came from Zangetsu, "There are times when Technicians are used to help with translating old languages and scriptures, dealing with things like bombs, traps and the like. So it wouldn't be strange for him to be on a mission. And he wouldn't be on one if he couldn't handle himself, as every member of Gotei 13, the Shinigami as we were known by, knew how to defend ourselves."

'Shinigami, err?' Kirito thought to himself, 'Not surprising that they would be called that for someone working in the shadows.'

Either way, the name of the members wasn't his problem; he didn't care. What did matter was knowing why Kayaba did what he did. Seeing that they had no idea what happened, the next best question was, "So, why am I here?" asked Kirito. He knew better to ask questions he knew he wouldn't get answers to.

"To ask for your help." said Zangtsu, "As you can guess, they are here to search for Kayaba to try and get him to free all of you. However, if that's not possible, they are here to try to help clear the hundred floors. For that, they need information about the game. And seeing that the only person I know who has information about the game is you, I suggested you can help."

"You do know that I only got to the tenth floor during the Beta Test right?" Kirito asked his teacher.

"That doesn't matter." Captain Hitsugaya answered this time, "Any information we can get would be useful to us. We know this is a game world, so knowing any information that'll help us get stronger will be appreciated."

"Fine, but I should warn you though, I don't know how much of my information can be very useful to you." Kirito warned them all.

"What do you mean?" this question came from Rukia.

"Do you know much about Beta Testing and what happens afterwards?" inquired Kirito.

"No." was the simple answer from all of them there.

"Simply put, Beta Testers normally only get half of the game you could say," explained Kirito, "we test out the gameplay, the graphics and the like. We make sure there's no real bugs, and if there are any, report them. Afterwards, it depends on the company of the game. More often than not, the company only fixes any bugs that's been reported and adds a few changes here and there to make it slightly different to what the Beta Tester knew so that they couldn't fully give away too much about the game."

"Are you saying that's not the case in this case?" asked Hitsugaya.

"Unfortunately, no," Kirito admitted darkly, "whilst there's been changes in the game, things added and things altered as expected, these changes are way more than normal. Didn't Zangetsu tell you about some of it already? I did tell him the changes that I have found already."

"Other than telling them that when killing someone could be like the real world instead of the body disappearing, I didn't tell them anything." explained Zangetsu, "I thought they should hear everything from you, as it's better believed from the source."

"So, is it true about killing these NPCs and players?" Orihime asked, sounding worried about this.

"Honestly? I don't know." admitted Kirito, with a sigh. He understood that it was better hearing what someone knew from the source, but it was a bother explaining everything when he could be levelling up his skills. Still, he knew that having other Players know what he knew could be useful. The only reason he hadn't said anything so far was because he was a Solo Player, and he spent his time trying to level up his skills.

"The truth is right now, I only think that this happens to the NPCs, as for the Player after thinking about it, I don't think so, at least not at this moment." explained the young teen, "As with how the monsters we have to kill them and dismantle them like we do in the real world, with all the blood and guts, I fear that this could be the same for fighting NPCs too."

"And for Players?" asked Orihime.

"We only get data scars, at least for the moment." Kirito told her and the others, "What I fear is that when they do the big update at New Year, I have no idea what could happen other than the time being slowed down so that we spend more years here, they might add the fact we get scars, blood and the like. To make it feel more real here."

This got the new group thinking. They wondered why Kayaba would do all this. It made no sense to them. What was his end game? They didn't think he was doing this without reason, but whatever his reason was, they couldn't think of what it could be.

"I see," the captain said simply, "so other than the monsters and death might work here, what else has changed?"

"The NPCs to start off with." Kirito said thoughtfully, "I don't know what the A.I programming that Kayaba is using for them, but all they are acting more like real people than NPCs should. They have their own personality and feelings. If you upset them, they can prevent you from getting quests."

"I can vouch for that." Zangetsu acknowledged this fact about the NPCs, "These Tians as the NPCs are called in this game, do seem to have their own personality and feelings, and I have seen a few times where the Tians wouldn't give a player a quest because they insulted them too much."

This shocked the new people there. Why would Kayaba do this? Sure, from their reports and Ichigo, he wanted to make this world look and act as real as possible. But why would he do so much work of A.I for NPCs, just to make them feel more real? None of this made sense. What on earth was he thinking?

"Strange… I know he was making better A.I for the training simulator before he left, so we would experience better during training. But to do this for a game, it makes no sense." Hitsugaya said with a sigh, not sure what to think about this. It would seem that Kayaba has lost more of his senses since he left Gotei 13. Deciding to think about this for a later date, he put his mind to this moment and asked, "Anway, what can you tell me about the quests in this game?"

"That lays the problem," Kirito admitted worriedly, "whilst I can tell you most of the quests that I know, some of them might come about as I remember them. In fact, I'm worried about when we get to the third floor."

"What do you mean?" asked Rukia.

"Whilst most of the basic quests like Fetch, Delivery and Gather Quests are more or less the same, apart for a few changes. But when it comes to quests where you get a weapon, that's where things seem to have changed." explained Krirto, "Take my sword, the Anneal Blade. In the Beta Test, the quest was a repeatable quest with a twenty-four hour cool-down time. But now though, it's a one time quest and now no one else is able to do the same quest from that Tians."

"That's worrying," admitted Hitsugaya, "does this mean that we can't get the blade?"

"Fortunately no, players are still able to get the blade." Kirito informed him, "I was able to find out that other Tians' have this blade, but only nine hundred and ninety nine of them. The thing is you have to find them first, and I don't know where they are. So whilst I can tell you what the quests are, I can't guarantee that you'll be able to do them if another player has already done the quest."

"That's bothersome." this came from Chad, who up 'til now said nothing, just listening. "It would seem as if Kayaba is trying to draw things out, making it harder to get to the hundredth floor."

"It would seem so, for what reasons I have no idea." admitted Zangetsu, sounding concerned.

"Either way, Kirito, you said you were concerned about the third floor, why?" asked the white haired captain.

"Well, from the third floor up to the tenth floor, the floors have stories to them, involving a race of elves." explained Kirito, "Now, on the third floor you can pick what race you want to help, either the dark elves or the wood elves and from there the story for you is decided on what race you picked to help. However, what I'm concerned about is what if someone picks a race before someone else and that race is stuck with that race. I would be fine if they picked the dark elves as I picked that race during the Beta Test, but if they picked the wood elves, I would be doomed as I don't know any of their quest lines."

Whilst it wasn't a bother to them so much, as they weren't in the Beta Test, it would be a problem learning the quests if things changed too much from that. As of right now, Kirito was the only person they knew who knew of the quests for the following floors until the tenth one. So it was for the best that they kept things as he knew and went from there.

"In that case, we just have to make sure that the dark elves are picked." Hitsugaya said simply, this would make things easier for them to get stronger if they couldn't find Kayaba, they could get stronger and clear the tower instead. "So, tell us, what can you tell us about the quests that we might face?

"You understand that they might have changed a lot, right?" asked Kirito. He didn't want to get blamed for telling them the quests but only to find out they had changed somehow.

"We understand, but some basic information is better than no information." admitted the captain.

"In that case…" began Kirito before he told them about all of the quests and monsters he could remember that they should know about and about the dark elves and how they were in the beta.

"Thank you for all that information, Kirito," Hitsugaya thanked the young man once Kirito finished explaining everything, "if you don't mind, I would like to talk to my comrades about what we should do next."

"No problem, I have things to do myself," Kirito told the white haired captain, "but I do have to ask, are you going to tell anyone else that you're here?"

"No, we have no intention to do that. We don't want to risk Kayaba learning that we're looking for him." Rukia informed the young teen with a smile.

"That's good to hear. People are only starting to come to terms with what is going on with them, having them learn that you are here could create more problems than we need right now. As it would be giving them false hope." Kirito told the group.

THe group nodded in understanding as Kirito bid them goodbye and began to walk out. But as he got to the door, a thought occurred to him and so he said, "I don't know if you have avatar names, but if you don't, I would go to the Adventurer's Hall and change your name. As if Kayaba is watching who is coming and going in the game and he sees your name and will be on more alert and making it harder to find him."

"Oh, so they have a place to change your name there? I wasn't suspecting that." admitted Zangetsu.

"Neither was I to be honest. I thought players would be stuck with their names until the game was beaten." admitted Kirito, "I don't know what Kayaba is playing at, but he must have some pity on those who had decided to play as females for whatever reason and went with female names. So to help them fit in more, he gave them a way to change their names."

Without another word from any of them, Kirito left the group to go to accept the mission with the Thief's Guild.

o0OoO0o

23rd of November 2027 - Horunka Village:

It has been a few days since then. During that time, Kirito had been working on his skills, seeing how he hadn't been able to level up. So far, he has been working on the following: One-Handed Sword, Grappling Hook, Dagger, Tracking, and Stealth. He had been working on these skills because he knew once he became an Alchemist, he'll be able to level up again, and with that in mind, he needed to think of a safe way to do so.

Sure, he could do it like in the Beta Test and rush into a battle and fight like a mad man, but this was now different with the game being a Death Game. Where one false move, you would die for real. It didn't help that as an Alchemist, he would have to place his stats elsewhere other than Strength. Not only that, but it wouldn't be as easy as in the Beta Test with how the monsters have been changed to act differently and be stronger.

With that in mind, Kirito knew that he would have to act in a different way, a more cunning way than before. So that he can fight without getting hurt too. Which is why he has been working on the skills mentioned instead of his other skills. For most cases where he can, Kirito was planning to attack in stealth so that he can do sneak attacks and kill his targets before they knew he was there, which is why he was doing Dagger, Tracking, and Stealth.

However, he knew that he couldn't always rely on stealth, as some monsters have abilities to hinder stealth useless and sometimes he might fail in his sneak attack and so need to attack head on. For this reason, he was working on his One-Handed Sword and Grappling Hook, so if he needs to fight head on, he can disarm his target if possible before killing them or if not, able to fight with one handed better.

One might wonder if he was worried about getting hurt badly and why he didn't train with a shield. The answer was simple: mobility.

You see, with a shield, whilst yes you can take less damage, the problem is that you could be stunlocked against mobs because you can't dodge. And if you were a Solo Player like he was, you would be alone and no one to protect you whilst you were stunlocked. Not only that some of the main problems with the shield build, but with it you can't have a decent offensive. This was because you had to work on raising your defence at the expense of your attack.

However, with a build without a shield, whilst yes you take more damage from attacks if it, raising your Agility can help to dodge attacks easier. If raised high enough, you could completely dodge attacks as long as your opponent didn't have a higher Agility than you. In fact, having a high enough Agility you had to face lots of enemies.

Now with Kirito planning to become an Alchemist, you would suspect him to use a shield for more protection and find ways to raise his attack in other ways. But this wasn't Kirito's play style, he didn't like to stand about and protect himself behind a shield, he liked to hit and move, never standing in one place for too long. If you keep on moving, making sure you don't stay in one place, who needs to block, anyway?

Anyway, Kirito found that training with Aloy and training at the Fighting Pit, there was a bonus. He gained more experience for his skills than he would doing so alone.

Normally, to level up skills it depends on a few things… the first was that you have to use them to get the Exp to level them up. The amount of Exp gained depends on the type ability of that skill that a Player uses and the type of monster they fight. More powerful the ability and monster they use, more of the experience a person gets to level up the skill.

Each skill has a different amount of Exp needed before it can be levelled up. Some might need 50 Exp before it levels up, but some might need more than that. However, as each skill levels up, you'll need even more Exp before you can level up the skill again. It was like levelling yourself up, however, the experience needed wasn't as if you were levelling yourself up.

However, to Kirito's surprise, it would seem that training in the Fighting Pit and along with a trainer like Aloy, he gained some bonus Exp. Thanks to this, his One-Handed Sword was at 0080/1000, Dagger was at 0075/1000, Tracking was at 0070/1000 and Stealth was at 0100/1000. As for Grappling Hook, he was only able to get it to 0050/1000, the reason it was so low was because he couldn't train with it at the Fighting Pit or with Aloy. So he could only use it against monsters.

These levels were much more than the young teen had hoped for, as during the Beta Test, it took a bit long to get to this point for the One-Handed Sword skill. He was slightly stronger than a few people thanks to all this. In fact, he had Argo let know about this so that he could tell others about this so they could get stronger too. To be honest, if he wasn't training his other skills simultaneously, he suspected he would have one hundred in his sword and dagger skills by now.

Either way, today was the day that Kirito was going to meet up with the Alchemist, Edward Elric, at Horunka Village to become an Alchemist. It was strange to be back in the village. Although it wasn't long since he was here, it was still strange, as it was the place where he had his first sexual encounter with Aiko. As he thought about it, Kirito would like nothing more but to see Aiko again and have some fun with her. With all the training he has done so far over the last week or so, no one could blame him for having some fun.

However, before he decided to visit the NPC, he needed to see Edward to become an Alchemist so that he could start the Thief's Guild quest and start levelling up again.

Today. Kirito was wearing his new alchemist that consisted of a greyish padded tunic and trousers, along with a dark blue robe and hooded cloak, with gold trimmings. He was also wearing a basic reinforced boots made of leather. Not only that, but he had a one strap bandolier, and a belt which had a small satchel connected to it, and there he had a satchel with a leather strap that he threw over his shoulder.

These items didn't have much for defence, like most of the starter outfits. So, he was also wearing the Trapper's Leather Armguards and the Trapper's Leather Shoulder Guard. It wasn't much, but right now, it was better than nothing.

Anyway, Kirito was able to find Edward in the centre of the village, where he was sitting in front of a fountain, watching the water flow. Other than his hair being clean and tidy, the only other change that Kirito could see was that this Tians was now wearing a long red coat.

"Edward, good to see you again." Kirito said as he walked up to the Alchemist and greeted him.

"Ah, Adventurer, nice to see that you came here," Edward greeted the teen, "have you come here to become an Alchemist?"

"I am." Kirito said with a bow.

"Do you have your Alchemist Chest?" asked the alchemist, making sure that he had the chest,

"I do." answered the teen.

"In that case, I have a test for you to complete before I'll help you become an alchemist." Edward informed the teen, "The test is simple, all you have to do is find the ingredients to make a healing potion and an antidote from a recipe that I'll give you. Are you up to it?"

Upon hearing this, the Quest Window appeared:

The Alchemist Test

Make Two Potions to Prove Yourself!

Gather the ingredients and make a Healing Potion.

Gather the ingredients and make an Antidote.

Reward(s):

Class Change.

?

?

?

Accept/Decline

Of course Kirito was going to accept this quest. He was waiting for this for so long, it would be stupid for him to decline it now that it is here.

"I am." was the only reply Kirito needed to say.

"Good, here are the ingredients that you'll need for the potions." said Edward as he gave Kirito a scroll with the ingredients he needed to collect. All these must be found in the nearby forest."

As Kirito looked at the scroll, he saw that it had the names and images of the ingredients he needed to get. He was surprised to see that other than the fruit from the rare Little Nepenthes, all the rest of them could be found outside the forest. Surprised by this quest, he asked, "Can I ask, other than the Little Nepenthes fruit for the Health Potion, why do I need to get the rest inside the forest when I can get them outside?"

"I want to see if you are able to handle gathering the ingredients from dangerous places," the alchemist explained. "Becoming an Alchemist is a dangerous job. You'll face dangerous monsters as you gather ingredients. So, if you can't gather these easy, simple ingredients, then you'll have difficulties in the future and, as such, have no right to become an Alchemist."

Kirito had to admit this made much sense. Out of the two classes of Warrior and Alchemist, being an Alchemist was more dangerous. So it would make sense that the Alchemist would want to make sure that you are able to handle yourself before allowing you to become one.

And so, with another bow he said, "I understand."

"Good, and once you have done this, I'm sure you can handle yourself and you are able to make these two potions. I'll give you a potion that'll allow you to become an Alchemist." Edward informed the young teen in front of you, "So, are you ready to leave here?"

"Just need to get a few potions, but I am." said Kirito with a smile.

With that, Kirito went to the nearest shop to get a few potions for the test. So that if he does get hurt, he would be able to heal easy enough. And once he got the potions, both he and Edward, headed towards the forest.

To Be Continued!

Author's Note: Here ends another chapter of Sword Art Online - Alchemy Edition, I hope that you enjoyed the second part of Becoming an Alchemist. I hope that you'll be able to spare a few moments and leave me some feedback to the story, as I would like to hear your thoughts and any ideas you would like to see happen in the story. Now I would like to thank Darklord331 for beta reading this story. He has worked on the other chapters that I'll be planning to post in the upcoming weeks when I get a few moments to do so.

Anyway, in this chapter we have the backstory of Ichigo and the others. Whilst not a full crossover like many of you feared, the elements of the show are there. But instead of the afterlife, Gotei 13 is part of a secret part of the Special Forces, one that very few know about. I hope you like how I did this and how I explained why they came into the game to search for Kayaba. He was once part of their group and felt as if it was their responsibility to deal with him.

I hope you like how I'm making it as to why it'll take players longer to level up. As I said before, I found it strange that after two days Kirito was able to get to level six I think it was, but in a month he only got to level fourteen or whatever it was, even though he knew hunting spots and quests to do. So, this is my way to explain this. That when they pick a class, their levels are reset and they need to level up again, but takes longer because they need more Exp to do so. Let me know your thoughts on this.