The Black Blades
Chapter 3–Someone New (Part 2)
(x)
The Next Day, Early Morning…
The quiet sound of rustling slowly stirred Alpha from her slumber, and she fully woke and sat up once the smell of meat hit her nostrils. She groggily wiped her eyes and looked around for the source of the sound and smell. The sound of light snoring directed her eyes to Sora sleeping soundly a few feet away, meaning she and maybe Aoki were the only ones awake. Her suspicions were confirmed when the sound of merry whistling led her eyes to rest on their campfire, which Aoki was crouched next to.
"Morning," he said, startling the girl. Without getting up, he turned to face her with a smile, exposing the legs of meat that were cooking on a spit above the flame. "Just in time for breakfast," he continued, turning away from her to rotate the spit. "If you want, you can use the stream a few meters south from here to wash up and fully wake up."
"Uhh…sure," was all Alpha said as she slowly got up and walked to where he specified, splashing her face with the water and shaking her head to get the excess off her face. Feeling more rejuvenated, she made her way back to the campsite, where the three pieces of meat were moved to plates. "Where'd you get the plates from?" she asked as she sat down and picked one up.
"You can buy them from some of the stores," he replied as he prepared his breakfast with some spices, giving them to Alpha when he saw her hand stretched out for them. "These, along with bowls and cups, are invaluable whether you're in- or outdoors." He took a bite of the meat, chewing quietly. Alpha chose to do the same, and both chose to eat in silence.
After a few minutes of silence broken only by the sounds of eating from both players, Alpha asked her blue-clad companion, "Where'd you even get this meat?"
"There's a small den not too far from here. It's actually next to the stream you were at earlier."
"Really?" Alpha swallowed the bite she took while Aoki was talking. "But there weren't any enemies there."
"And why do you think that is?" Aoki simply asked as he tossed the now-stripped bone aside, itself shattering as he looked at her.
"Oh," was all Alpha said, feeling a bit dumb for not realizing where their breakfast came from. "Hey, shouldn't we wake Sora up?" she asked, noticing their companion was still fast asleep.
"Don't bother," was all his friend had to say. "Once he's out, he's out. He's a heavy sleeper, y'know."
"I figured as much. But wouldn't his food get cold?"
"Actually, boar meat stays hot for a while." As if on cue, Sora began to stir from his sleep, leading Aoki to walk over to his dozing friend. "Oi, wake up." Aoki gently tapped Sora with his foot. "I make breakfast, and you're gonna waste it, Sleeping Beauty?" Sora waved his friend's harassment away and sat up.
"I'm up, I'm up," he mumbled.
"Great! There's a stream south of here. While you wash up, you want eggs?"
"Yes please." Sora stretched and slowly got to his feet. "Can you make omurice in this game?"
"Not 'til floor 6."
"Dammit. Oh well." He looked at Alpha and smiled softly, giving her a wave which she returned.
"Yo, show 'im where the stream is," Aoki instructed, crouching back down next to the campfire, presumably to cook Sora some eggs.
"Gotcha," was Alpha's reply before she motioned for the red-clad player to follow her.
(x)
Later, at Noon…
Aoki whistled merrily as he kept pace ahead of the other two, playing true to his role as the party leader. Alpha had to admire how he kept walking without once tripping over so much as a pebble, given that he had his map out too. Her gaze moved to Sora as he jogged slightly ahead and asked his friend, "What're those markings on the map?" while pointing at said marks.
"They're custom markers," began Aoki's explanation. "Alpha, you want in on this too?" he turned to their lone-wolf companion, who snapped to attention once she heard her name being spoken.
"Sure." She increased her pace and caught up to Aoki, looking at his map opposite from Sora. The three players stopped so Aoki could properly explain.
"Custom markers are icons that typically don't mean anything in particular, which is handy for marking things like drop areas, monster dens and, say, quest targets," he continued, pinching his map and showing the plethora of markers he had already set throughout the floors that had already been cleared.
"I don't think I've seen these before. What's the three tally lines mean?" Sora asked, pointing at a marker that looked suspiciously like—
"The claw marks? I use those for monster dens." The older player clicked on the marker his friend pointed at and showed them the marker in full—a white claw mark with the flavor text 'Dire Wolves—N'. "And the flower symbolizes medicinal herbs. Speaking of—Alpha, can you grab those roots by your feet?"
"Sure thing," the girl replied as she knelt down and pulled out the roots Aoki specified. "Hm. Does the caretaker need these?" she asked as she inspected the items she pulled, the name 'Bitter Root (S)' appearing in her HUD.
"That's some of what she needs, yeah." Alpha gave Aoki the root, and Aoki then put the item into the party's shared inventory. "I'll share my map with you guys, so be sure to pick up the roots when you come across them." After saying that, Aoki selected the Options tab on his map and pressed the option Share Map With Party. After Aoki pressed the option, Sora and Alpha saw his map appear in their respective HUDs.
As they continued along their route, the trio's progression in completing Anna's request had been increasing. Before long, they had several bitter roots and sweet herbs, along with a few berries in case they were needed. "Whew!" Aoki wiped away his virtual sweat with the back of his hand and stood up straight. "Nothing like a little field work to get the blood pumping, amirite guys?"
"I wish I stayed asleep," Sora replied hoarsely as he keeled over. Aoki simply opened his menu and took out a water bottle, tossing it over his shoulder to Alpha, who caught it and passed it to their exhausted ally. "Thanks," he said after guzzling the bottle, standing up straight and stretching. "Hey, Aoki. Where's this wyvern?" Aoki held up a finger to silence Sora in response.
As all three waited with bated breath, Alpha heard a distant roar—one that was slowly growing louder. As she realized it was heading towards them, she shouted "GET DOWN!" right as a large winged figure dashed by them. As she and Sora slowly got to their feet, they realized Aoki was nowhere to be seen, his sword laying flat on the ground.
"AOKI!" Sora shouted for his friend as he ran in the direction the figure had flown to. Alpha dashed after her companion, making sure to pick up Aoki's greatsword before giving chase.
As the pair dashed and cut through anything that stood in their way, they heard Aoki's voice shouting, "LET GO, YOU WINGED BASTARD!" Before long, they made it to an area with no trees blocking the sky above them, where they saw Aoki trying to wrestle himself out of the claw of a winged dragon, which was screeching as it flew around like a maniac. Alpha primed Aoki's sword in a throwing position, before she was stopped by Sora's outstretched hand.
"I've got a better idea," he said. Opening his menu, Sora took out a throwing knife and flipped it, catching the handle and preparing to throw it. Once he saw Aoki get one hand free, he used all the strength he had to throw the knife at his friend.
Meanwhile, Aoki tried to get his other hand free before seeing the glint of the knife Sora had thrown. He smiled as he put two and two together, catching the knife and driving it into the beast's claw. The wyvern shrieked in pain and opened its now-injured claw, releasing its would-be hostage. As he plummeted to the ground, Aoki opened his menu and quick-equipped a wooden shield, putting his body behind it in preparation to use it to soften his landing. Before long, as Sora and Alpha were running to where he was gonna land, he crash-landed, the shield having absorbed all the damage and shattering as he rose to his feet.
As the three turned to face the wyvern, Alpha tossed Aoki his sword, who caught it and readied himself, keeping his right arm outstretched with his greatsword parallel to it. At the same time, Sora crossed his arm over his chest and readied his sword, and Alpha had one fist brought close to her body with the other hand outstretched towards the monster. The beast was a rather large one; not big enough to warrant being called an actual boss, but certainly larger than the three players it was confronting. Its skin was a scaly green, and its eyes were yellow slits. It looked down at the three and and shrieked once more as its HP and name was displayed: "Greater Wyvern," 9.9k/10k HP.
"What now?" Alpha asked, her fist glowing with the preemptive charge of a skill.
"…Break!" was Aoki's command as the dragon reared its head and charged its fire breath, with the trio simultaneously dispersing right as the breath escaped the beast's mouth and exploded where the trio had originally been. In an immediate retaliation, Aoki turned his dash away into a running start and slashed at the beast, dashing through it and steadying himself while it roared in pain. The beast jumped and hovered backwards, using its wings to blast a strong gust to where Aoki was—in response, Aoki stabbed his sword into the ground and used it to keep himself in place while the wind blown by the wyvern did its damndest to throw him back.
Once the wyvern had landed, Sora ran to Aoki and jumped off of his back as he was still hunched over, meeting the creature at its eye level as he slashed at its face—the wyvern recoiled, and Alpha took the opportunity to rush to the monster and punch it in its scaly stomach before meeting its lowered chin with an uppercut.
As the monster recovered and the party readied themselves for a retaliatory action, Sora took note of the monster's stomach where Alpha had punched it—it had cracked somewhat. "Sora, watch out!" At his friend's call, Sora snapped to attention—but he wasn't fast enough to dodge the swipe of the wyvern's tail as it crashed into him and launched him backwards into a tree. The wyvern then took advantage of the other players being distracted and flew backwards as it fired a fire blast into the ground in front of them, knocking those two players back as well. Aoki was the first to scramble to his feet, grabbing Sora—the closest to him—and dragging him to a nearby boulder for cover. Alpha followed the two of them and they huddled together behind the rock as the wyvern let loose the fire breath it had been charging while they scrambled about, the boulder acting as a natural shield between the fire and the players. "You guys okay?!" Aoki asked the other players.
"I'm fine," Alpha said.
"I'll live, but damn that hurt," Sora responded as he nursed his arm a little. "Did you guys see its stomach? Where Alpha punched it?"
"Couldn't afford to focus on it. Why, you got a plan?" Aoki asked.
The wyvern's fire breath had stopped, and Sora peeked out from behind the boulder. When he saw that the monster was grounded and had started charging its fire breath again, he looked back at the other two and said, "Alpha, get ready. Aoki, follow my lead." Once the two nodded in response, Sora turned his attention back to the wyvern, and jumped out from behind the boulder with Aoki and dashed at the monster, who was about to let loose its fire attack.
Alpha saw that the wyvern was about to open its mouth and fire at the two as they approached it—she looked down for something she could throw and saw a rock. She picked up the rock, tossed it up and caught it to get a feel for its weight—then turned her attention to the monster while charging the rock with a sword skill and chucked it with all her might at its mouth the second it opened.
Her plan had worked, as when the rock hit the wyvern's mouth, it hit the fire forming in the mouth and dealt massive damage as the wyvern effectively swallowed the fire it was forming. Once she saw the monster recoil from the attack, she ran out from behind the boulder as well, following a good bit behind the other two.
Sora and Aoki took the opportunity to charge sword skills as they ran and slashed once each across the crack in the monster's stomach, dealing a great amount of damage per slash and causing more cracks to appear. The two stepped to the side as they landed to allow Alpha to punch the biggest crack forming on the monster's stomach with a martial arts sword skill. The second her fist made contact with the monster's stomach, its HP had dropped to 0 and the monster shattered, leaving behind a ton of materials.
It took the three of them a second to process that fight had ended, and once the realization kicked in, Sora and Alpha cheered and high-fived. "WE DID IT!" the pair cheered at the top of their lungs.
Sora's attention snapped to his best friend who was crouched down next to the beast's corpse, deep in thought with a concerned expression on his face. "Why the long face, Aoki?" he asked as he walked up to Aoki and smacked his back. "We just beat a wyvern!"
"This isn't right." Aoki's voice was almost minuscule, yet the words that escaped his mouth quickly put out the festive mood of the younger players.
"What's not right?" Alpha asked, crossing her arms after accepting the drops the party received.
"Why did we fight a Greater Wyvern?" As this question left Aoki's lips, Alpha's arms dropped to her side and Sora's smile slowly disappeared. "In the beta test, there were never any Greater or Lesser variants of the monsters—just the monsters themselves."
"So you're saying—" Alpha started.
"That Kayaba's making this whole ordeal a hell of a lot harder," Aoki concluded with a serious look on his face. After a few seconds, he stood up from the wyvern's corpse and turned to face the other two, his typical carefree smile reappearing on his face to reassure his allies. "Well? This loot isn't collecting itself." At that, the party got to collecting the numerous items the monster dropped upon its defeat—try as Aoki could with his smile and usual attitude, he couldn't get rid of the serious mood that his words had brought, nor could he bring the smiles back to Sora and Alpha's faces.
(x)
"That was one hell of a haul," Aoki said merrily as he led the party back to their camp. He checked the party inventory again to check the items they had gotten from the Greater Wyvern—4 Greater Wyvern Talons, which would be converted to rare ore for weapon crafting; the Greater Wyvern's Wings, which could be broken down to use for potion materials for a long while; about 15 Greater Wyvern Scales, which could be used to create stronger armor; and a good number of Dragon Teeth for various uses. He also checked the inventory for the herbs that Anna had asked him to pick up, and closed the inventory once he confirmed they had the amount they needed. The lack of response from his teammates led Aoki to look over his shoulder at the two of them—when he spotted them looking slightly downward, he stopped in his tracks and turned fully to face them. "Guys, what's wrong?"
"What's wrong?" Sora asked incredulously as he looked up at his friend. "You dropped that bombshell on us and you want to ask us what's wrong?"
"And that's getting you down, why exactly?"
"I don't know if you know," Alpha said as she looked up too, "but we're not experienced players like you. You have at least SOME knowledge to fall back on if something doesn't line up with how the beta test was. WE don't."
Aoki was silent for a moment after Alpha finished talking. He then opened his map to see how far away from the camp they were—not far. "We'll talk more about this at camp, okay?" When he got begrudging nods from Sora and Alpha, Aoki turned back around and continued walking in the direction of the camp. The party was silent the rest of the way back.
Once they had reached the camp, Aoki sat down at one of the logs they had set up as makeshift seats. He motioned for the other two to sit across from him—when they did so, he took out a piece of flint ore and struck it against the knife he had caught earlier, aiming it so that the sparks that flew out would hit the firewood separating the three of them and start the campfire. Once the campfire got going, he put the ore away and planted his sword in the ground in front of him, resting his hands on the pommel of the sword. "So," Aoki started, "that Wyvern."
"You mean the Greater Wyvern that shouldn't have existed?" Sora cynically asked in response.
"I mean the Greater Wyvern that we managed to beat as a team. The attitude you guys had after we killed it was the right one—and it's my fault for ruining that. But we did it anyway. We beat a monster that we knew basically nothing about. And before you say anything," Aoki said as he saw Alpha's mouth open, "we can't say for sure that general knowledge about mobs will apply across Greater and Lesser versions." Alpha shut her mouth after Aoki answered the question she would have asked. "For all we know, the Greater Wyvern could've just been an oversight. And the fact that we beat an enemy the other beta testers haven't seen before should speak volumes of the skill you guys have. I would have died if it weren't for you guys getting me out of its claws."
There was a bit of silence. Then it was broken when Sora said "Okay, we can handle this. But what about all the players who can't? We can't be there to help people fight against every Greater variant."
"That's why we won't." At Aoki's response, Sora and Alpha looked at him with a confused look on their faces. "Trust me, information about the variants WILL get to other players. But we'll help who we can—anyone we happen to stumble across. Realistically, those are the only ones we'd have any ability to help."
"..."
"Guys?" Aoki asked, a bit worried at the lack of response.
"...You're right," Alpha finally said after a bit of silence. She looked up and smiled at Aoki. "I don't know how you did it but you made me feel better about all this."
"He's had that talent since we were kids," Sora said with a chuckle as he looked up. "Thanks, man. And sorry we—"
"Don't be sorry, guys. I get it, really. Now, if you're feeling better, we can get back to the town by nightfall." When he saw the other two nod in response, Aoki stood up and stamped out the campfire he made. "Let's go." At that, the other two stood up with him and followed Aoki back to the town.
(x)
That Same Day, Evening…
Night began to fall as Aoki and co. walked back into the town, the shopkeepers turning in for the night. As they walked through the town returning the friendly waves the residents had been giving them, they arrived at one of their destinations: Agil's soon-to-be-open shop. Luckily for the trio, the bald shopkeeper was still awake, and when he saw the group outside his door, he motioned for them to come in. As Aoki opened the door and they stepped inside, Agil walked out from the counter with his arms open in a welcoming gesture. "Well, if it isn't my favorite group a' hunters! How'd it go?" The three looked at one another and smiled before Aoki opened his menu and let all of the drops from the Greater Wyvern exit his menu and land on his friend's countertop. "My god…" Agil spoke softly as he picked up one of the wings and examined it. "You guys actually did it. Not that I had any doubts."
"Of course we did it," Aoki scoffed, crossing his arms. "Will these items be enough?"
"Mhm, and then some. I'll buy 'em off you, so you don't walk away with nothing from this."
"You sure?" Sora asked, crossing his arms. "Wasn't the original deal for us to gi—?!" His query was cut short by the simultaneous jabbing he received from Aoki and Alpha's elbows.
"Sounds good to me," the female player simply replied as Sora bent over in pain, opening her menu to sell the items to Agil, who was laughing at the rough treatment the young player had suffered.
"Sorry Agil," Aoki said as he gently rubbed his friend's back, "but given that we fought a Greater Wyvern, I'd say we earned a little something for this."
"It was a Greater Wyvern?!"
"Yeah. I'll gather some info, see if this was just a one-time thing, but we should be fine for the time being." Aoki crossed his arms and furrowed his brow while Agil and Alpha went through with the transaction. "Agil, I don't like this. I almost don't wanna believe Kayaba would mess with the monsters just to make it more difficult for us players." At this point, Sora had fully recovered from the double elbow he received and was now standing up straight.
"Well, you're the beta tester here, Aoki," Sora said, mimicking his friend's pose. "You think the game master would do something like this?"
"I…can't say for certain. He never did interact with us, even during the beta testing. Everything we had to report would go straight to his team, but I dunno if those complaints ever reached the man himself."
"Either way," Alpha said, preparing to leave the shop, "it doesn't concern us now, especially since we've shown we have the firepower necessary to meet these attempts to hinder us. Now c'mon, we got somewhere else to be."
"Oh shit, you're right! Talk to you later, Agil!" Aoki was the first to leave, opening the door and dashing out. Agil merely laughed and waved goodbye to the other two as they followed suit.
(x)
Moments Later…
The blue-clad player made a beeline through the town as it was slowly preparing to slumber, making sure to return greetings to those who would greet him along his path. Once the orphanage came into view, and a figure waiting outside was now visible, Aoki picked up speed while shouting, "ANNA!" at the top of his lungs.
Anna jumped up, startled, and visibly relaxed when she saw him running to her.
"You're back!" she said, relief still showing itself on her face. "Did you get everything?"
"And how!" Aoki replied, opening his menu and pulling out the sack as Sora and Alpha finally catch up to him. "Here, this should be enough for the orphanage."
"I really can't thank you enough for this, Aoki," Anna said with a smile as she perused the bag's contents. "But I have to say, I do feel bad for having to always rely on you for resupplying."
"Well, hopefully some merchants can set up here," Sora said. "That way, you can get what you need more easily."
"That being said," Aoki continued, gently holding one of Anna's hands in both of his, "please don't hesitate to call on us again. I could use the excuse to see the kids."
Anna, slightly blushing, said nothing and merely nodded. Before she could say anything else, Alpha interrupted the moment with a clearing of her throat. "As touching as this mushy romance is, we gotta go turn in the bounty now. Come on, boys," she stated as she grabbed both males by their arms and pulled them away, dragging them both to the inn.
"Don't be a stranger!" Aoki shouted before the trio disappeared from sight.