Oath of Rebellion

by Solid Shark

Tired of spending a life studying to reach an empty future, Asuna enters Sword Art Online, a world of swords and airships, to gain some measure of freedom. When she is trapped, she throws herself into building a new life for herself, as far from what her parents intended as she can. Meeting a dark swordsman sets her on a new course, in Aincrad's skies...

15. Chapter XV: Sound and Fury

Chapter XV: "Sound and Fury, Signifying Nothing"

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December 18th, 2032

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A flaming tree branch swung by, entirely too close to the bridge viewports. "Hard to port!" Coper shouted. "Get us some distance!"

It wasn't fair, Lind thought numbly, as Liberator hurriedly pulled away from the blazing tree giant. They'd done everything right this time. They'd investigated all the local quests, and even hired the Rat to dig up every bit of detail the beta testers had on the boss. By all accounts, attacking Birunam with airships was the intended strategy. They'd even loaded up with ammunition to combine it with the strategy that had been used in the beta.

It wasn't like Illfang, or even the Second Island Skywall raid. This time, everything should've been like clockwork. But Kibaou and the ALF couldn't even be bothered to show up in time to get aboard, he thought, watching Liberator lead the raid up and out of Birunam's flaming reach with only a fraction of his attention. And now the boss set itself on fire, meaning our intended strategy is useless. And two of our airships—even the Beater's!—are made of wood….

"Lhan," Coper was saying behind him, sounding oddly calm, "tell Gunnery to switch out the rune shells for standard rounds. Not the explosive shells. Remember what happened when we were fighting Lament, I don't want them detonating prematurely!"

"Aye, sir." Liberator's brunette gunnery officer flipped a switch on her station, and a chime rang out. "Gunners, switch to standard rounds, we're going back in as soon as you're ready…."

"Helm, get us altitude," Coper continued. "But don't take us out of aggro range. I don't want to reset the encounter if we can help it. Durendal, Moondancer, are you good with that, or do you need to retreat to change your loadout? For that matter, are you going to be all right going up against a fire-based boss—?"

"If we keep our distance, we'll be fine," the Legend Braves' Orlando called back over raid chat, sounding as bold and confident as ever. "The fire won't make any difference to our offense, either. As soon as you're ready to go back in, so are we!"

"We've seen worse," Kirito said simply, voice as flat and controlled as it had been the last time Lind had dealt with the Beater in person. "And I think we can get away with killing living wood when it's on fire and trying to kill us. Worry about yourselves."

"That's… good?" Coper said uncertainly. "Well, just give us another—another half a minute, and we'll be ready—"

A burning tree branch hurtled over the bow deck, startling him into ending his sentence on a yelp. Lind couldn't help flinching away from the viewports, swearing to himself.

This wasn't how it was supposed to go. With Kibaou out of the way, the Dragon Knights Brigade was supposed to lead the raid and show how it was really supposed to go. Instead, Lind found himself nothing but a passenger, while Coper sounded more in control than he had in the battle with Icarus' Lament and the Beater just treated the whole thing as if it was only a battle with unexpected mob mechanics.

Almost worse were the Legend Braves. They'd showed up the ALF and DKB both against the Bullbous Bow on Niian, and while they'd been late to the battle with Lament, that had just made them the cavalry. The heroes of the hour—even more than Moondancer, since the Beater just didn't seem to care about sticking around for the spotlight. If the ALF and DKB weren't careful, the Braves would take the position of de facto raid leaders.

It's not about ego, Lind told himself, gripping a handy edge protruding from a bulkhead to brace himself as Liberator suddenly accelerated. It's that the Braves may look flashy, but being in the right place at the right time a couple of times doesn't make them fit to lead. Especially if the Beater—of all people—is right, and they're making dangerous deals, they could lead the clearing right off a cliff!

That was one thing he would say for the Beater: Kirito didn't seem at all interested in leading. Just surviving at any cost. He was obnoxious, but he wasn't a threat.

"Guns ready!" Lhan called out, glancing back at her captain. "Sir, we're all set!"

Coper straightened up in his chair, pressed a finger to the bridge of his nose as if adjusting invisible glasses, and nodded sharply. "Take us back in! As soon as we're on target, open up with a full broadside! Durendal, Moondancer, be ready to engage!"

Liberator swung hard back to starboard and lowered her nose, driving down to pass to one side of Birunam. Lind's knuckles creaked as he held on, watching the cruiser's crew maneuver the ship with a confidence born of having survived fighting a much bigger ship just days before.

Just a passenger, he thought bitterly, unable to suppress a wince as the giant flaming tree hurled another branch at the cruiser, this time bouncing it right off Liberator's port flank. Coper is the one giving the orders here. I don't even know the mechanics….

That has to change.

---

The boss is on fire. And we're using a wooden airship. Oh, I'm going to kill whoever programmed this boss fight!

Asuna seldom even thought about the Aincrad Archipelago in gaming terms anymore, especially the deeper she got into exploring the Elf War. This once, though, with Kizmel having specifically called it out as one of Kayaba's creations, she was reminded of the artificial nature of the world around her, be it programmed or spell-cast.

What Kizmel said, and the fact that this is pure sadistic programmer. I'm not a gamer, and even I know that!

Bad enough that they were taking a wooden-hulled airship against a thirty-meter-tall flaming tree. Worse that she herself was going to have to go out on deck to play her part. Which she did, borrowing a few of Kizmel's choicer Sindarin invectives as she struggled to keep her footing. Going from the pilothouse to the deck gun's mounting while Moondancer was maneuvering was not her idea of fun.

At least she'd had practice at it. After some of the crazier things they'd done with the ship, she mostly had her air legs by this time. Though seeing Birunam yanking branches off its own limbs and sending the flaming pieces hurtling toward the Swordmaster airships did make concentrating on her footing more difficult than she wanted to admit.

"You do remember you can run the gun from inside, right?" Kirito called, as Asuna strapped herself in and powered up the gun. "I'm not sure this is a good idea, Asuna."

"I haven't had enough practice aiming that way," she replied, trying not to think too hard on how she felt energy flowing up into the gun. "If we're going to do this, we need to make every shot count."

Ahead of them, she could see Liberator diving in an arc back toward Birunam, having finished swapping out the carefully-prepared—and utterly useless—new ammunition. To port, the Legend Braves' Durendal was also just about ready to fire, judging from the emerald glow on her own deck gun's barrels.

Here's hoping Wood-element guns even work on trees. …Which reminds me. "Say, Kizmel? Elves aren't supposed to kill living trees, right? So… how much trouble are we going to be in for this one? I haven't even been an apprentice for a week, I don't want to get kicked out already!"

Before her friend and Knight could answer, there was a loud boom, and Liberator's port side was abruptly obscured by a cloud of smoke from her broadsides going off. Asuna couldn't quite see the result, but Birunam recoiled, uttering a howl that made her ears ache. It tried to swing one of its huge, burning limbs into the cruiser, but the ship put on a burst of speed, racing just ahead of it.

Which, just incidentally, put the flaming branch-arm right in the path of the two very flammable airships trailing her. Asuna heard a not-so-knightly yelp from Durendal over raid chat, accompanied by a Sindarin complaint from Kirito that made her ears burn. Durendal abruptly pulled up, Moondancer angled sharply down, and in the split second she had a clear shot, Asuna squeezed the triggers.

Emerald light lanced out, briefly connecting the gun with the tree. Between that bright green flash and Birunam's own fire, she couldn't see exactly what happened before they were under the branch-arm and then past. Her HUD showed about four or five percent knocked off the first lifebar, though, and when she whipped her head around to look, she saw a chunk of wood flying off.

She didn't see the few pieces that bounced off Moondancer's hull. Somehow, though, she knew they had, even before a quick check of her HUD revealed a few pixels had been chipped off their ship's own lifebar. She immediately resolved not to think too hard about the faint, phantom burning sensation, instead focusing on the way Liberator was leading them into an elliptical course that would bring them up and then back down and around for another pass.

Moondancer didn't follow that course quite precisely, though, Kirito throwing in a jag to starboard to let yet another flaming branch soar by. It did nothing more than singe their port railing, but it was enough to really annoy Asuna.

"While my people do our best to simply avoid treants and the like," Kizmel finally answered, dry mirth evident in her tone, "we do generally allow battling them in self-defense. As for Birunam—" she broke off for a second, as Birunam suddenly swept an arm up into the middle of the airship formation, forcing them to scatter "—I believe even our strictest priests would make an exception for this monstrosity. It threatens the forest more than we ever could!"

She was probably right, now that Asuna thought about. With Moondancer banking into a hard turn to port, she could see a glimpse of the ground below over the railing. So far, the battle was keeping Birunam within the clearing its awakening had created, but if it ever strayed out of it….

Liberator's guns barked again, blasting directly into Birunam's jagged "mouth", before the cruiser pulled up and away. This time, before Moondancer or Durendal could follow up with their own shots, the flaming tree giant roared and swung both arms, one up and one down, trailing fire across a huge arc of the sky—including across any course either airship could take from where they were.

"Hang on!"

Asuna hunched in her gunner's seat, trying to minimize how much unarmored skin was exposed as Kirito and Kizmel gunned the engines and drove right through the flames. For a heartbeat, then another, all she could feel was heat, and she had a split second to be grateful SAO didn't emulate pain.

Then they were through, and if she felt toasty in places she didn't think were even part of her own body, they were all alive, and Moondancer was clawing for the sky.

Above them, Durendal wasn't quite so lucky, the Braves' ship trailing fire. Not a serious fire, Asuna thought, but on a ship, any fire was bad news, so she wasn't surprised to see water cascading down a few moments later. Wish we'd thought to bring some, she thought ruefully. Come to think of it, how are we supposed to put out a shipboard fire?

Ahead of them, Liberator carried blithely on. Though Asuna couldn't quite suppress a tiny flicker of schadenfreude, seeing that they at least had a burning branch lying on the deck, with half a dozen of the DKB frantically trying to dislodge it without setting themselves on fire in the process.

"This doesn't seem to be the most effective formation for this battle," Kizmel said after a moment. "Well and good for the steel of Liberator to risk the flames; why should we follow her lead so closely?"

"Because so far, it's easier than dealing with Lind's shouting if we 'challenge his leadership' or whatever," Kirito said dryly; though Asuna was relieved to see he was taking Moondancer out to the farthest edge of a course that would still trail the cruiser. "For now I'd rather risk a little scorching than disrupt the raid arguing."

Kizmel sighed. "Fair enough. But the moment the risk of catching our entire ship on fire becomes too great, we will take matters into our own hands."

"No argument from me." One more burning branch—no, Asuna realized, eyes wide, this time it was an entire tree—hurtled by, accompanied by a roar from Birunam, and Kirito snarled something under his breath. "I guess we should just be glad the ALF didn't make it at all. If Kibaou were here, they'd be arguing so much by now that Liberator wouldn't be flying straight."

"At least then we'd be able to just use our own initiative," Asuna pointed out, even as the trio of ships dove back in for another pass. "What do you want to bet we could handle this a lot better on our own?"

"…You may have a point there."

---

Three airships, one of steel and two of wood, circled the burning tree-giant, firing bolts of magic and salvos of cannonballs once per pass. The tree, in turn, bellowed and swept its flaming limbs at them, occasionally throwing pieces of itself as projectiles. So far, the ships appeared to be winning, or at least inflicting more damage than they received.

Aboard the ferry hanging half a kilometer outside the battle area, cheers resounded every time the Swordmaster ships struck a blow. When Birunam's fiery left "arm" brushed a little too close to their flight path, leaving a trail of flames that briefly ignited one of the wooden ships, there was a loud groan, yet the sound didn't seem to be one of great concern.

"C'mon, Braves! Put that fire out, c'mon…! Yes, that's it! Fry 'em right back!"

"Did you see that?! Did I see that right?! I think Liberator just blew one of the tree's fingers right off!"

Tourists, Alice Synthesis Thirty thought, standing at the rear of the crowd on the ferry's deck. Blonde hair tucked out of sight under the hooded cloak she'd picked up in town, she could only shake her head. The Swordmasters are fighting for their lives—there's a battle going on right in front of them, at this very moment—and there are tourists. These people simply are not sane.

To be sure, when she'd arrived in Koriki and begun to—very carefully—ask questions, one of the first things she'd learned was that "Field Bosses" weren't considered very serious. To the Swordmasters, even the tree-giant having set itself on fire was apparently considered more of an annoyance than a catastrophe. "Event Bosses" might be another matter, and the guardians of the Skywall Towers were treated as seriously as death itself, but the likes of Birunam were thought of as minor threats.

Alice still believed it was utterly insane that many weaker Swordmasters had chartered an airship ferry to watch the battle, as if it were nothing more than a tournament exhibition. They were all fighting for their lives, and they acted as if it was a mere game?

Useful, certainly. It gave her a clear vantage point, much closer than she would've managed on her own. They're still insane. Now I'm beginning to believe they truly are civilians duped by Kayaba. They have tourists, and their warriors are amateurs.

Certainly, the three airships circling Birunam were making a good accounting of themselves. The Dark Elf ship she recognized as the one belonging to Kirito was following the Chrome Disaster as though tied by a string, and the ship's gunner was having no trouble striking Birunam even when the tree's fires forced them to take drastic maneuvers. The Forest Elf ship was doing almost as well, not following the course quite as precisely yet never straying too far, and they'd dealt expeditiously with the shipboard fire. Even the Chrome Disaster itself was at least showing better coordination than when last she'd seen the ship.

No, she reminded herself, remembering the gossip she'd picked up in town. They are Moondancer, Durendal, and Liberator. Don't forget that, or the Swordmasters may notice something amiss. …Maybe.

But while they were following their current tactics with impressive unity, Alice couldn't help shaking her head, again and again. When Liberator took advantage of her steel hull to power right on through a wave of fire from Birunam's arm, using the cover of the flames to unleash a broadside right in its face, Moondancer and Durendal followed as closely as they could, diverging from the course only far enough to avoid the fire, costing themselves good shots in the process.

She wasn't a sailor. She was a dragonrider. The simplistic pattern, an endless elliptical orbit around Birunam, was inefficient even for Liberator, which had little to fear from fire. Moondancer and Durendal were badly handicapped by it, constantly at risk of igniting themselves. With how simple Birunam's own attacks were, it would've made far more sense for the two wooden-hulled ships to either keep a wider distance, or use hit-and-run tactics.

Kirito is smarter than that. Why is he allowing the Chrome Disaster's—Liberator's—captain to take the lead here?

Well. That was why Alice was even there. Finding out what strange hierarchy governed the Swordmasters who did choose to advance across the Archipelago was a large part of her mission. If she could learn that, their unpredictable actions might begin to make some semblance of sense.

Might, she thought, stifling a snort as Liberator abruptly broke to starboard, pulling out of her predictable orbit with some haste when Birunam suddenly began to rotate in place, far faster than anything its size had any right to. That time, at least, Moondancer and Durendal had the sense to maneuver independently, pulling up in a hard climb rather than following Liberator's turn. Right now, they could use some unpredictability.

"Hey, I think the boss' first lifebar is down!" an excitable Swordmaster called out from closer to the railing, pointing enthusiastically. "That's a state change, I'm sure of it!"

And that would be another reason I'm here, Alice thought ruefully, taking a mental note. "State change"? Kayaba's spell gave us understanding of his language, and I still don't know what they're saying half the time.

It was probably a matter of terminology, much as a warrior's words might mean little to a civilian. From some of the odder babbling she'd heard in Koriki, she wasn't prepared to rule out multiple dialects being involved. Or the Swordmasters being just plain mad.

"Idiot, it's got five lifebars, and it's just a Field Boss. There's not gonna be a state change this early!"

"Bets on who's going to be the MVP? My Cor's on Liberator; that steel hull means she doesn't have to pull out as much as the other two." The would-be gambler in the crowd snorted. "The 'Beater' they keep talking about sure got the short end this time. Wood-magic cannons are bad enough against a tree. Wooden hull against fire? He'll be pulling back any minute now."

If you believe that, Alice thought, casting a scornful look toward the voice, and the small cluster of Swordmasters suddenly exchanging silver coins, you underestimate his skill. And overestimate his sanity.

Indeed, even as Birunam continued to spin, sending a wave of fire in all directions, Moondancer was quicker than Durendal to dive back in, settling back into formation with Liberator in a wider, higher circuit. Safely above the "Field Boss" and its current angle of attack, the three ships swung out wide, and then turned tightly back in, unleashing a fusillade of cannonballs and Wood magic into its face.

Birunam roared in rage, spin shuddering to a halt, and swung one arm in retaliation. This time, though, the Swordmaster ships were out of range even of the flames spilling off, and the handful of branches fired off in the same motion either went wide or caromed harmlessly off Liberator's metal hull. The ships sailed onward, unharmed, preparing for another pass.

Finally, they do the sane thing and get out of its immediate reach. Why didn't they do so sooner? Surely even Liberator's captain can at least recognize remaining in melee range with an airship is foolhardy!

"…Uh-oh," one of the Swordmasters closest to the ferry's railing said suddenly. "Um, can somebody tell the captain he might want to back off the ship? Like, kind of a lot? And get to higher altitude?"

Puzzled, Alice risked slipping through the crowd to get a closer look. We're well outside the battlefield. Why would anyone here be worried…? Oh. Oh, those fools—and Kayaba, you are diabolical.

"Eh, what's the problem—oh, hell!"

The battle thus far had been confined to the massive clearing formed by Birunam's awakening. On closer inspection, Alice finally recognized that the strangely-close orbit the Swordmaster ships had been maintaining had kept it there. With the wider course they'd now taken, Birunam was approaching the forest edge—while still on fire.

She didn't know how fast a forest fire might spread. She wasn't really in a hurry to find out, either, and from the sudden shouting back toward the ferry's pilothouse, that was one sentiment she shared with the Swordmasters. In moments, the ferry's engines roared to life, and the airship angled up and away. Not too sharp an angle—she wondered just how much the ferry's crew was being paid to take such risks—but enough of one to get them above any potential fire, and most likely out of rage of Birunam's wrath.

Alice paid little mind to the maneuvers, though, keeping her gaze fixed on the battle throughout. So. They have a choice: risk themselves, or risk Sandoria's towns. This one forest covers most of the Island, after all. Hm… if Diavel's words are true, the Swordmasters know most people in this world are mere marionettes; indeed, they believe everyone but themselves to be such.

Yet even they need support from the towns. So, Swordmasters, what will you do? And do any among you besides Kirito even think anything but pure self-interest matters here? Show me.

---

"Well, that tears it," Asuna said, voice dripping disgust. "We probably could've avoided this, if we hadn't been following Coper like we were on a leash."

Spinning Moondancer's wheel to follow Liberator in a tight turn back toward Birunam, Kirito couldn't exactly disagree. The giant flaming tree had just bumped into the outer edge of the clearing serving as the boss arena, and ordinary trees were beginning to ignite. Only a few thus far, but he knew it wouldn't stay contained.

If nothing else, the elliptical course was basically leading Birunam further into the forest. If that kept up, it wasn't going to be pretty.

"Had we maneuvered independently, we could've confused it into staying within the clearing," Kizmel said clinically, pulling the wing-sails in as they dove back down toward Birunam. "Adapting 'Switch' tactics to airship combat would have been the wiser choice here, I think."

"I know," he said ruefully. "And I'm sorry." He grimaced, even as Asuna dropped a blast from the deck gun right between Birunam's eyes. The tree-giant responded to that and Liberator's latest salvo by bending down, snatching up a tree, and swinging it like a gigantic club, nearly swatting Durendal from the sky during the Braves' attack run. "I've only handled airship-on-airship action before, though. A slow, ground-based enemy… I didn't know how to maneuver properly at first." Not really an excuse, and he knew it. Sighing, he went on, "You're right, though. Switching should've been obvious."

Kirito could feel Kizmel watching him, and he felt like wilting under her stare. After a moment, though, it was her turn to sigh. "No, Kirito, you're quite right. We're all still very new at this, after all. That said… now that we do have some idea of how this works, I believe we need to change our strategy."

"No argument here." He started to say something else, then almost bit his tongue as instinct screamed at him. They were flying back up and away from Birunam, and that flash of instinct was all that warned him to spin the wheel one way, then the other, letting the tree Birunam had picked up fly harmlessly past. The quick zigzag also got them through most of the subsequent storm of branch-arrows.

Most. At least three of them struck Moondancer's stern, and Kirito gritted his teeth. He told himself it was from the way it threw off his handling, and not any kind of phantom sensation of impact… or burning.

The way it thew off handling, or maybe the sight of the forest fire spreading beneath them, coming into view as the airships swung back around. "Coper," he called, "we need to take the fight in another direction! We can't let the forest fire get too far!"

"We'll be fine," Coper called back, sounding almost as confident as he probably meant to. "I know it'll be bad if any players are doing quests in the forest right, but nobody's going to miss the fire. The towns are all Immortal Objects, and there's no way damage to the forest will last after the battle—"

"You don't know that," Kirito interrupted, trying to keep his tone to the calculated arrogance of the Beater and not the burning frustration he was really feeling. "After everything that's happened lately, do you really want to count on things being the same as in the beta?"

"I know things have changed, Captain Kirito, but only details within battles. Fundamental gameplay mechanics haven't." Coper sounded surer of himself on this one. "I can't imagine even Kayaba messing with those. If the game doesn't have stable rules, how would we ever beat it?"

On the one hand, Kirito had to admit the other captain had a point. Even the retail version being persistent world hadn't altered the fundamental way the game worked. On the other hand, if Kizmel was right about it being a spell rather than technology, sooner or later that would change. And on the gripping hand—

"We're about to hit the third lifebar," Asuna snapped, breaking into the argument. "Look, even if things reset after the battle, this is going to wreck mob spawning for hours, probably. Either way, we really ought to be on the lookout for a state change about now. Halfway through, and this has been way too simple so far—"

Something rumbled, loud enough to be heard from inside Moondancer's pilothouse and over Liberator's latest volley. Then again. And then something outside the viewports, on the far side of the clearing from the nascent forest fire, visibly rippled.

"…Asuna?" Kizmel said, calmly and deliberately. "I believe this time you would be responsible for 'jinxing' us."

A cough from the deck gun. Through the viewport, magnified by the glasswood, Kirito could see the musketeer toss them a sheepish look. "Um. Oops?"

---

We need our own airship. This is ridiculous.

Lind was honest enough with himself to admit—if only to himself—that part of that sentiment was born from feeling absolutely useless and not liking it. Though the Dragon Knights Brigade had made the basic arrangements for the battle, once in the air it was Coper's show, and that rankled. Even so, he clung to the knowledge that there was a practical reason for his discontent, as well.

Still standing against the aft bulkhead on Liberator's bridge, the rest of the DKB's core party similarly trying to stay out of the way—and on their feet throughout air combat maneuvers—he could only watch the battle in frustration. An endless loop of flying in close to Birunam, firing a broadside, and then pulling away to circle around again, while Durendal and Moondancer followed in their wake. It was working, but it was slow, and riskier than it should've been for the two wooden airships in the formation.

"The new guns from the engineer in Koriki are working well," he heard Coper muse, as Birunam's second lifebar drained slowly but steadily from the repeated attacks. "Nezha, was it? He really does know his stuff. The guns we had when we fought Lament wouldn't have done the job even this fast. We should look into having work done on the engines after this…."

A burning tree clonged against the bridge's outer bulkhead, making Lind jump, but Liberator's own captain barely seemed to notice. Which just added fuel to the first of his frustration: he was just a passenger, and Coper clearly had the situation well in hand. It was inefficient, yes, but not inefficient enough for Lind to feel comfortable trying to second-guess the ship's own captain.

If we had our own ship, we'd have more input in how the battle was run, he thought, only distantly noticing Coper getting caught up in a discussion—argument—with the Beater. Not to mention more options. Three ships are adequate, and that's about all I can say about it. If this were a Skywall boss, we'd need more than this. I'm sure of it.

Definitely something to look into after the battle. Hopefully with more funds—one thing, at least, they'd learned from the Niian Skywall Tower fiasco was to make sure all players aboard ship were registered as part of the raid group, so everyone would get a cut of the EXP and loot. With luck, the DKB would be able to use that to finance getting their own airship.

We should make a trip back to Origia for that. I don't like the travel time, but one of the big ships from the aerodrome there would be better than anything they're selling at Koriki—

"Um. Oops?"

Hearing "oops" over raid chat—from one of the Beater's companions, Lind thought—broke him out of his post-battle planning. He looked up just in time to see Birunam's second lifebar had completely drained, edging into the third, courtesy of the last volley from the new guns Coper had spoken of. Just in time for Liberator's gunnery officer to sit bolt upright in her chair. "Captain! New contact, big, getting bigger—!"

Birunam remained off to Liberator's port, now between the airship and the treeline. Off to Liberator's starboard, another mass of wood was growing, absorbing trees on the far edge of the clearing to become a new giant, at least as tall as the first.

[Eenash: The Vengeful Forest].

As Coper started barking frantic orders—spurred on by both trees throwing branches and smaller trees at the airship formation—Lind found himself observing the situation with a detached, clinical air. At least this one isn't on fire?

---

"At least this one isn't on fire!" Having run out of impolite things to say in both Japanese and Sindarin, that was the first thing to came to Kirito's mind otherwise. Not the most insightful comment he could've made, but he was too busy wrestling with Moondancer's helm to manage anything better.

The raid formation had disintegrated pretty much the instant Eenash had appeared. With flaming branches—and trees—coming from one direction, and improbably sharp ones from the other, maintaining the tight delta was beyond impractical. Though Liberator was mostly continuing the fight against Birunam—Kirito had heard Coper saying something about trying to finish off at least the already-damaged enemy—Moondancer and Durendal had broken off to maneuver independently.

Kirito had quickly lost sight of Durendal; so long as the Braves' ship wasn't about to cross their flight path, he didn't really care. Presented with two giant, hostile trees, he'd turned Moondancer toward Eenash, reasoning that it was better to face the one not likely to set their ship on fire. As it was, Kizmel had half-turned her chair to keep an eye out the aft viewports, while Asuna kept the deck gun swiveling. Veering Moondancer to starboard to avoid a thrown, flaming tree that the Knight warned him about—trying not to think about the fact that he wasn't absolutely sure she'd actually said anything—his vision was briefly obscured by a blast from the gun.

He wasn't going to begrudge that. Better a half-second of blindness than taking a five-meter-long tree right through the pilothouse. As it was, Asuna's shot had blown it to splinters, and he winced at both the minor hull damage and the hits Asuna herself took in the process. Still better than a direct hit, he told himself, driving Moondancer down beneath the next wooden projectile. So far, this isn't that threatening, exactly. The real problem is….

"We need to focus fire on Birunam!" he heard Lind snap over raid chat. "That's the fastest way to cut this back down to one!"

Damn. The couple of minutes Lind had apparently been too stunned to stick his nose in had been so much calmer. On the one hand, Kirito saw his point, especially since Birunam was the one actively causing a forest fire. If they had to prioritize one, that was definitely the right choice.

On the other hand, he thought, as Kizmel shouted out another warning and Asuna missed a shot from the violent port turn he had to make, things are not that simple. "If we ignore Eenash, we'll be attacked from both sides," he called, keeping his voice as tight and controlled as he could. "Either we'll be taking fire we don't even see coming, or we'll be too distracted to make headway. And if I know Kayaba's game design, there's something waiting to make this worse if we leave the other one alone."

"Captain Kirito is probably right," Orlando put in; Kirito glanced up to see Durendal sailing a dozen meters above, heading back toward Birunam. "And I don't want to know what it might be. Setting itself on fire like Birunam, maybe."

Then they'd have two flaming trees, and even Coper wouldn't be able to deny the hazard of a forest fire of that scale. Kirito could almost hear Lind wince over chat, as the DKB guildmaster followed the same logic.

"I say we split up," Orlando continued. "Obviously Liberator should focus on Birunam. Durendal will help—I think we've got the fire suppression worked out. Moondancer, you're better off going for Eenash. You don't have the crew to properly put out fires, right?"

"Right," Kirito admitted sourly. They had been lit on fire, briefly, earlier in the battle. It had knocked off a good five percent of Moondancer's HP before it ran its course, and it had only been a small blaze from a thrown branch. He didn't want to think about what would happen if one of Birunam's direct fire attacks hit them. "All right, Moondancer will engage Eenash. But—"

"Taking on Eenash all by ourselves is hardly a practical task," Kizmel finished for him, turning back forward to adjust the wing-sails for a faster flight. "We have only the one gun. Powerful, yes, but only one. We will also be drawing all its… aggro… which could turn this battle from a nuisance to a serious threat."

She wasn't wrong about that. Almost as soon as she finished speaking, Eenash roared—a much deeper sound than its flaming brother—and swung both arms forward, sending a fusillade of branches straight at them. Faced with a barrage of sharpened wood bigger than their airship, Kirito desperately threw Moondancer into a dive, praying that what they didn't dodge, Asuna could shoot.

One deck gun against all that. Asuna fired rapidly, not even letting the gun fully recharge between shots, but there was only so much she could do, and Kirito had to pull them out of the dive before they slammed right into the ground. In the tiny span of seconds all that took, Moondancer's deck was hammered with huge splinters, some of them as much as two meters long.

In those few seconds, another fifteen percent was knocked off the hull, and Asuna's yelp alerted Kirito to her having taken a bad hit herself. Yet they were through, too close and too low for Eenash to try that trick again—

And right in the path of one of its legs, Kirito realized, a split second too late. Roaring in defiance, even as Kizmel spread the wing-sails wide, he spun the wheel hard to starboard, frantically trying to avoid being stepped on.

He wasn't sure they were going to manage that. Time seemed to slow, as the shadow of Eenash's "foot" grew large.

Boom!

Eenash rocked back, root-foot slamming hard onto the ground a scant few meters from Moondancer's path. Five percent had been knocked off its first lifebar, in an explosion of emerald light. "What the—?!"

"Those weren't cannonballs," Asuna said, pulling a potion from her belt in the unexpected moment of breathing room. "But Durendal is still over by Birunam! Who—?"

For just a second, Kirito thought Captain Emlas had joined the fight with Moonshadow. When he pulled Moondancer up and around to get a look, though, he saw a completely different airship arcing in from Sandoria's northeastern edge. Ebony like any Dark Elf ship, carrying a broadside of Wood-element cannons, yet flying a pennant definitely not from Lyusula. It was hard to tell at a distance, even with the glasswood's magnification, but Kirito thought it looked like a spiral shape of some kind. What it meant, he couldn't guess. "Definitely not an elf ship, though," he muttered. "Who…?"

"Sorry we're late," came an all-too-familiar Kansai drawl. "Oi, Beater! This time, we got yer back! But don't think we're gonna let ya have the LA bonus! Emancipator, fire at will!"

---

Now cruising at around double the altitude of its previous position, the ferry continued to allow its passengers a clear view of the battle. Though the engines were at a noticeably higher pitch, clearly prepared for another quick escape if necessary, no one aboard seemed particularly concerned. None of them even seemed to care very much about the rapidly-spreading forest fire.

All eyes were, instead, focused on the antics of the airships engaging the two tree-giants. There had been shouts of dismay when the second, Eenash, made its appearance; that had been the only moment when anyone had even suggested taking the ferry off to safety. That suggestion had quickly died out when the new arrival soared into the fray, joining Moondancer in engaging Eenash.

"A new ship! So that's what the ALF was up to! I thought Kibaou wasn't the type to sit out a battle like this!"

"Well, that sure changes the odds. Ten thousand Cor on the new guys!"

Madness, Alice thought, once again shaking her head at the tourists' antics. Certainly the battle is now firmly in the Swordmasters' favor, but if these tourists think this is some great victory, they're truly naive.

On the one hand, it seemed Liberator had finally lost her iron grip on command. The Chrome Disaster and Durendal were still circling Birunam, but now were doing so in opposite directions, so the flaming tree couldn't simply swat at both at once. Though it was still a simple pattern, and she saw Durendal suffer minor fires more than once even after the change in tactics, it was certainly less suicidal.

Though a flight of Integrity Knights would still slaughter them easily. As before, were I to engage them with Amayori, they would find themselves in far worse straits than against Kayaba's petty tricks.

On the other hand, the new arrival—Emancipator, judging from some of the chatter among the tourists—while powerful, didn't seem very interested in cooperating with Moondancer. The obviously-elven frigate appeared to be jockeying for position with Kirito's ship, to the point of accelerating to block Moondancer's line of fire just as they were preparing to attack Eenash's head.

Moondancer was smaller and more nimble, with a more flexible firing arc. She dropped below Emancipator, angling her deck gun up to land a burst of emerald fire right in Eenash's mouth. Emancipator nonetheless beat them to it, firing a full salvo of four bolts of Wood magic from her starboard flank into the tree-giant's eyes. Eenash screamed in response, flexed its arms, and fired a barrage of stakes from its shoulders.

Alice did have to give the helmsmen of the two airships credit. Emancipator rolled, using her balancers to turn her tough keel toward Eenash and take the brunt of the wooden flechettes there. Moondancer accelerated and dove, most of the attack simply missing completely.

Most, but not all. Though she doubted any of the Swordmasters aboard the ferry could see it, her Synthesis-enhanced eyes brought her the sight of a half-dozen stakes embedded in the small ship's hull, and at least one buried in the deck near the gun. Even so, she had to grudgingly concede Kirito—she was sure it was him at the helm, somehow—clearly had a good idea of what he was doing.

So did Emancipator's helmsman. In their case, though, Alice was less than convinced the captain knew what he was about. It took a few passes for her to be sure, but it was soon clear to her that, while the two ships weren't flying a predictable pattern like Liberator and Durendal, Emancipator was keeping very careful track of Moondancer's course. For the most part, the frigate was flying an irregular orbit around Eenash, keeping speed, distance, and angle too unpredictable for the tree-giant to simply swat them down. The armed yacht seemed to favor hit-and-run tactics, darting in quickly to fire her deck gun at vulnerable targets and then rushing back out again as quickly as her engines could manage.

For the most part, Emancipator ignored this. She seemed to fire whenever her guns were ready, rather than aiming for anything specific, and in the process blew up Eenash's entire right "hand" in fairly short order. But whenever Moondancer angled in to attack Eenash's head, Emancipator was always there first, firing a full barrage just moments ahead.

Recklessly, too, Alice thought, narrowing her eyes at the fourth repetition. They've nearly collided twice now. If Kirito and Emancipator's helmsman were any less skilled, they would have. What is that frigate playing at?

A power play of some sort, she supposed, but if so, not a very smart one. Especially since, the frigate having fewer guns than Liberator, taking down Eenash was going to be a longer process than Birunam, all the more so since Birunam had initially been attacked by three ships.

"Okay, okay, so it's gonna be two MVPs, one for Birunam and one for Eenash. My bet is still on Liberator for B, and Emancipator for E. Who's got the most guns wins, right? And—"

An indescribable howl drew Alice's attention back to Birunam, and she snapped her gaze over to it just in time to see the crown of its head explode into a thousand flaming chunks of wood. Victim of a full broadside from Liberator and a fully-charged burst from Durendal's deck gun, everything above its mouth was simply gone. The flaming tree-giant staggered half a step, setting more of the surrounding forest ablaze, and then simply froze unnaturally in place.

A split second later, Birunam shattered in thousands of azure shards.

"And Liberator scores the LA on Birunam!" one of the Swordmasters crowded, recklessly waving a sword in the air. "Yes! Nice one, Cap'n Coper!"

"Hey, doesn't this change the odds on Eenash?" A squat fellow in heavy armor started flipping a hundred-Cor coin, eyes narrowed shrewdly. "With Birunam gone, Liberator and Durendal are free to go after Eenash. …Two thousand Cor on Liberator scoring another kill."

"You're on!"

These people are completely out of their minds. Alice started to shake her head yet again—only to pause, seeing a subtle change in the battle around Eenash. Moondancer and Emancipator seemed to have noticed the other airships had finished their fight and were headed to the remaining tree-giant, and after an almost imperceptible hesitation redoubled their efforts. Moondancer's turns became tighter, her loops taking her a shorter distance from Eenash between attacks. Emancipator started firing more often, suggesting to her that they were straining their systems in exchange for inflicting damage faster.

…Sir Fanatio did say I would need to acquire additional resources in the field.

Alice stepped into the crowd of Swordmasters. "Twenty thousand Cor on Moondancer!" she declared. "That man will pull another trick soon enough."

You've caused me quite enough trouble already, Kirito, she thought, smiling thinly at the scramble her large bet caused. It's only fair if you pay me back. Now, don't you dare lose!

---

"You said you might be late, you never said anything about this! Is this why you 'borrowed' Liberator the other day? Why didn't you explain yourself at the time?! For someone who thinks everything should be distributed equally, you're certainly not living up to it yourself!"

"Aw, shut yer trap! I didn't tell ya 'cause I knew you'd make a fuss, and who knows when we'd have gotten it done! Look, Blue Boy, y'all should be thanking us! Now that we got our own ship, ya can have Liberator to yerselves. Why fight 'bout it now, huh?"

Well, I suppose this is becoming routine, at least, Kizmel thought, shaking her head under her hood. A routine I could do without. For any number of reasons.

She honestly wasn't sure which was worse: watching Lind and Kibaou have yet another post-battle shouting match, or having to stand on Liberator's steel hull to watch it. It might've been mildly amusing, were her sixth sense not constantly pricked by Liberator's odd core crystal, and had she more than just the mythril of her boots between skin and Cold Iron burns.

Unfortunately, the cruiser was simply the only ship big enough for a raid meeting. So Moondancer was hovering close to Liberator's starboard, while the Aincrad Liberation Force's new frigate Emancipator hung off to port, the Legend Braves' Durendal just beyond. Crews from the three wooden-hulled airships had gathered to meet with Coper and Lind's DKB—and, naturally, an argument had broken out almost instantly.

"Look on the bright side," Asuna muttered, from where she stood at Kizmel's right shoulder. "If they're this busy yelling at each other, Kibaou isn't going to complain about us getting the LA Bonus on Eenash."

"You have a point," the Knight conceded. "I admit, I wasn't looking forward to that discussion, myself." Not that she had let that stop her from doing everything she could to make sure Moondancer got that "Last Attack Bonus" in the first place. As a Pagoda Knight, veteran of many disputes between the Knight Brigades, her pride had not allowed Kibaou's initial declaration to go unchallenged.

They'd pulled it off. Though exactly what good the bonus item was, none of them were yet sure. Crafting materials, meant to enhance the tempering of a wooden sword? Neither the native of Aincrad nor the Swordmasters had been able to figure out what that even meant. It made no particular sense from a magical perspective, nor the game mechanics with which Kirito was familiar.

"If you didn't gain a particular advantage with this ship, you wouldn't have done it at all," Lind was saying, drawing her attention back to the argument. "If you expect us to 'settle' for Liberator, Kibaou, you're mistaken. What do you know that you're not sharing with the rest of us?"

"Oh, fer—!" Kibaou slapped his forehead. Kizmel was amused to see the young, pig-tailed girl behind him start to mimic the gesture, only to squeak and hide behind her guildmaster when one of Lind's team looked at her. "What we 'know', Lind, is that we're tired of the fightin' over this one ship. Best thing we can do fer clearing right now is ta get as many ships goin' as we can, an' it was easier ta get our own than ta keep competin' over Liberator. It ain't complicated, dammit!"

"He's got a point." Kirito, leaning against Liberator's starboard railing with all the deliberate arrogance of the Beater, was giving Kibaou a calculating look. "Their last try at deciding who got Liberator ended in a draw. If he found a way to get his own ship—without spending a fortune back at Origia—that's definitely more efficient. But…."

But where did he get it, Kizmel finished silently. Because Emancipator was plainly built by Lyusulan shipwrights, and as far as she knew that shouldn't have been possible short of the Fifth Island. Unless, of course, it has something to do with the other camp, the one at the Spirit Tree. Though I cannot fathom how they would have the capability, either.

Something very odd was going on, and it was beginning to make her uneasy.

"All right," Lind said, visibly fighting back his own temper, though his clenched fists belied the effort. "That's fair. But you still should have told us, Kibaou. If nothing else, that would've allowed us to plan this battle better, instead of just flying around in circles and expecting everything to work out."

That last, accompanied by a disapproving look, was said in the direction of Captain Coper. Liberator's captain had, thus far, sat out the argument, staying close to the bridge hatch. Kizmel rather thought it was smarter tactics than what he'd displayed in the battle. Though at Lind's pointed comment, Coper appeared to wish he could simply go belowdecks and hide for the duration.

"An' if we had, you'da held everything up arguing," Kibaou shot back, folding his arms. "I'll tell ya this, Lind: we got a message sayin' it was a one-time quest. Tellin' ya where wouldn't help ya anyway. What matters is that there's ways ta do it. What I can tell ya is that that engineer in Koriki, Nezha, does really good mechanical work. He says he's got sources on where ta get hulls done. You're not happy with Liberator, go talk ta him, why don't ya?"

Lind flushed. "Don't be ridiculous," he snapped, stepping closer to his rival, before forcing himself to stop. "Quests that only one group can do, one time? No game would ever—"

Kirito always preferred to stay out of interpersonal conflicts, Kizmel knew. After a month of spending almost every waking moment with him, and many sleeping, she knew how averse he was to dealing with people in general, and how he usually only stepped in when lives were directly at stake. She also knew, however, that he did have his limits.

And in a way, lives are at stake here, if Lind continues that line of thinking, she mused, as Kirito groaned and pushed away from the railing. He's making a grave mistake.

"Do you really still not get it?" Kirito demanded, stalking toward the argument. "Lind. Kayaba designed this game to play out a story, a story that can kill us. Assuming ordinary gaming conventions still hold true here will kill you, and probably a bunch of other people. As we've been trying to tell you for weeks now. Yes, there are 'one group, one time' quests. We know that. The Fuuma found that out the hard way. The Braves know it. The Rat's been giving away info on it. Kibaou gets it. Why won't you?"

Both turned on him—Lind simply redirecting his existing irritation; Kibaou, Kizmel suspected, set off by the implied insult—but another, deeper voice cut in before either of them could speak. "The man's right, Lind," Agil rumbled, emerging from the hatch into Liberator's interior. "I'd wonder if maybe you just don't like who you're hearing it from, but I don't feel like adding fuel to the fire. I'll just second what Kibaou said 'bout building your own ship, if Liberator ain't good enough for you."

"You ought to have enough wood just from your share of the drops," Lowbacca chimed in, casually balancing his two-handed axe on his shoulders as he followed Agil out. "That was a big tree. I know we got enough from it, and all we did was a little damage control."

"Yeah, lucky us," Shaggy Wolfgang muttered. If Kizmel didn't know better, she'd have thought the big swordsman was airsick. "Our own airship, that's going to be so much fun…."

I didn't even know their group was aboard for the battle. Given some of the maneuvers Liberator was forced to, I suppose even the strongest stomach would've been sorely tested. …I wonder why I've never had that problem aboard Moondancer? I did during the battle on Moonshadow, when we were ambushed the day this all began.

She was distracted from pursuing the thought further when Lind let out a long, hissing breath. "If that really is the case," he said finally, "then that's all the more reason we need to coordinate more closely. Clearing is only progressing at all because we are, more or less, acting in cooperation. If we break trust, everything falls apart, and I can think of little that would break it more easily than monopolizing finite resources."

Kizmel had to admit, there was something entertaining about watching the spell world's expression of Kibaou's reaction. Steam literally began to pour out of his ears, as his face turned a volcanic shade. "You, of all people, callin' us on hoggin' resources?! Yer the ones who want a group of 'elites', instead of buildin' up as many people as we can!"

Kirito, completely forgotten by the bickering guildmasters, retreated back to the railing and face-palmed. "How in the world did we even get this far, with these two leading the big guilds?"

"Dumb luck," Agil deadpanned, leading his party over to them. "And Liberator being a game-breaker. Which, I'm guessing, isn't gonna help us quite so much with the Skywall Boss on Sandoria. Am I right?"

"Hard to say," Kirito said after a moment, brow furrowed as he obviously thought back to the beta test. "Honestly, that was a weird one in the beta. Started off as basically a boss-level treant—way smaller than Birunam, obviously, fitting into the top floor of the Tower, but a lot faster, and with a kind of poison breath. Then for the last lifebar, it rooted itself in the middle of the boss room, and started growing over the entire Tower. If you didn't finish it off before it covered the whole structure, it pulled a TPK poison attack."

Kizmel shared a disturbed glance with Asuna, her friend and squire obviously trying to picture what that must've been liked. Just as obviously, it perturbed the other girl just as much. From what Kirito has said of the beta in general, he must've gone through that multiple times. …Kayaba is a devious and disturbed man, indeed. Or the Administrator, but it sounds more like the sorcerer's work. That said.

She cleared her throat. "Actually, Kirito, that does sound to me like a scenario where an airship would be a welcome asset. Much like Birunam, I would speculate you missed the point back then."

He shrugged, still maintaining the Beater's outward arrogance for the benefit of anyone watching. "Probably, but that means it is balanced for airships. Probably several, which means Liberator would at best level the playing field. Given what a pain it was the beta, I'm guessing in this version it's balanced for even more ships."

"Then we'll just have to build some, or buy 'em from Origia," Agil said thoughtfully. "My bet's on clearing slowing down a day or two, while people scramble to get their own ships. Liberator was one thing, but now Kibaou's proved they can be scratch-built. 'Course, that just means—"

"Yes, we need more ships," Lind snapped, voice rising again, "but we can't just have anyone and everyone flying around on their own! Some solos are inevitable—" he cast a baleful look toward Moondancer's crew; for a moment, Kizmel thought Asuna was going to burst into flames in response "—but overall, we need coordinated, unified fighting forces. Our guilds will need to provide guidance more than ever!"

Kibaou uttered a sound Kizmel didn't think was even a word; it reminded her more of a kettle brought to too high a boil for good tea. "What the hell d'ya think I've been sayin'?! Open up yer damn ears for once, you—!"

Asuna's bootheels rang on the steel deck as she turned away. "Okay, I think we're done here. Those two idiots are going to be at this for hours, and we have other places to be, don't we?"

"If nothing else, I would like to return to camp soon," Kizmel agreed, inwardly deeply relieved not to be the only one out of patience. "I want to prove to Tilnel that not all battles end so terribly." She arched one eyebrow at Agil and his group. "Would you care for a lift?"

She was bound by honor and courtesy to make the offer, but she couldn't deny some relief when the four of them shook their heads. "Thanks, but we need to get back to Koriki. There's gonna be a rush on airships, mark my words, and we want to get a head start."

"Speak for yourself," Wolfgang muttered.

"We'll see you later, then," Kirito said, giving them a quick nod. With a little more haste than he probably wanted to show, he headed for Moondancer, long coat billowing behind him.

As the three of them went, the argument behind them reached a pitch sufficient to make Kizmel's ears twitch painfully. It also drew an annoyed hiss from Asuna. "Sound and fury, signifying nothing," the musketeer muttered irritably, even as she followed Kirito in leaping back to their own ship.

"More Shakespeare?" Kirito asked, glancing back at her on his way to the pilothouse. "Um… Henry Something…?"

"No, it's from Macbeth, too," Asuna corrected. She had a complicated expression of her face, as if she was torn between being exasperated and impressed. "Still, fifty points for getting that close. I won't ask you which Henry you were thinking of."

"Oh, good." Hand on the pilothouse hatch, Kirito paused. "Wait. Fifty out of…?"

"I'll leave that to your imagination," she said loftily. "You exceeded expectations, let's leave it at that."

"That doesn't sound good at all," he muttered, finally going inside. "If only I could do a search from in here…."

Kizmel followed them in, listening to the bickering with a smile. The argument still going on behind them was full of ill feeling, which she feared might yet spill over into something far worse. The ribbing between her two human companions was that of good friends.

Kirito will have his revenge the next time we encounter a "gameplay mechanic" new to Asuna, the Knight thought, as the three of them took their places and readied Moondancer to leave the other ships behind. And I… I will have my fun when we finally reach Lyusulan territory.

Kirito pulled Moondancer out from the formation, and Kizmel allowed herself to put the guild disputes out of mind. Even a glance at Durendal, and the troubling questions surrounding the Legend Braves, couldn't dent her sense of anticipation, thinking of introducing her friends to Yofel Castle.

"…I don't like that smirk, Kizmel," Asuna said, glancing her way with a wary expression. "What in the world are you thinking about?"

"Oh, nothing important," Kizmel assured her, keeping her attention ostentatiously fixed on the wing-sail controls. "Nothing at all."

"Now I'm getting worried," Kirito muttered, even as he turned Moondancer back toward the Forest of Wavering Mists.

Kizmel didn't deign to reply. No doubt the Skywall Tower will be a great challenge once again, and I'm still uneasy about where Kibaou got his ship. But for right now… I believe all is well in my world. Just for this moment.

---

December 19th, 2032

---

Leaving the weapons shop The Sharp End and stepping back onto the streets of Koriki, Alice shifted her shoulders to try and settle her new gear. Underneath the midnight blue cloak that concealed her braid and face, in place of her Integrity Knight armor she wore a simple breastplate, gauntlets, and greaves, all made of steel. Reasonably well-made, for something forged in the Archipelago's outermost reaches, but most definitely not what she was used to.

This is a problem none of us quite expected, she thought, blending as best she could into the flow of passersby, both the local marionettes and the ever-growing crowd of Swordmasters. I don't think even Uncle knew the Swordmasters could carry objects within their Mystic Scribing. I'm going to have to find some kind of workaround, if I'm not to be exposed in short order.

As it was, she'd been forced to leave her usual equipment with Amayori, out in the forest. If things came to a fight, she was sure her Integrity Knight body would shrug off blows from anything so close to the very edge of Aincrad, but it would be far too obvious for her liking. She was also not entirely pleased to be relying on a Swordmaster's blade, even if, going by local gossip, it was about the strongest that could be found so far.

There was a certain irony in bearing an Anneal Blade at her hip, near-identical to the one wielded by the man who so confused and annoyed her. Of course, she mused, with a reluctant smile, there was also a perversely amusing irony in the fact that he had, in a sense, been the one to pay for it.

Pity about all I learned of the Swordmasters in that last battle is that they're terrible gamblers. That their foremost fighters are a mix of disorganized amateurs, I knew from our prior encounters.

Still. Alice had learned a few things from the airship battle, a day prior. As she walked down Koriki's cobblestone streets, taking note of the fact that the town seemed busier by the day, she reflected that Kayaba's own methods had become a little clearer to her. As hinted by the absurd nature of Icarus' Lament, the sorcerer was clearer a trickster at heart.

Going by the information she'd gleaned during and after the battle, listening to Swordmasters talk and making a few discreet inquiries, the "beta test" had presented a very different battle. If anything, Eenash had been closer to the "beta" Birunam, with the original giant tree having been entirely alone and not on fire.

Kayaba changed it, for the final spell. That obstacle was created entirely by him, and he altered it to give a surprise to anyone who knew the original version. Whatever he's up to, the man is playing all sides like game pieces. Which means whatever his actual objective is, it's not simply the overthrow of the Axiom Church.

What the mad sorcerer's true intentions were, she still couldn't guess. To her frustration, it seemed the Swordmasters had no more idea than she did, with many simply ascribing it to insanity. Alice didn't believe that. As chaotic as Kayaba's actions were, they were also utterly meticulous. She did not accept he'd simply set it all off to watch the fun.

I am sure, now, that he is at least as much an enemy to the Swordmasters as he is to the Church. That said, I must not forget the old adage: the enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy. The Swordmasters may not be allied with him, but they are still trying to overthrow centuries of order—

"Whoops!"

There was a clank, and a stumble, and after a very quick leap backward, Alice realized to her chagrin that she'd nearly walked right into a Swordmaster just coming out of an inn. A Swordmaster about her own height, remarkable primarily for the fact that they were wearing gleaming steel armor from head to toe. How did I not hear that coming?

"Sorry, sorry!" the Swordmaster blurted, voice muffled by the heavy helm they wore. Bowing sharply, the armored figure added, "I wasn't paying attention, sorry!"

Alice found herself reflexively shaking her head. "No, not at all," she said, forgetting for a moment that she was, technically, addressing an enemy. "If I couldn't hear that armor coming, clearly I was the one too distracted…." She trailed off, belatedly recognizing something in the timber of the other's voice. "You're a woman?"

She doubted most Swordmasters would've realized it. She doubted most Integrity Knights would have, for that matter. But she had known Fanatio Synthesis Two for years, and she had little trouble hearing past the helmet's muffling to the woman beneath.

Only after she spoke did it occur to her that this Swordmaster might've been just as touchy on the subject as Fanatio, but to her relief, the armored woman only chuckled, putting one gauntleted hand to the back of her helmet. "Yeah, there aren't that many of us around, are there? Actually, I think you're the first one I've met this far out. I mean, I know there's Argo the Rat, and the rumors about that one airship, but otherwise…." The laughter trailed off into a sigh. "…Maybe that's why it's so hard for me to be taken seriously as a tank. Oh! I'm Liten, by the way."

"Alice," the Integrity Knight returned, after a moment's hesitation. As far as she could tell, details of her encounters with the Swordmasters hadn't spread far, so the name alone wasn't likely to expose her to a random warrior. "I can't say I've run into the problem myself," she went on, "but I know a woman who has. I understand it's… frustrating."

Better to play along for now. This may be my best chance yet to learn something useful. …I just hope Sir Fanatio never hears about this conversation.

"I'm surprised, though," Alice mused aloud. "With how few people are coming to the frontlines at all, you would think someone with your strength would be welcomed regardless. With our bodies, the differences in physical ability don't apply." One thing Swordmasters and Integrity Knights shared, for good or ill.

"I know," Liten said with another sigh, armor clanking as she moved away from the inn's entrance and off the street; Alice quickly followed, realizing they were on the verge of blocking traffic. "That's why I went to the trouble of getting a full set of steel armor. Wasn't easy, even with the trick I used… but there's no way people will turn down a tank like this!"

Trick?

The armored girl spoke again before Alice could question that odd phrasing. "Anyway, that's why I was so glad to hear the two big frontline guilds are running a recruitment drive right now. Word is, they're looking for anybody who could hold their own—rumor says a knife-fighter girl younger than me just joined one of them the other day. Oh!" Liten snapped her fingers, producing a very odd clank with her gauntlets. "There's a rally today, out at the aerodrome. I was just heading there. You coming, Alice?"

A guild recruitment meeting? Alice almost voiced a quick, awkward refusal, but caught herself. I couldn't possibly maintain my cover within a guild, the Swordmasters have too many special abilities we hadn't counted on. And I need to be able to slip away at a moment's notice. Yet this could be quite the opportunity, if I'm careful.

"I'm not so sure about joining a guild at the moment," she said slowly. "For one thing, I'm uneasy about the infighting between them. Still… I admit I'm curious." She smiled, with a sardonic hint she didn't think she really needed to hide, under the circumstances. "Who knows? Perhaps they'll change my mind."

"All right!" Liten pumped a fist, producing another loud clank. "Then let's get to the aerodrome! I don't want to be late, if this is my big chance!"

---

Alice had seen the aerodrome at Origia, in the early days of Kayaba's spell. One of the largest aerodromes in the Aincrad Archipelago, despite being at its very edge; according to the Axiom Church's archives, it dated back to early efforts to try and find something other than the Hundred Islands in the sky. Then it had been the staging area for the expeditions that had ultimately led to the Human Empire.

Large… yet, at the time, silent and nearly deserted. So many airships left idle, with the Skywall rendering flight essentially pointless. Even as a loyal Integrity Knight, Alice had found it somehow sad.

"Wow! Things really are picking up around here! It wasn't like this just a couple days ago."

Koriki's aerodrome was much smaller, yet as she and Liten approached it, it was much louder and busier. Before the port even came into proper view, they could hear shouts and the hum and clank of machinery, all of it so much louder than when Alice had first arrived on Sandoria. It was, she recognized, the sound of an aerodrome in full use, much like one of the islands closer to the Archipelago's center.

When they did emerge onto the outskirts of the aerodrome, even Alice had to raise her eyebrows at the sight. She could see at least a dozen airships under varying degrees of construction, from the bare framework of keel and ribs to a couple that appeared to be very nearly complete already. None of them were as large as the Chrome Disaster, but she could see only two that were as small as Moondancer. Apart from one that looked roughly the same size as the Legend Braves' Durendal, the Swordmasters seemed to be favoring frigates like the new Emancipator.

"…How have they gotten them this far in just a day?" Alice wondered aloud, fighting a chill. I know there were twenty thousand Swordmasters to begin with, and even now only around three or four thousand have died, but still. Numbers alone shouldn't account for this.

Especially since, if she was any judge, the majority of the work was being done by marionettes, not Swordmasters. The warriors from the other world were mostly just watching, apart from a couple she thought were engineers. They certainly weren't throwing numbers at the problem.

"Gameplay balance, I'd guess," Liten's muffled voice interrupted her musings. "I mean, airships were half the selling point, right? Even with Kayaba turning it into a death game, there's not much point if it's that hard for players to get airships up and running. Bigger ones probably do take longer, though."

Gameplay balance. Of course. So Kayaba's measures to give the Swordmasters a fighting chance against us aren't limited to just what they can carry themselves. Stupid of me not to think of that.

"When do you think larger ships will be practical?" Alice asked, trying to keep her voice casual, as they walked toward the ships in the center of it all. "I admit, I don't know much about the finer details yet."

"Wanted to jump right in without spoilers, huh?" Liten's voice was knowing, and the armored girl gave an understanding nod. "Yeah, I heard SAO drew in a lot of people like that. Killer app for NerveGear, right? Even people who'd never touched a game wanted in…. Anyway, I think the pre-release stuff started showing bigger player ships around… the Fifth Island, I think? Supposed to be a lot of shipbuilding there, anyway."

The Integrity Knight understood about half of the explanation, and cursed the situation in general and Kayaba in particular for it. Still, she got the information she really wanted clearly enough. Pentaga. I should have thought of that, Rovia's shipwrights are renowned. Although don't I remember a guild dispute disrupting things there recently…?

Before she could track that thought down, they'd reached the outskirts of the crowd gathering around Liberator and Emancipator, as well as a third ship still early in construction. Two stages had been set up, one in front of Emancipator, the other before the unfinished ship; each stage had a banner flying proudly above. One of them displayed a spiral pattern, which Alice realized after a moment represented the Aincrad Archipelago, while the other bore a dragon, rampant.

The Aincrad Liberation Force and the Dragon Knights Brigade, she thought, remembering the guild names she'd heard bandied about. "Odd," she murmured, barely audible over the sounds of the milling crowd and airship construction. "No sign of the Legend Braves?"

A clanking shrug. "I've heard the Braves aren't ready to push recruiting yet," Liten said thoughtfully. "Rumor is they're trying to make sure their core group is solid first, or… something."

Or something. The Braves had struck Alice as an oddity from the moment they'd entered the fray in a Forest Elf airship; she added this to her mental list. No surprise Moondancer isn't here, at least. I don't know what is up with them, but I can't see Kirito being involved in guild affairs.

"Oh!" Liten pointed, bouncing on her feet. "It's starting!"

So it was. The cactus-haired guildmaster Alice had heard named "Kibaou", clad in green and gray scale mail and bearing a sword not unlike her own, ascended the steps of the ALF stage. He was accompanied by a taller, scruffier man with a halberd, as well as a young girl with pigtails and a knife Alice could see even from a distance was Dark Elf make. Something about the way they moved also told her the girl was very possibly the most dangerous of the three.

Marching up the other stage was a man in polished bronze armor and blue leather, long hair dyed blue and tied back in a ponytail, bearing a scimitar. Alice hardly took notice of his companions, as taken aback as she was by his startling resemblance to Diavel. It took her a few moments to remember rumors she'd heard that the DKB's guildmaster, Lind, had deliberately styled himself after the Swordmasters' first raid leader.

It was Lind that spoke first, while Kibaou looked on with folded arms and raised chin. "Welcome, everyone!" the DKB guildmaster called out, raising a hand in greeting. "If you've seen the notices in town, you know we're here recruiting. It should be obvious to everyone that the current state of affairs, with only around fifty people on the frontlines, simply isn't sustainable. We've won our way to Sandoria, the Third Island, this way, but we all know it won't be so easy forever."

"Understatement," Alice muttered, as much to herself as to Liten. "Kayaba would hardly have brought twenty thousand people if only a few dozen could do the job." The sorcerer was insane, after all, not stupid.

Liten nodded, even that small motion producing a noticeable clank. "He probably figured there would be a lot of deaths early on," she whispered back, "but that can't be all of it. If he trapped so many of us, he must've balanced it for at least a few thousand to fight."

He didn't, but that's still basically true. Before the Great Separation, this would hardly be an army worth worrying about. In the Archipelago… we're fortunate so few Swordmasters truly are warriors.

"Of course, fighting on the frontlines is dangerous," Lind was continuing, gazing over the motley assembly of Swordmasters with what must've been his best effort at looking a proper and noble knight. "We need everyone we can to level up and obtain the best equipment they can, but for actual participation in the frontline battles, only those who have already done so are truly fit. That is what the Dragon Knights Brigade aims to be: the tip of the spear, the vanguard of elites to lead the way. Anyone who is prepared for the hardest battles, come, and join with us! Meet a minimum level of twelve, and you will be fit to be a Dragon Knight!"

Had he not been an enemy, had he not been obviously trying far too hard to be something he wasn't, and had not his talk of "levels" robbed his speech of much of its sobriety, Alice might've applauded. There was, after all, considerable merit in his argument. Quality over quantity was, indeed, the very basis of the Human Empire's defense. Though the nobles had conventional forces of their own, it was the Axiom Church's Integrity Knights who truly defended the realm.

That, however, is because we truly are far beyond any ordinary warrior. Well beyond even the Swordmasters, at least for now. And from what I've seen, even Kirito and his allies are not that much stronger than other Swordmasters.

"That sounds good," Liten murmured beside her, under the cover of Lind outlining further details of his guild and the general hubbub of the crowd. "That is kind of why I got this armor. But still, I don't know if it's really that simple…."

"Awright, listen up!" Kibaou's voice boomed out. The cactus-haired guildmaster swaggered to one edge of his stage, to take firm hold of the pole bearing his guild's flag. "Lind got one thing right—we need everybody we can get! But where he's wrong is that we need everybody! Not just a buncha grunts backin' up some 'elite squad'. One thing we've seen, last coupla boss fights: numbers matter! Two outta two airship battles, people thought we had enough, an' we didn't! Only reinforcements showin' up at the last minute saved the raids!"

"Modest of him not to mention he was the reinforcements last time," Alice muttered, prompting a giggle from Liten.

Kibaou let go of the flagpole, turning to pace the stage. "It ain't just that, either! We've been seein' one-time quests lately. Lind might say that just proves we need to focus on buildin' th' elites. I say that means we need ta spread out, find every one of these quests we can! Dig up everythin' we can, an' we'll all be stronger fer it!" He jabbed a finger back toward the airships. "Trailers showed fleet-size battles, people! We need ta build fleets, or one day, we're gonna run into a fleet boss an' that'll be the end!"

Lind was beginning to glare. Alice, though, found herself unwillingly nodding. Strange as it was, the rough-spoken hothead seemed to be the one with something resembling a good head on his shoulders. She herself suspected the best option for the Swordmasters was a little bit of both proposals, but based on what she'd seen Kibaou's was the closer to fitting their situation.

"Equipment can be bought. Levels, we can help ya grind." Kibaou pointed into the crowd, jabbing here and there apparently at random. "What matters most right now is will! The will ta fight! 'Cause together, we can fight!" He clenched his hand into a fist, thumping it against his chest. "Minimum level ten, an' the Aincrad Liberation Force will take anybody who wants to fight their way outta this death game!"

Cheers erupted in the crowd of Swordmasters, prompting a disgusted look from Lind that he didn't quite hide in time. Cheers, clapping, and a general level of enthusiasm that left Alice more than a little concerned. Lind's group may well become strong, she thought, taking a careful step backward. But as it stands… Kibaou is the dangerous one. He has something resembling sense, and a genuine talent for stirring up sentiment.

"Now that's what I wanted to hear," Liten whispered, raising one gauntleted fist. "We need to work together, if we're going to get out of this alive. So many people died, when everyone was just out for themselves… Alice?"

Drat. Caught before she could quite escape, Alice mustered up a smile for her erstwhile companion. "I can see how this might be the right path for you, Liten," she said honestly. "But I believe mine lies elsewhere. At least for now. I wish you well."

"Thanks! And… good luck, Alice." Liten gave her a thumbs-up, voice implying a smile behind her heavy helm. "Sounds like we do need the solos, too, so… be careful, okay?"

"I will." Bowing slightly, Alice waited for Liten to turn away, joining the throng of those approaching the ALF's stage. When the armored girl had, she slipped back to the very edge of the aerodrome to watch the outcome. They are the enemy, she reminded herself. They may be simply people, thrown into a war they never wanted or expected, but they are the enemy. Their desperate drive to escape could upend an entire empire.

Observing from a safer distance, she saw that Kibaou's speech didn't win everyone over. By the time the rally finished, some twenty minutes later, she estimated the two guilds roughly split the prospective recruits between them. People were, indeed, people, and Lind's elitism clearly struck a cord with a certain breed of Swordmaster.

Which is where our best hope lies. So long as the Swordmasters are divided, we can hold them back. Split them further. Break their efforts. It will be painful, and it seems many of them truly do not deserve it, but it must be done.

We cannot sacrifice the entire Empire for the sake of a few lost souls.

Alice watched just long enough to get an idea of the new strength of the Swordmaster guilds, then finally began to turn away. At the last moment, though, she paused, realizing something was off about the situation. About the aerodrome itself, she thought, not the recruiting rally. Frowning, she swept her gaze over the airships. Liten had, at least, neatly explained how they were building so many so quickly, but there was still something….

Cannons and engine parts gleamed in the midday sun, and it hit her. Those ships are mostly wooden construction, but the machinery, the fittings… that's neither iron nor steel. Apart from Liberator, none of it is. That's mythril. A dozen airships, and all of them are built with mythril.

Where are they getting so much of it? Even in Kayaba's spell-world, there shouldn't be anywhere near this much here. This is beyond even the elven kingdoms' borders.

Another oddity. Frowning deeply, Alice added it to her mental list of things to investigate, and turned to leave the aerodrome at last. The rally had, at least, been enlightening, in more ways than one. For the first time since she'd arrived at Sandoria, she thought her mission had finally made some tangible progress.

It is a terrible thing that's been done here, she thought, pulling her hood lower as she walked down a back road toward Koriki proper. Kayaba is even more a monster than I'd believed. But their situation is not our fault, nor our responsibility. I don't know what will be done with them in the end, but the kindest thing for everyone concerned is to cut off their efforts early, before they can truly organize and threaten us, or lose too many of their own in hopeless battle.

"A difficult question, isn't it?"

Halfway back to town, having seen no sign of anyone else on the road, Swordmaster or otherwise, the voice made Alice jump. Spinning around, hand reflexively dropping to the hilt of her Anneal Blade, she found herself looking into a blank white mask, over a blue coat edged in yellow triangles. An incredibly quiet Swordmaster, with a long, curved sword at his waist.

A Swordmaster she recognized with a chill. She'd seen him before, when she had arrived at the Einsla Skywall Tower—and while she couldn't see his face, his posture made it clear he recognized her, in turn.

She cursed herself for the lapse that allowed him to sneak up on her, exposing her so soon into her mission. She cursed Kayaba a moment later, remembering that the rules of the spell-world meant she couldn't even cut him down to silence him. In town, in this world, even her strength as an Integrity Knight meant nothing.

The masked man—Tengu, if she recalled some gossip she'd heard correctly—could've taken advantage of the hesitation born of her uncertainty. Instead, he only stood there calmly, arms folded. "Relax, Dame Alice," he said quietly, confirming he knew exactly who she was. "I have no intention of reporting your presence to anyone else."

"And why not?" she demanded harshly, still half a breath from drawing her sword. Spell-world protections or not, she'd realized she could still push him back. Push him out of town entirely, and the situation would be quite different. "Why would you betray your fellow Swordmasters that way? You must know why I'm here."

"Betray? No, no, not at all." A quiet chuckle. "This is not a betrayal, Dame Alice. It is a tactic. A famous strategist in my world once said that the best victory is one achieved without fighting. As I see it, the path to victory is not to fight you, not to try to counter your strength, but to let you see the truth with your own eyes."

This man makes no sense whatsoever. Alice watched him warily, not loosening her grip on her sword hilt. Why must I encounter all the insane Swordmasters?

"What 'truth'?" Alice asked aloud, heart pounding. "If it's the truth that Swordmasters are victims, I've already seen that. It changes nothing. Victims or not, you are a threat to the peace and order the Human Empire has maintained for centuries now."

"That much is obvious," Tengu said dryly, not even twitching. "The truth you do not see… is that nothing in Aincrad is what it seems. Not for the Swordmasters. Not for the elves. Not for the Axiom Church. Not even, perhaps, for Kayaba himself. The truth behind the truth. There is a war going on, Dame Alice, one almost no one sees. One I glimpsed a long time ago, and denied, and have spent many years since paying the price for denying. One you must see for yourself. You would no more believe it from my ears, I'm sure, than most Swordmasters would believe this world anything but a twisted game."

He knows, she thought, eyes widening, just a little. He believes this world is real. But the rest… what is he babbling about?

"When you see the truth behind the truth, Dame Alice, I believe you will do the right thing." Tengu half-turned, head tilted as if to listen to something. "So for now, I will not interfere with you. I will watch, and wait, even as you watch us."

"You realize I have no reason to believe anything you're saying," Alice said carefully, keeping most of her attention on him but sparing a little to try and see what else might've caught his. "Even if it's true, until and unless I see it with my own eyes, I will continue on as I have. I will fight the Swordmasters, with everything I have. Should you and I meet outside the town's protections, I will kill you."

Though she couldn't see his face, she had the very distinct impression Tengu was smiling as he turned fully away. "Oh, I should hope so, Dame Alice. After all, no swordsman grows without challenge, and we all have much growing to do in this world. As do you, whether you realize it or not. Power, young lady, is not strength in itself." Walking away as if on idle afternoon's stroll, he added over his shoulder, "Please, do as you feel you must. But as you clash swords with us—with him—do try and keep your eyes open, will you? The more you learn, the better off this entire world will be, in the end."

Only when Tengu had gone all the way back to the aerodrome did Alice slowly straighten from her half-crouch. Easing tense fingers off the hilt of her Anneal Blade, she took several long, deep breaths, expelling the tension the strange encounter had built in her.

Resolutely, she turned back to Koriki, to resume her mission. "Victory without fighting?" she muttered. "Truth behind truth? Is the man completely senile?

"Swordmasters… they're all impossible!"

---

Author's Note:

---

Health problems. Need I say more? Oh, yes, and a hurricane to the face. Got out of it safely, but boy howdy, five days without power was the most bored I'd been in about twelve years. Argh. And right when I was about to wrap this all up, I made the mistake of estimating when it would be done. As always, the Demon Murphy took exception and whacked me upside the head. When will I learn?

Ahem. Anyway. I will be the first to admit I consider this chapter to be… rough. Seeing as it only exists because I wrote myself into a corner with poorly-thought-out comments about the Field Boss, I'd have to say it could be worse. At least it did advance the plot in a couple of important ways, and in the process of writing it I finally got an idea as to how to lead up to the arc's big reveal. The reveal that should've been the climax of the previous arc, but I could never figure out how to fit it in.

No promises whatsoever about the next chapter, in large part because I still have only the vaguest idea what it's going to be. Expect to see a lot more of Alice, though, and a fair bit of fluff with Moondancer as I set up the conditions for the next advancement in their relationships. In the meantime, as I work out the details, I have no intention of being idle. A project I intended to write about this time last year is finally about ready for me to begin work in earnest. (Hint: expect KiriMel fluff. I have been suffering from KiriMel withdrawal, and this new project will be my way of filling the void until Duet gets back on track.)

Speaking of Monochrome Duet: I have not been idle on that, either. Planning for the Fairy Dance arc is advancing nicely, and I have also completed three of the four volumes of the PDF version of Duet's Aincrad arc. FFnet readers may have noticed revisions appearing on that site already; I intend to—gradually; it's a heck of a project!—update the AO3 copies as well, once Volume IV is complete. Which, I admit, is taking longer than I expected, due to the appendices getting kind of out of control. Should've factored that in, this is me we're talking about….

Er. Right. I think that about covers everything for now? Good, bad, die in Birunam's fire, let me know. I'll see you all in whatever I post next, which will hopefully be before the end of the year. I will not estimate more precisely, between the threat of the Demon Murphy and the small matter that I expect the coming one-shot to be anywhere from 16K to 25K words…. -Solid