Phantom Avenger

Kirito: "Yolko-san!" Kirito looked out the window and saw a cloaked player

Kirito: "Hikari, Asuna, you two stay here!" After he said that he leaped out of the window to try and chase the cloaked player

Asuna: "Hold on!" She tried to go after him but I stopped her by grabbing her shoulder

Asuna: "Why are you stopping me! He's going to get himself killed!"

Hikari: "Relax he's going to be fine. For now, let's just do what he says."

Asuna: "Fine..." She gave up

~Kirito POV~

I was chasing him down and trying to stop him but he took out a teleport crystal

Kirito: "Damn!" I threw throwing needles at him to stop him from using the crystals but it failed and was blocked

Kirito: "Teleportation? Where's he planning to go?" I tried to listen to the name of the location but

~DING DONG DING DONG~

I couldn't hear it because of the bell and he got away

Kirito: "Damn it."

~Hikari POV~

After a few minutes of waiting, he came back and Asuna didn't like what he did and took out her rapier

Asuna: "You idiot! Don't be so impulsive!" I stepped in front of her and put my hand up to try and defend Kirito

Hikari: "Calm down Asuna I would do the same as him if I saw the killer running away." She then sighed and relaxed

Asuna: "Well? Did you catch him?"

Kirito: "No. He got away using a teleport crystal." He clenched his hands

Kirito: "Inns are designed to protect everyone inside them. so I assumed we'd be safe from danger here."

Kirito: "Damnit." He hit the wall making a screen pop up saying "Immortal Object"

Schmitt: "That robe was Griselda's..."

Hikari: 'Ah this isn't looking good he's freaking out.'

Schmitt: "That was Griselda's ghost. She rose from the dead to seek revenge" He started chuckling

Schmitt: "If she's a ghost. PKing in safe areas should be a piece of cake." He started laughing like he was crazy

Hikari: "Ok there's no way ghosts exist in this game unless it's a mob."

Kirito: "Yeah it's not a ghost. There has to be a logical explanation behind both safe area murders. I'm sure of it."

We went outside and sat on a bench to try and think about our current situation

Asuna: "I wonder if the one wearing the black robe really was Griselda-san's ghost. after seeing something so unbelievable happen twice... I'm starting to think it's not too far-fetched."

Hikari: "Again Asuna there's no way ghosts exist in this world unless they are a mob. And also if she really was a ghost why would she need a teleport crystal?"

Asuna: "Then how would you explain what happen?"

Hikari: "How should I know?"

Kirito: "No... It's definitely impossible. Hikari is right if she was a ghost, she wouldn't have used a teleport crystal and- Teleport crystal?"

Asuna: "What is it?"

Kirito: "No, it's nothing."

Hikari: "We're back at square one then..." I sighed

Hikari: 'Great... Why do I keep getting involved? And I haven't even eaten anything ever since this started.' I hugged my stomach in hunger

...

Asuna: "Here." She handed out a sandwich to Kirito

Kirito: "For me?"

Asuna: "Why else would I be handing it to you? Do you think I'm trying to mock you?"

Kirito: "I-In that case, thank you."

Asuna: "Sorry Hikari I only made two."

Hikari: "No it's fine..."

Kirito unwrapped the cover and It revealed to be a sandwich and it looks quite good and my stomach wants it

Hikari: 'Calm down stomach you'll get your food later.'

Asuna: "It'll expire and disappear soon, so you should eat it quickly."

Kirito: "O-Oh okay." Asuna then looks at him to see his opinion

Kirito: "Delicious." And he started eating it. My stomach is getting even hungrier

Kirito: "Where'd you find the time to pack a lunch?"

Asuna: "I did say it's about to expire. I figured we wouldn't have much time to eat so I packed it in the morning but I only made two since I didn't think three of us would be involved. Sorry, Hikari."

Hikari: "Ahaha... It's fine Asuna I'm not really that hungry so you can eat yours." She nodded and my stomach is angry at me

Kirito: "As expected of the Knights of Blood's clearing group representatives. By the way, where'd you buy this?"

Asuna: "I didn't buy it."

Kirito: "Eh?"

Asuna: "It's not from a store. I cam cook, you know." She continued munching her sandwich

Kirito: "U-Uh... How should I say this? If you had put this up for auction, you could've made a fortune ahahah..." Asuna stomped her foot making Kirito jump in surprise and dropped his sandwich to the ground which in turn disintegrated

Kirito: "Ah...."

Asuna: "I don't have anymore." He fell down to his knees

Hikari: "Was it really that good that it would make you fall down to the ground?"

Kirito: "Shh. Ahhh! I see. So that's what it was!"

Hikari: 'Ah so he finally figures it out.'

Asuna: "What is it? What did you realize?"

Kirito: "I... We... didn't witness anything. We thought we did, but we were actually seeing something else."

Asuna: "Huh?

Kirito: "Safe area murders... There weren't any items or methods that would make them possible to begin with."

19th Floor - Hill of the Cross

Hikari: 'This should be the place.' I was walking to the location when I heard Schmitts voice

Schmitt: "Griselda... All I can do now is beg for your forgiveness."

I hid behind a tree and sensed that there were six players nearby

Hikari: 'Yolko, Caynz, Grimlock and three Laughing Coffin members...'

Schmitt: "I'm sorry! I really am! Please forgive me, Griselda! I... I never thought that it'd happen!"

...

???: "Really? Really?" Soon as Caynz heard this he was scared when he heard something behind him. He turned around to see a rabbit he calm down till he saw who was in front of him and he was scared for his life

Griselda?: "What did you do? What did you do to me, Schmitt?" This 'Ghost' pulled out the same sword that 'killed' Caynz and Scmitt instantly confessed

Schmitt: "I... On the day we decided to auction the ring. I found a crystal and memo in my belt pouch, with instructions to-"

???: "Whose, Schmitt? Whose instructions?" He looked up to see another 'ghost'

Schmitt: "Grimlock? You're dead, too?"

Grimlock?: "Who was it? Who gave you the memo?"

Schmitt: "I-I don't know. Honest! The memo's instructions told me to get access to Griselda's room by setting it as the destination of the corridor teleport crystal, a-and then to put it in the guild bank..."

Grimlock?: "And?"

Schmitt: "That's all I did! I never intended to help the murderer. Believe me! Please!"

...

???: "We recorded everything, Schmitt." He looked up to see Yolko and Caynz who were supposed to be dead

~40 minutes ago~

Asuna: "Th-They're alive?!"

Kirito: "Yeah, they're fine. Yolko-san and Caynz-shi, too."

Hikari: "Why is that Kirito?"

Kirito: "In safe areas, a player's HP won't normally drop. However, the object expires. Just like the sandwich did. Back then, Caynz's armor was impaled by the spear. The spear wasn't lowering Caynz's HP, but the armor's durability."

Asuna: "Th-Then what shattered back then was..."

Hikari: "It was his armor that shattered correct?" He nodded

Kirito: "Yep, and at the moment the armor's durability dropped to zero, Caynz, who was still wearing it... used a crystal to teleport away. The result was an effect that closely mimicked the death effect, yet was completely different."

Asuna: "So what about Yolko-san?"

Kirito: "She must've talked to us with the dagger stuck in her back the whole time."

Asuna: "The whole time?"

Kirito: "Think back. Throughout the meeting, she didn't show her back to us even once, As she continued talking to us, she closely monitored the decrease in durability."

Hikari: "Then when it was close to zero she just acted that she was hit by a dagger that was thrown at her from outside right?" He nod

Asuna: "Which means the man in the black robe was..."

Kirito: "In all likelihood, it wasn't Grimlock. It was Caynz. Yolko-san and Caynz-san thought that by using this method, they could fake their deaths. Moreover, they thought they could spread fear by faking safe area murders."

Asuna: "And their goal was to find and expose the culprit of the ring incident."

Hikari: "And they faked their deaths to create a phantom avenger."

Kirito: "Schmitt was probably under suspicion from the beginning."

Hikari: "No wonder why Yolko wanted to call Schmitt so badly."

Kirito: "Hey, you still have Yolko on your friend list, right?" Asuna then checks her menu to find Yolko is indeed alive

Asuna: "She's at a field on the 19th Floor. At a small hill a short ways from the town area."

Kirito: "I see. anyway, let's leave the rest up to them. We've all done our part in this case already."

Asuna: "Okay."

Hikari: "Alright."

~Present~

Schmitt: "R-Recorded?" Once he saw the crystal Yolko was holding it clicked for him and he relaxed

Schmitt: "So that's what it was... You two cared for Griselda that much..."

Caynz: "You didn't hate her either, right?"

Schmitt: "O-Of course not! Believe me. Well, it's true that because of the rare weapon I had bought with the extra money, I was able to clear the entrance requirements for the Divine Dragon Alliance..." He was going to continue when

~Swipe~

Schmitt fell to the ground he inspected on his HP bar that he got hit with paralysis

LC 1: One down!

Schmitt: "No way, are these guys...

LC 2: "This guy really is valuable prey. Well, if it isn't the leader of the Divine Dragon Alliance?"

Hikari: 'They finally show up. The PK guild, Laughing Coffin"

LC 2: "Now, how should we play with you guys?"

LC 1: "That! Let's play that, Head! The game where we make them fight amongst themselves, sparing the last one standing"

LC 2: "But we never played it correctly, since you also killed the survivor last time."

LC 1: "If you spoil it like that, it won't be much of a game, Head."

Hikari: 'Interesting I forgot Zaza was here. He's going to play a major role after this season.'

LC 1: "Well then, how about we get started?" He started approaching Schmitt and lift his butcher knife

He was going to attack but when he heard a horse

Hikari: 'And there he is...' Kirito

Kirito: "Ow... Looks like I'm just in time." He slapped the horse to send it back and started walking to them

Kirito: "What will you do now? Reinforcements will be here soon. Want to try facing thirty people from the clearing group?"

LC 2: "Tch." Kirito took out his sword preparing for a fight but

*Snap*

The leader snapped his fingers which signaled the other two to put their weapons away

LC 2: "We're leaving." Kirito watched them walk away till they were no longer in sight. He relaxed and put his sword on his back

Kirito: "It's nice to see you again, Yolko-san."

Yolko: "Once everything was over, I planned to sincerely apologize. But i doubt you'd believe me, even if I did." Kirito smiled

Schmitt: "I'm thankful you saved us, Kirito, but how did you know? That those three would attack us."

Kirito: "I didn't really. I just concluded that it was a possibility. Hey, Caynz-san, Yolko-san, you two asked Grimlock-san to make those weapons for you, right?" The two looked at each other and they agreed to tell Kirito

Yolko: "He was unwilling at first. He said that he wanted to let Griselda-san rest in peace."

Hikari: 'What a liar.'

Caynz: "But as we continued to plead, he gave in and made them for us."

Kirito: "Sadly, he wasn't opposing for your plan for Griselda-san's sake." The two were confused

Kirito: "He thought that, if you staged something as outrageous as safe area murders, and attracted the attention of many people, someone would eventually figure it out.

Kirito: "I only realized it thirty minutes ago."

~30 minutes ago~

We were sitting back at the restaurant since everything was fine now

Kirito: "I ended up getting toyed with by Yolko-san, but it doesn't really bother me."

Asuna: "Same."

Hikari: "Still it was annoying we wasted 3 days of investigating." I sighed

Asuna: "Say... " the two of us looked at her

Asuna: "If you two were in that situation, what would you have done with the rare drop?"

Hikari: "Uhm..." Yeah I have no idea

Kirito: "Well... One reason I'm a solo player is that I want to avoid conflicts like that."

Hikari: "Yeah my reason is the same as Kirito as I don't really like to get into those situations."

Asuna: "In my case, I'd let the person who picked it up keep it. That's my guild's rule. In SAO, there's no way to tell who got what unless someone announces their drops. So to avoid any trouble that could arise from that, a rule like ours is ideal. Also, because of that, in-game marriages actually mean something."

Hikari: "Like what?"

Asuna: "Well if you get married, your item storage becomes linked to your partner's. Things that you would have been able to hide before coming into plain sight with marriage. Storage sharing is a really pragmatic system, but at the same, I think it's very romantic." Our food arrived and Kirito ask a question to Asuna

Kirito: "Say..."

Asuna: "What is it?"

Kirito: "Asuna, have you gotten married before?" The instant he said that Asuna grabbed a fork and pointed it at him and Kirito was trying to explain himself beside me

Kirito: "No! No! Don't misunderstand! I mean, you just said it's romantic and plastic..."

Hikari: "Plastic?"

Asuna: "That's not what I said!" She kicked him under the table

Asuna: "I said it's romantic and pragmatic! Pragmatic means "practical", just so you know."

Kirito: "Practical? marriage in SAO?"

Asuna: "Yep, it's really straightforward, after all. Storage sharing, I mean." I saw Kirito that thought about something

Hikari: "Kirito when you do that face your thinking about something so spill it."

Kirito: "What happens to the items if your spouse dies?"

Asuna: "Huh?"

Kirito: "The item storages are linked. So what happens to them when one person dies?"

Asuna: "Are you talking about Griselda-san and Grimlock-san?"

Asuna: "If one of them dies..."

Hikari: "Well wouldn't they go to the surviving spouse if their storage were linked?"

Asuna: "That mean's the rare ring that was in Griselda-san storage was..."

Kirito: "It should be in Grimlock's storage instead of the murderer's."

Hikari: "So the ring wasn't even stolen, to begin with."

Kirito: "No that's not it."

Hikari: "What do you mean?"

Kirito: "It was stolen, Grimlock stole the ring that was in the shared storage." Asuna had a look of realization

~Present~

I excused myself back at the restaurant so I would get here earlier

Caynz: "Grimlock... He was the one who wrote the memo and killed Griselda?"

Kirito: "No, he probably didn't do it in person. He probably hired a red player to murder her."

Yolko: "Then why.. If he's the culprit, why did he cooperate with our plan?"

Kirito: "You two explained your plan to him, right? If so, he would be able to use your plan to bury the truth behind the ring incident forever." I got alerted when somebody was coming it must be Asuna searching for Grimlock... But.

Hikari: 'Wait why is she coming over to my direction?!' I instantly went to another hiding spot this time far away from her. it looks like it worked and she decided to search for Grimlock

Kirito: "Schmitt, Yolko-san, and Caynz-san. All he needed was for the three of you to gather, so he could kill you all in one fell swoop." I saw two dots going over to the group it looks like Asuna found him

Schmitt: "I see... That's why the PK guild came here."

Kirito: "They've likely been in touch since Griselda-san's murder."

Yolko: "No way..."

Asuna: "I found him."

Kirito: "Let's hear the details from the culprit himself."

Grimlock: "Hey, it's been a while, everyone."

Yolko: "Grimlock-san... Did you... Did you really..." He stayed silent

Yolko: "Why, Grimlock?! Did you really... need the money so badly that you willing to kill Griselda-san, your wife, and steal the ring?!"

Grimlock: "Money? Money, you say?" He started chuckling

Grimlock: "It wasn't for the money. I... I had no choice but to kill her. While she was still my wife... We were married in the real world as well." Everybody was shocked that the two were married in real life

Grimlock: "She was the perfect and ideal wife. She was cute and loyal. We hadn't argued even once. However... once were trapped in this world, she changed."

Grimlock: "I was panicking and cowering in fear at ebing forced to play this deadly game. Compared to her real-world seld, she was more lively and energetic in-game. I had to accept it. That my beloved Yuuko had vanished!"

Hikari: 'What a dumb reason...'

Grimlock: "In that case, in this world where murders go unpunished, I should... lock Yuuko away to remain immortal in my memories. Who would blame me for thinking that?!" This guy

Kirito: "You killed your wife for a reason like that?"

Grimlock: "It was more than enough reason to. You'll understand someday, detective boy. When you're about to lose love that just obtained."

Asuna: "No, you're the one who doesn't understand, Grimlock-san." She walked infront of him

Asuna: "It wasn't love that you felt for Griselda-san. You only treasured her as your possession!" When he heard this he remembered back when her wife loved her even in this game and fell down to his knees

The three went over to Grimlock

Caynz: "Kirito-san, would you mind leaving him with us?"

Kirito: "All right." Caynz and Schmitt held Grimlock to pick him up and Yolko gave the two a bow then they left with him. And the light came over

Asuna: "There was one other person around here but I lost them when I tried to find them."

Kirito: "That's probably Hikari watching us she does this sometimes."

Hikari: "Ack!" They looked over to the direction of the sound

Hikari: 'Oops they heard me'

Kirito: "You can come out Hikari."

Hikari: "Really Kirito? Stop blowing my cover." I went out of my hiding spot

Asuna: "So it was you I sensed?"

Hikari: "Yeah sorry..." I looked at the light and it was beautiful

Asuna: "Say... Hypothetically speaking if got married, discovered a side of your spouse you never knew existed, what would you think?"

Hikari: "That's a question for Kirito."

Kirito: "What!?"

Kirito: "I guess I'd consider myself lucky. I-I mean, marrying someone means, you love every side of them that already know. So if you discover a new side of theirs and come to love that part of them too, won't that mean you'll love them more?"

...

Asuna: "Well, I'll leave it at that."

Hikari: "Really? You're not going to say if it's right?

Asuna: "Anyway I'm hungry, I missed my chance to eat earlier, too."

Kirito: "Y-You're right..."

Hikari: "Why are you nervous?"

Kirito: "I-I'm not."

Asuna: "We've been away from the front lines for two days. We'll have to work hard again, starting tomorrow."

Kirito: "Yeah. I want to clear the current floor by the end of the week."

Hikari: "By we you mean just you two right?"

Asuna: "No you're included as well."

Hikari: "Why?!" We were talking when Kirito grabbed our attention by grabbing us

Asuna: "What is it?" Kirito pointed his finger and we looked

Hikari: "No way..." our jaw drops

When we all blinked she was gone

Asuna: "Hikari, Kirito-kun, let's add each other to our friend lists."

Kirito: "Eh?"

Hikari: "What?"

Asuna: "The three of us haven't yet, right? It's convenient not being able to contact each other since the three of us are in the clearing group.

Kirito: "But we're both solo players so..."

Asuna: "I never said you guys had to party with me. Besides, you two need to make more friends

Hikari: "No way Asuna I like being alone." I backed away from her and putting my hand up in defense

Kirito: "O-Oh, you think? i don't think it's inconvenient though-" she slapped us both at the arm

Kirito&Hikari: "Ow!"

Asuna: "Just think about it over some food. Now let's head back to town now."

Hikari: "Yeah I'm getting hungry so let's go."

Kirito: "R-Right." We then walked back to town