Awakening, July 7Th, 2026 Ad / November 7Th, 380 He

"I hope that was…in time…?"

Takeru Higa shook out his arms, which were cramped from overuse.

In less than an hour, he'd managed to convert the accounts of about two

thousand characters sent to the Ocean Turtle from the Japanese Seed network

to the Underworld. He could still feel the keys against his fingertips.

"It was in time. I guarantee it," said Dr. Rinko Koujiro, who handed him a

sports drink. He took the bottle, struggled to twist off the cap with his

exhausted wrists, and gulped it down. The liquid was lukewarm, but he felt it

lubricating his insides pleasantly.

Once he was half done with the bottle, he exhaled and shook his head weakly.

"Man…I can't believe how careless I was…"

When he'd been told that two teenage girls calling themselves Leafa and

Sinon had shown up at Rath's Roppongi office and warned that the attackers

were trying to get American VRMMO players to dive into the Underworld,

Higa's mind had simply shut down for a good five seconds.

And he had to admit that he'd been caught blind when he'd learned that this

threat had been detected by an existing model of AI connected to Asuna Yuuki's

cell phone.

The high school girls, who'd claimed to be acquaintances of Lieutenant

Colonel Kikuoka, had dived into the Underworld from Roppongi's Soul

Translators using the remaining super-accounts. And after great effort, Higa had

completed converting the two thousand players to allow them to drop on

Asuna Yuuki's present location.

If they couldn't eliminate the much larger assortment of American players,

Alice would almost certainly fall into the enemy's clutches. In fact, Lieutenant

Colonel Kikuoka and Lieutenant Nakanishi had even discussed climbing up the

outside hull of the Ocean Turtle to physically destroy the satellite antenna.

But to get outside would require unlocking the pressurized door splitting the

Main Shaft into top and bottom sections for several minutes. If the attackers

got wind of that, they would be able to commandeer the sub-control room, too,

the worst of all outcomes.

So instead, Kikuoka and Higa had decided to place everything in their new

allies' hands: the three teenage girls in the Underworld as the three goddesses

of creation and the VRMMO players of Japan who'd agreed to come to their aid,

at the risk of losing their characters forever.

The moment they'd been allowed to connect, the majority of the confidential

secrets around Project Alicization had essentially become public knowledge. But

that wasn't really the problem anymore.

Not compared to what would happen if the attackers, and the American

military conglomerates that were most likely behind them, got their hands on

Alice and seized complete control over the coming age of drone warfare.

"That's right," Higa mumbled at a volume no one else could hear as he

slumped into his desk chair. "Alice isn't some control AI for UAVs. She's a new

form of humanity, born in a different world from the rest of us…And you knew

that way before any of us did. Isn't that right, Kirigaya…?"

He glanced from the main monitor window showing the situation in the

southern Underworld to a smaller window displaying Kazuto Kirigaya's fluctlight

status.

The gently radiating light contained a cold void at its center, as usual. That

was his damaged, missing core…his self-image.

It hurt to see that window open all the time, so Higa finally grabbed the

mouse so he could minimize it. But just before his finger clicked the left button,

it stopped.

"Hmm…?"

He lifted his glasses and squinted at the rolling log graph for fluctlight activity.

Just forty-five minutes ago, despite being essentially unmoving until then, there

had been one sharp peak in the line chart. Higa squeezed the mouse and slid

the log to the left. About ten hours earlier, there had been one even larger peak

of activity.

"Um…come here and look at this, Miss Rinko."

"Don't call me that," Dr. Koujiro snapped. She looked at the main screen.

"This is Kirigaya's fluctlight monitor, right? What's that fluctuation?"

"His lost consciousness broke into activity for just a moment…I suppose. But

supposedly he's not supposed to be supposedly active now."

"Calm down—you're talking nonsense. Do you think he received some kind of

powerful stimulation from an exterior source?"

"Well, any senses that might register such a stimulation are completely

blocked off at the moment. Let's see, at this point here…"

Higa clicked the peak in the graph to bring up the time. But confirming that

point in time couldn't actually tell them what was happening inside the

Underworld at that moment.

And yet…

"Wait a moment," Dr. Koujiro said, her voice tense. "That time stamp. Both of

these…are when the girls used the STL to dive in, aren't they? The first peak was

Asuna, and the second one was for Sinon and Leafa from Roppongi…"

"Wow, really…? Wow, really!" Higa gasped. It was true; the two brief peaks

on the line chart corresponded to the points in time when the young women

had gone down into the Underworld.

"But wait, what does that mean…? Is it just that he had a stronger reaction

when familiar people came close? But…the kind of damage he's suffered isn't

going to heal itself with a fairy-tale explanation like that. There must be a

reason…A physical, logical reason…"

Higa stood up from his mesh chair and walked around the front of the

console. The movement caught the attention of Kikuoka, who was nodding off

in a nearby chair. The other engineers slumping against the wall watched him

with suspicion.

He didn't notice their attention, however. Higa was lost in thought.

"The self…The subject…The image that one has of oneself…Was there some

kind of backup of that quantum pattern somewhere…? No, that's not possible…

We never copied Kirito's fluctlight, and even if we had, it would be impossible

to just cut his self-image out of that and overwrite his original…Is it some kind

of living quantum pattern that can connect to his fluctlight…? But where…

where…?"

"Hey. Hey…Higa."

He looked up only when he realized that someone had already called his

name several times. "What is it?"

"You keep talking about the 'loss of the subject.' What exactly does that

mean?"

"Um…it means…"

He stopped to arrange his thoughts for a few seconds before continuing

rapidly, "That which sees—and thus knows…It's you, inside your head. In

philosophical terms, the subjective, rather than the objective. The human

being's main processor, which receives and sorts information from the senses."

"Uh-huh…So through the STL, you've combined materialism with dualism.

That's fine. What I'm asking is, can you really separate the subject and object

that clearly and easily?"

"…Huh?"

Higa blinked a few times, surprised. Kikuoka and the engineers maintained

their silence, leaving the room quiet except for the low hum of the cooling fan

and Dr. Koujiro's husky voice.

"That which observes: the subject. That which is observed: the object. These

are simply philosophical concepts to explain the relationship of things. I don't

think that they can be applied directly to the structure of the fluctlight, as a

visible model of our individual consciousness. Humans are social creatures;

we're not perfectly isolated individuals. The other people who exist in my mind,

the me that exists in other people's minds…these things are connected into a

kind of network. Do you agree with that?"

"The me…in other…minds…"

As soon as he put it in words, Higa recognized that the concept was one of the

things he tried to avoid the most.

How do others see you? How do you compare?

How does Rinko Koujiro see you?

How do you compare to Akihiko Kayaba?

I see…

I barely even remember my own face. If I had to draw a self-portrait, it

wouldn't really look like me. And it's because I've always tried to avoid facing

myself—my exterior and interior, my existence that couldn't compare to

Kayaba's in any way. That's the extent of my subjective sense anyway.

In fact, if you collected the Takeru Higa who exists within all the people

around me, I feel like you'd be able to re-create me in every unflattering detail…

Higa was just snorting sardonically in his own self-hatred when at last, the

intent of Rinko Koujiro's words sank in.

"…A backup self-image," he murmured, looking up with a start. The note of

self-pitying loathing was totally gone from his face. "That's it…Then we do have

something! We have the data that can complete the hole that was blown into

his subjective self-image! It's right in the fluctlights of the people he's closest

to…!!"

His pacing resumed, as fast as he could go short of running. "But we'll need

the STL to extract that data…and the level of re-creation's going to be weak

coming from just one source. We'll want two…no, three…"

Higa paused with a deep breath.

Who would know Kazuto Kirigaya best and have the most detailed image of

him stored in their soul? That would be Asuna Yuuki. And she was resting in the

STL right next to Kazuto's.

Higa looked over to Lieutenant Colonel Kikuoka and said hoarsely, "Kiku, are

the girls diving from Roppongi…connected to Kirigaya somehow?"

"…Yes, they are," Kikuoka replied, his black-rimmed glasses reflecting the

light. "Sinon helped solve the Death Gun incident half a year ago with Kirito's

help. And Leafa is Kirito's sister."

There was a brief silence. Higa's rounded glasses glinted in the same way.

"…Here we go. Here we go, then! We can do it…We might be able to restore

Kirito's self-image! If we can extract the image of him that's stored in their

fluctlights and connect it to the lost regions…then that data should be able to

take to Kirigaya's fluctlight, activate, and repair the subjective sense that's

supposed to be there…"

Driven by a fresh source of enthusiasm welling up from within, Higa smacked

his hands together.

Exactly one second later, all that heat and excitement vanished, and his skin

went cold.

"Oh…ohhh, no…It can't be…aaaah!"

"Wh-what? What's the matter, Higa?!" Rinko demanded.

He looked at her and mumbled absently, "The only place we can do that…is in

the main control room…"

Heavy silence fell over the room again like ash, gathering on the floor of the

sub-control room. Eventually, their commanding officer, Kikuoka, sighed

heavily.

"That's right…Of course it's set up that way…Don't get down, though, Higa.

Let's consider it a positive that we've shed some light on how to rehabilitate

Kirito. We can perform the actual operation once this situation is over, and

those people have been driven from the ship…"

"But…that's too late…," Higa said, cutting him off. "If the escort ship Nagato

sends in a command team, and there's a major battle in the Main Shaft, the

power's going to go down in Subcon. Hell, they might even damage the

equipment in Maincon. Kirigaya's Soul Translator will shut down, and he'll be

logged out of the Underworld, still unconscious. And my guess…is that he'll

never be able to connect to the STL again. In his current state, he won't pass the

initialization stage…Whatever we can do to heal him has to be done while he

and those girls are in the Underworld."

As he spoke, Higa felt a kind of determination flood through him once again.

What would he do in this situation? Not long ago, his subjective self would have

answered, I can't do anything. Who am I, Akihiko Kayaba?

But that wasn't his real self-image. That was an escape. It was an excuse.

The Takeru Higa I know, the genius who crafted the STL and the Underworld,

would say something like this:

"…I'll go, Kiku."

"Go…where?" grimaced the commander in his aloha shirt. Higa turned to him

and sucked in a deep breath.

"I'm not sayin' I'm going to barge my way into the main control room, fists

flying. Just listen…STL Room Two, where Kirigaya is now, and Maincon on the

other side of the pressure-resistant isolation wall are connected by a cable duct

that runs through the aft end of the Ocean Turtle's Main Shaft. There should be

one connector location on the cable for maintenance purposes. If we slip into

the duct from STL Room Two and go down the ladder inside, we should be able

to connect a laptop to the maintenance jack and manipulate Kirigaya's STL."

Kikuoka's eyes went wide behind the black-framed glasses when he first

heard Higa's plan, but he soon returned to his usual stern look and argued, "But

the maintenance connector's on the other side of the isolation wall that

separates us from the attackers. In order to access that point, we need to

briefly undo the lock on the wall of the cable duct. The duct is accessible from

STL Room One on the Maincon side, so if they learn we've unlocked it and sniff

out our plan, they could attack us from below."

"So we'll go with a decoy plan."

"A…decoy…?" Kikuoka repeated dangerously, eyes flashing.

Higa shook his head. "I'm not saying we're going to send valuable manpower

to do it. If we undo the lock on the isolation wall, we can use the personnel

stairs on the opposite side of the duct to send down…well, you know."

"Aha…you mean Ichiemon. Thankfully, it's in storage in the Upper Shaft. Will

someone go and bring it over here?" Kikuoka ordered. Two of the staffers along

the wall got up and trotted out of the room.

Dr. Koujiro, meanwhile, looked worried. "Look…if you're going to use

Ichiemon as a decoy, all it can do is slowly go up and down stairs. There's no

way it can draw the enemy's attention and then race back up."

Ichiemon, officially named Electroactive Muscled Operative Machine #1, was

an experimental machine body meant to load an artificial fluctlight. It was, in

essence, a humanoid robot with metal bones and polymer muscles. Because it

was an experimental prototype, no effort was made to give it a pleasing

exterior. It was all exposed mechanisms and wires, with no bulletproofing

whatsoever.

Yesterday, Higa had asked Rinko to fine-tune Ichiemon's autonomous walking

balancers. Despite a lot of grumbling, she took the job very seriously, so she

would naturally have something to say about a plan to use Ichiemon as a decoy.

Higa regretted the idea greatly, of course, but this wasn't the time to prioritize

equipment over lives.

"…I feel bad for Ichiemon, but we need him to do this for us. And hey, given

how he looks, the enemy might not shoot him right away, thinking that he

might explode."

"…I suppose…"

While they spoke, the sliding door opened, and a large wheeled cart rolled

through. Sitting atop it with arms around its legs was a blocky robotic body, its

head equipped with three lenses.

Dr. Koujiro stared at Ichiemon with a conflicted expression, then turned away.

"Well…with a look like this, it's certainly going to stick out, and it'll convince

them that we're up to something ridiculous…"

"At the very least, they can't ignore it. While the enemy's reacting to

Ichiemon, I'll sneak into the lower part of the cable duct and operate Kirigaya's

STL through the maintenance connection. The only question is how many

minutes this guy will buy me…"

Kikuoka waggled the wooden geta sandal hanging from the foot he had

crossed over his other leg and said, "Can we throw Niemon in there, too?"

"I'm afraid we can't," Higa said definitively, shrugging. "Niemon's got better

mechanical capabilities, but it's built entirely upon the premise of an onboard

artificial fluctlight for control. Unlike Ichiemon, it has no autonomous balancing

system. As soon as it starts to step down the stairs, it'll fall over."

"I see," the commander murmured.

Rinko turned away from him and focused her eyes on a spot on the floor with

an odd expression. Then she snapped back to attention and said, "But, Higa,

even if you're able to fool them about the lock on the isolation wall, that

doesn't completely eliminate the chance of you being detected. Shouldn't you

take someone along to guard you in the duct?"

"No…at this point, the military officers here are too valuable to risk that way.

Besides, the only person with any mobility in that cramped duct will be me, the

skinny short guy. I'll just zip down there and zip back up."

He answered in his usual cheery, aloof tone, but just imagining that

experience made his heart rate jump a bit. If the enemy spotted him and shot

from the bottom of the duct, there would be no escape. When the Ocean Turtle

had been attacked, he'd only heard the guns firing and never even witnessed

any of their attackers.

But…I—no, all of Rath owes Kirigaya too much not to do this, Takeru Higa

thought, burning the words into the back of his mind.

Memories blocked or not, they had forced him into a dive that was three days

in the real world, and ten years of internal time in the Underworld, giving the

artificial fluctlights the crucial trigger they needed. There was no doubt that

Kazuto was deeply involved with the birth of the breakthrough fluctlight Alice,

from start to finish.

After that, they hooked him up to the STL with all its safety limitations off for

the purpose of recuperation—and caused great damage to his fluctlight. And it

happened because he was fighting a desperate, painful battle against the power

structure of the Underworld in an attempt to save Alice, losing many friends in

the process. As long as the possibility of healing him remained, they had to take

every risk they could to tackle it. It was the only way to make it up to him.

Takeru Higa clenched his fists and started to motion to Kikuoka— when a

fourth voice made its presence in the sub-control room known.

"Um…I would like to go with Chief Higa…"

They all turned to look at a Rath engineer who'd been sitting on a mattress

along the wall the entire time.

He was just as small as Higa, but his hair was long and tied into a ponytail in

the back. Despite his bold proclamation, the way he got to his feet was rather

timid.

"As you can see, I'm quite skinny, too…but I might serve as a bullet sponge for

you, Chief…Plus, I'm the one who's been maintaining the cables, so…"

Higa stared at the man with the quiet, mumbling voice. He was much older,

probably past his mid-thirties. Even for having been on the Ocean Turtle for

months, his skin was pale. Higa recalled that this man had quit a major game

developer before coming to join Rath.

He would be a vast downgrade from one of the military officers in a fight, but

it felt better just knowing that someone was risking everything with him. Higa

got up from the chair and bowed to the staffer.

"…To tell the truth, I'm not a hundred percent sure about the location of the

maintenance connector. So I'd be grateful for your help, Mr. Yanai."

2

When he returned to the real world in STL Unit Two, Gabriel Miller's eyelids

rose slowly.

Technically, it was less of a "return" than an unexpected exile. As the

sensation of the gel bed he was lying on returned to him, Gabriel stewed over

the faint taste of surprise on his tongue.

To think that he, of all people, would lose in a one-on-one virtual duel. And

not to another human, but to an AI.

Gabriel spent valuable seconds considering the reason he'd lost to that

knight. Was it strength of will? The bond of souls? Some power of love, tying

people together…?

All bullshit.

A cold grin tugged at the corner of Gabriel's mouth. Whether in the real world

or in the virtual world, there could be only one unseen strength out there—that

of his own fate guiding him to his purpose.

It was thus inevitable that he lost. Perhaps it was necessary: Fate did not want

him to fight in the borrowed avatar of Vecta, the god of darkness; it wanted him

to fight as Gabriel. It demanded that he return to that world, in the proper way

this time.

Then that was what he would do.

His considerations complete, Gabriel silently slipped out from under the

sheet. He was surprised to see that in the other STL unit, his XO, Vassago Casals,

was still in a dive. He'd thought the man had died and logged out long ago. He

must have found something to seek out.

He can do as he likes. Gabriel shrugged and opened the door to the adjacent

main control room. The bald team member facing the console looked up and

said without much concern, "Welcome back, Captain. Got your ass kicked,

huh?"

"Situation," Gabriel prompted.

Critter composed himself a bit more and reported, "Well, as you instructed, I

inserted fifty thousand American players we scrounged up, in waves. Half of

them have been wiped out already, but they should succeed at the job of

eliminating the human realm's army. The uncertain variable in play is that Rath

utilized similar means…There's been a large influx of connections from Japan.

But only around two thousand, so it shouldn't make a big difference."

"Oh…?" Gabriel lifted an eyebrow and glanced at the main screen.

It displayed a terrain map of the southern part of the Underworld. The black

line going directly south from the Eastern Gate until it ended in an X would be

the movement path of Gabriel, as Vecta. It wasn't even half of the way to the

system console at the very southern tip of the world, but Alice would still be

around the location of the X.

There was also a thick white line, hugging the path of the black line. That

would be the Human Empire's army. They were tightly packed and seemed to

be stationary now.

A much larger army indicated in red was converging upon the white army. If

those were the American VRMMO players, then the blue light between the

white and red like a defensive wall must be the two thousand players

connecting from Japan.

"Are the Japanese using default accounts on the human side?"

"That's what I assume. Why do you ask?"

"No reason…"

He lifted the bottle of mineral water Critter handed him to his lips and

thought. Was it possible for the Japanese VRMMO addicts to have converted

their characters to the Underworld? They were as devoted to those avatars as

to their own lives, after all—if not even more so.

So no. That wasn't possible. Gabriel smiled coldly again.

He recalled the youngsters he'd faced and crushed in the VRMMO Gun Gale

Online's PvP tournament on the Japanese server half a month ago. They might

connect to the Underworld out of sheer curiosity, but they would never convert

their hard-earned characters if they'd risk losing them forever.

He briefly thought of the end of that event, when that sniper girl with the

light-blue hair had refused to give up once in the clutches of his sleeper

chokehold. The image passed, however, as he returned to his previous train of

thought.

"I'm going to dive back in again. Convert this account to the Underworld," he

said, writing down an ID and password on a piece of paper next to the control

console and handing it to Critter.

"Oh? You too, Captain?"

"Too…?"

"Well, Vassago died once, too, the son of a bitch. But then he had me convert

his account, and he happily dived back in."

"…Ahhh," Gabriel murmured, glancing at the piece of paper next to Critter.

The three letters at the start of what was surely Vassago's ID stood out to him.

"I see…I see."

Deep in his throat rumbled a rare, true chuckle. Critter looked even more

confused, so he patted the man's shoulder and said, "Don't worry about it.

Despite what you might think, that man has his own shackles that bind him…Go

ahead and perform the process now."

Gabriel turned on his heel and headed back toward the STL room, a crooked

smile on his lips.

At that very same moment, Vassago Casals wore a smile, too, visible under his

dark hood, as he surveyed the battle below him.

From the top of one of the sacred statues lining the path through the temple

ruins, he had a perfect view of American and Japanese players engaged in a

bloody melee. But in fact, a melee would imply that it went both ways; this was

more of an outright slaughter.

In the center of the entryway, two thousand Japanese players arranged in a

wide circle were slicing through the rush of red-armored soldiers without

suffering any losses at all. The difference in gear and teamwork was stark, but it

was the system of backup from the rear that proved definitive. Injured players

were instantly taken back to their makeshift camp deeper into the temple,

where they got healing spells, and returned to the front line healthy.

Considering that the experience of the Underworld was just as painful as real

life, their continuing morale was impressive. And the fact that two thousand

players had chosen to convert their main characters to join this fight was damn

near miraculous.

It was a situation that even Gabriel Miller did not think possible—but Vassago

Casals had anticipated it all the way.

If it was possible to connect from America, it was possible for the other side

to call for reinforcements from Japan. Vassago expected, too, that they would

convert their characters over first.

When he noticed among the furiously battling Japanese players the familiar

countenances of several more players than just Asuna the Flash, Vassago found

himself in a state of utter elation. The game of death he'd thought he'd never

experience again had come back in a different form.

Of course, this wasn't a literal death game, given that it wouldn't take away

the real-world lives of those who were lost—but there was one thing here that

the floating castle did not have and one thing that once existed but was no

longer.

They were, respectively, pain and the Anti-Criminal Code.

That meant this would be a very enjoyable time. In fact, it might be even

more thrilling than taking a life with his own hands.

"Heh-heh, heh-heh-heh, heh, heh, heh, heh…"

The quiet chuckles rose from Vassago's throat, uncontrollable.

I didn't make it in time.

Sinon watched the crying knight in golden armor clinging to the scarred body

of the older swordsman in silence. At the knight's side, two huge dragons hung

their heads, apparently sharing in the grief.

She had raced through the air after Alice, the Priestess of Light, who would

decide the fate of the world; her captor, Vecta, the god of darkness; and Knight

Commander Bercouli, who was in hot pursuit of them. She'd made full use of

the voluntary flight system she'd had to practice so hard in ALO and kept her

bearing south at the maximum speed the system would allow—but by the time

she caught up to them, the battle was already over.

Perhaps this was a moment where she ought to praise Bercouli's strength,

instead. He had caught up to Vecta's dragon, which should have been

impossible, and beaten the unbeatable super-account.

There was one great injustice in the situation, however.

With Bercouli's death, his soul was lost forever. But the destruction of the

soul of Vecta, the god of darkness, was not the end of him.

Sinon needed to explain that the danger had not fully passed to Alice, who

had cried all she could for now and so currently sat still and empty. But Sinon

didn't know the right words to use.

Valuable minutes trickled away in silence, until at last it was Alice who spoke

first. Despite the tears that reddened her face, Alice's stunning beauty left

Sinon speechless. Her cobalt-blue eyes, shining like the surface of water, caught

the sniper directly. Her pink lips opened to expel a voice as gentle and clear as a

platinum bell.

"Did you…come from the real world, too?"

"Yes," Sinon admitted. "I am Sinon. I'm a friend to Asuna and Kirito. I came

here to rescue you and Bercouli from Vecta…I'm sorry that I wasn't able to

make it in time."

Sinon knelt on the rocky top, which was scarred from the fierce battle, and

bowed in apology to the other girl.

Alice just shook her head. "No…I was foolish. I paid no attention to my rear

and was kidnapped as helplessly as a baby. It is my fault. Even though saving my

life is nowhere near equal to losing the life of a great man like Unc…like the

commander of the Integrity Knights."

The deep regret and self-admonishment in her voice robbed Sinon of the

ability to speak. Alice looked up, fighting back tears, and asked, "What is

happening in the battle?"

"…Asuna and the human army are managing to fight off the red army from

the real world."

"Then I will return north to them," she said, getting unsteadily to her feet. She

tried to head to one of the dragons, but Sinon stopped her.

"You can't, Alice. You need to continue south, to the World's End Altar. If you

touch the console there…er, the crystal panel, the real-world side will summon

you to them."

"Why? Emperor Vecta is already dead."

"…Because…because that's not true."

And then Sinon explained it all. About how if a real-worlder died in the

Underworld, they did not truly lose their life. That the enemy who dwelled in

Vecta's body was surely coming to attack again in a different form this time.

Alice reacted with tremendous fury, as though emotions she'd just barely

been holding in check all exploded at once.

"So…the foe that Uncle gave his…his life to slay is not even dead?! He's only

temporarily vanished and will return to life as though nothing ever happened…

Is that what you are telling me?!" she shouted, her armor clanking as she closed

in on Sinon. "That…that nonsense cannot be allowed to pass!! Then…why did

Uncle…why did he have to die?! What is a duel when only one combatant is

risking his life…but a folly, a farce…?"

Her blue eyes filled with tears again, and all Sinon could do was stare.

I have no right to argue with her. I've died countless times while fighting in

GGO and ALO. And like Vecta, I'm a god here who won't really die when I die…

Still, Sinon took a deep breath and stared right back into Alice's gaze. "Then…

would you say that Kirito's suffering is false, too, Alice?"

The golden knight inhaled sharply.

"Kirito is a real-worlder, too. If he dies here, he won't lose his true life. But the

wounds he's suffered are real. The pain that he felt and the damage to his soul

are real."

Sinon paused and took on the barest suggestion of a grin. "I'll be honest…I like

Kirito. I love him. So does Asuna. There are many, many other people who do,

too. They're all worried about him. They're praying, praying for him to get

better. And though they can't say it, they're all wondering why Kirito had to go

to these lengths."

She placed her hands on Alice's shoulders and said firmly, "Kirito was hurt

because he was trying to save you, Alice. He went through all of what he did

just for that purpose. Are you going to say that the way he felt was false…? And

it's not just Kirito. The same goes for your commander. He suffered all these

wounds and ultimately gave his life to create the opportunity to save you. He

gave us this valuable time to escape from the enemy's clutches."

There was no answer right away. Alice simply stared down silently at the

prone body of Bercouli.

Big tears began to fall from her eyes again—until the golden knight clenched

them shut and raised her head, resisting some urge. In a hoarse voice, she

asked, "Sinon, if I…if I leave through the World's End Altar to the real world, will

I be able to return here? Will I be able to see my loved ones again…?"

Sadly, Sinon did not have the truthful answers to Alice's pressing questions.

All she knew for certain was that if the enemy got Alice, the Underworld itself

would be destroyed and deleted forever.

If they could protect the world and Alice, their hopes would come true. It was

all that she could believe for now.

So Sinon nodded her head slowly. "Yes. As long as you…and the Underworld

are safe."

"…Very well. Then I will continue south. I don't know what awaits at the

World's End Altar, but if that is what Uncle and Kirito wished for me to do…"

Alice knelt, white skirt splaying outward, so that she could tenderly brush

Bercouli's hair, and she placed her lips on his forehead. When she stood up

again, the knight's body seemed surrounded by an aura of newfound purpose.

"Amayori, Takiguri, just a bit more work to do," she said to the dragons, then

turned back to Sinon. "And…what will you do, Sinon?"

"Now it's my turn to use this life," she replied, grinning. "I think Vecta will

come back to life on this spot. I'll find a way to beat him…or at least to buy you

enough time to do what's necessary."

Alice tucked in her bottom lip and lowered her head.

"…Please do. I will be sure that your sentiments do not go to waste."

Sinon saw the two dragons off as they flew into the southern sky, then took

the white longbow off her shoulder.

Apparently, it was highly likely that the people who attacked the Ocean Turtle

were private military contractors working with the support of the American

government. One of them used Super-Account 04, Vecta, the god of darkness,

to attack Alice.

It was the kind of opponent that Sinon, just a normal teenage girl in the real

world, could never deal with.

But here, in a one-on-one fight in a virtual world?

She would beat anyone who crossed her path.

With that oath in mind, Sinon waited and waited for the moment her enemy

dived back in.

He felt the dry sensation of the last bone breaking in his fist.

Iskahn, chief of the pugilists guild, looked away from the enemy, who toppled

backward with limbs splayed out and a hole punched through the chest

protector, and he stared silently at the hand that had inflicted it.

It was not the steel fist that crushed everything it touched any longer. It was a

bag of swollen flesh, full of pulverized bones, lacerated meat, and loose blood.

His other fist had already been in that condition for a while. His legs were

bloodied and bruised, such that he could no longer kick with them, nor even

run.

"…You fought brilliantly, champion," rumbled his second-in-command,

Dampa. Iskahn glanced over his shoulder.

The large man was sitting on the ground, both arms lost, and with many blade

wounds on his face and body, indicating that he'd continued fighting with

nothing more than head-butts and body charges. His eyes, which always

glittered with aggression and intelligence, were now dull, making it clear that

Dampa was at the end of his life.

Iskahn raised his broken fist to pay his respects to the brave warrior's soul and

replied, "Well, I suppose this is one way to die that won't shame me when I visit

the old generations in the afterlife."

He limped his way over to his aide, dragging his leg, and collapsed to a sitting

position.

Over a long, furious battle, they had ground down the red army from over

twenty thousand in number to maybe three thousand. The cost was that barely

three hundred pugilists were still alive, all of them gravely wounded, unable to

form a proper battle configuration, gathered in one big clump and waiting to be

crushed for good.

The only reason the three thousand enemy soldiers weren't making one final

charge to wipe them out at last was the presence of a single knight and dragon,

visible ahead of Iskahn and Dampa, fighting as though possessed by demons.

The exhaustion of her body and mind were completely beyond their peak.

But through clouded vision, the Integrity Knight Sheyta Synthesis Twelve still

detected the presence of enemies and lifted her arm, heavy as lead, to ready

the Black Lily Sword.

Byew. Air whipped dully aside.

The ultrathin blade cut into the shoulder of the enemy's armor. The feedback

sent needle stabs of pain all through her arm from wrist to elbow.

"Haaaaaaah!!"

She screamed a battle cry, her throat cracking, defying her epithet of "Silent."

The sword managed to break through the thick plate and sliced right through

the body beneath it. Then she pulled it free of the collapsing enemy, who

screeched at her in words she did not understand.

Sheyta's breathing was labored. It was not just the near-infinite supply of

enemies that had her so exhausted, but the odd hardiness of the red soldiers.

Her Incarnation was not working well. The weapons and armor of the enemy

were far inferior to Sheyta's divine weapon, but there was a nasty resistance to

the sensation of severing them. The same could be said of the enemy's attacks.

They hurled their weapons at her in crude, unthinking ways, using nothing but

strength to guide them, and yet, she found it strangely difficult to read them

ahead of time.

It was like fighting against shadows. Projected against a wall was an army of

shadows, who were, in fact, nowhere near her.

There was no enjoyment in fighting them. She lived to cut things, but cutting

these shadows left Sheyta with nothing but powerful disgust.

Why is it? Whether they are shadows or flesh, or even simple statues, I should

be happy with anything that is hard to the touch. After all, I am a puppet who

knows nothing but cutting…

The Black Lily Sword was a Divine Object whose narrow blade had the

maximum priority level. It was a tool meant entirely for severing objects, and it

was a kind of totem for Sheyta herself. If she stopped cutting, her entire reason

for existing would be lost.

Administrator had taken the single black lily that Sheyta had brought back

from one of the ancient battlefields in the dark lands and refashioned it into a

sword. As she'd gifted it to Sheyta, she had said, This sword is a representation

of the curse carved upon your soul. The curse of homicidal urges created by a

wavering in your genetic traits. Cut and cut and cut again. Only at the end of

that bloody path will you find the key to undo your curse…perhaps.

At the time, she'd not understood the pontifex's words.

Sheyta had done as she'd been told, and over almost countless months and

years, she'd dedicated herself to slicing. At last, she'd met the perfect rival: a

pugilist who was harder than any person or any thing she'd interacted with

through her sword.

I want to fight him again. If I do, I might learn something about myself at last,

she'd thought, a desire that had driven her to break off from the Human

Guardian Army and stay here at this battlefield. But it did not seem as though

she would have the chance for a rematch with that red-haired gladiator.

She drained the last mouthful of water she had left and tossed aside the

empty waterskin, glancing over her shoulder as she did so.

Visible atop a distant rock was the chief pugilist, his body broken and bruised.

He was staring right back at Sheyta, a note of sadness in his one remaining eye.

Suddenly, she felt a twinge in her chest.

What is this pain?

I just want to cut that man. I want to taste that battle again, to feel everything

burning to its core, and to sever that fist, harder than diamond. That was my

only desire, so what is it that makes me feel like…like my chest is being clenched

in a vise…?

Suddenly, there was a faint cracking sound near her hand.

Sheyta lifted the Black Lily Sword and examined it. That ultra-black blade,

which seemed to absorb all light that hit it, now had a single fissure running

through it, finer than a spider's thread.

Oh…I see now.

She inhaled deeply and smiled.

All her doubts had been answered. At last, Sheyta understood the meaning of

Administrator's words—and the nature of the curse.

A sudden rumbling drew her attention to the next enemy, charging at her

with a crude war hammer raised high in the air. Sheyta smoothly sidestepped

the initial swing and thrust her sword into the center of the red armor.

Her final attack was utterly silent. The Black Lily Sword slid directly into the

man's heart, gracefully ending his life—and without any kind of sound

whatsoever, it broke apart in the middle into a storm of black petals.

Sheyta lifted the hilt up to her mouth as it crumbled in her grasp, and she

whispered longingly, "Thank you…for all of this time."

It even felt like there was a bit of flower fragrance in the air.

On her right, her longtime mount and partner, Yoiyobi, crushed an enemy

soldier with a swing of its powerful tail. The beast's gray scales were dyed red

with the blood from a plethora of wounds, and its claws and fangs were all

chipped or missing. It had used up its heat breath, and its movements were

sluggish.

Once she was sure the enemy's charge was done and the coast was clear,

Sheyta walked over to her dragon and ran her hand along its neck.

"Thank you, too, Yoiyobi. You must be so tired…Let's rest now."

And so Sheyta and her dragon, each supporting the other, headed for the low

hill where the remnants of the pugilists guild were gathered. Their chief was still

sitting when she arrived, and he greeted her by raising a hand that was so

swollen it looked about to burst at any moment.

"Sorry about that…I caused your precious sword to break," he offered, but

she just shook her head.

"It's fine. I finally understand now. I know why I've been spending my life

cutting everything…" She slumped to her knees and lifted her hands, pressing

her fingers around the young warrior's face. "To find something I don't want to

cut. I've fought and fought to find something I want to protect. That is you. I

don't need the sword anymore."

To her surprise, the pugilist's left eye welled up with clear liquid. He gritted

his teeth and grunted deep in his throat. "Yeah…damn it all. I wish I could have

had a family with you. I'm sure we would have had powerful children. The

greatest pugilist the world has ever seen, greater than my predecessors and

greater than me…"

"No. Our child would be a knight."

They looked into each other's eyes and smiled. Under the warm gaze of the

large man nearby, Sheyta and Iskahn shared a brief embrace, then sat side by

side.

Three hundred pugilists, one Integrity Knight, and one dragon waited in

silence for the steady approach of the red soldiers.

"Looks like the battle is largely decided, by my estimation," said Klein as they

returned from the front line to the rear of the group. Asuna murmured in the

affirmative.

The Japanese players in magic-wielding classes set about casting their newly

learned sacred arts to heal the wounds the two had suffered. They weren't able

to utilize the same imagination-amplified boosts that the actual Underworldian

priests could, but because high-level converted characters had an appropriately

advanced arts-usage privilege level, they could get the job done.

"Thank you for coming to help us," Asuna said to the female player who was

healing her. Then she said as much to Klein. "Thank you, too, Klein. I don't know

how I can show my appreciation…"

The sight of Asuna at a loss for words made Klein rub the spot under his nose

in apparent embarrassment. "C'mon, don't be like that. You know I owe you

and that damn Kirito more than I can possibly repay with an act like this…He's in

here, too, isn't he?" he said, lowering his voice.

Asuna nodded. "Yes. When the battle's over, you should go and see him. If

you tell him one of your usual stupid jokes, I'm sure the urge to tell you off will

snap him right awake again."

"Wow. That's just cruel," he said, his face crinkling into his familiar grin, but

there was deep concern visible in his eyes. He already knew how deep the

wounds to Kirito's soul were.

But maybe it's true.

Maybe, when everything's safely over, and the enemy is gone from the

Underworld and the Ocean Turtle, and Sinon and Leafa and Klein and the rest of

the ex-SAO gang, and Sakuya and Alicia and the ALO folks…and even Alice and

Tiese and Ronie and Sortiliena all stand around him, Kirito won't have a choice

but to wake up.

I have to keep fighting now, so that I can greet him with a smile when that

moment comes.

As soon as her wounds were healed, Asuna thanked her healer again and got

to her feet.

Like Klein had said, the outcome of the battle was essentially sealed at this

point. The number of American players in red was about equal to the Japanese

players now, and their attacks were growing desperate and simple, perhaps

because their overall spirit had been broken.

But the battle here in these ruins was just the warm-up fight.

The real problem was Alice, the Priestess of Light, who'd been abducted by

Emperor Vecta. While Commander Bercouli and Sinon were holding him down,

they had to rush after the emperor and take Alice back from him. They would

select an elite team from the converted players, borrow the human army's

horses, and race south at top speed.

If they could just catch up, then even the super-account wouldn't be able to

handle the full force of an elite team of the nation's top players working

together. Their power was so overwhelming that she felt utterly confident of

that. The way they fought so bravely, swords and shields and armor glittering in

the sun in every color of the rainbow, made them look like the einherjar, the

heroes of Valhalla in Norse mythology…

Asuna wiped away her tears and turned from the front line to the very rear of

their camp. The supply team's wagons had been brought forth from the back of

the temple grounds to form a makeshift base. The sight of the wounded

Japanese being healed by the sacred arts of the Underworlders felt like a

blessed thing to her, something she couldn't describe in words.

"All right…It's all right. Everything will work out…I know it," she murmured to

herself. Klein overheard and agreed firmly.

"You bet your ass. C'mon, we got one more round of work to do!"

"I know."

She turned to head back to the front line of battle—when something in the

corner of her eye caught her attention, and she froze.

What was that? It was something dark…like a black smear…

She looked around, trying to capture the thing she'd seen, and at last, she

spotted it.

Standing atop one of the huge holy statues that lined the path through the

temple ruins, the closest one on the right-hand side, was a person.

It was hard to see against the glare of the sun. It was just a dark shadow,

blurring into the red of the Dark Territory's sky. Was it one of the Americans

who was taking refuge from the battle? Or one of the Japanese, using the

opportunity to scout out the situation?

A closer examination revealed that the cause of the silhouette's flickering

outline was a black half cloak that whipped in the wind. The cloak's hood was

pulled low, keeping the face completely hidden. But…

"Klein, do you see that…?"

She tugged on Klein's sleeve before he could rush back into combat and

gestured with her other hand.

"That person standing up there. Does that look familiar to you…?"

"Eh…? Whoa, someone's up there just scoping out the scene? Who the hell

would do that…? I can't say they're familiar, because that cloak makes it

impossible to see their…face…"

Klein trailed off. Then he turned his stubbled face to Asuna, white as paper.

"Hey, what's the matter? Do you remember them? Who is that person?"

"No…it can't be. There's just no way…Am I…looking at a ghost…?"

"Gh-ghost…? What do you mean, Klein?"

"I…I mean, that black cloak…That leather poncho…it's just like Laughing

Coffin's…"

The instant she heard that name, Asuna felt the center of her head freeze, like

it had just turned to ice.

Laughing Coffin. That was the almighty red guild, the group of murderous

PKers who'd terrorized the old, deadly SAO from its mid-level to late-game

sections.

Red-Eyed Xaxa. Johnny Black. Many legendary PKers had lurked in their midst.

They'd claimed scores of players' lives…until ultimately, a major alliance of

frontline players had teamed up to vanquish them and destroy the guild.

In the battle, virtually all the Laughing Coffin members either died or were

apprehended and imprisoned, except for one who escaped alive. It was the

guild leader, who was mysteriously absent from the guild's hideout: the one

man who was responsible for directly and indirectly killing more SAO players

than anyone else. He went by the name PoH.

He always wore a black poncho and did his bloody work with a huge dagger

that was more like a meat cleaver than anything else. And now, two years later,

that murderer was in the Underworld and watching Asuna and Klein from

above.

"...…It can't be," she whispered, her throat hoarse.

It's an illusion. I'm seeing a ghost.

Begone. Go away.

But the black silhouette flickering in the heat haze just mocked her prayer by

raising its right hand. Then it wiggled it back and forth in a sarcastic greeting.

And what she saw next was worse than her nightmares.

Next to the figure of the man in the black poncho, a new figure appeared out

of thin air. Then another. Then another.

An entire squad of red soldiers appeared on the roof of the massive temple

ruins adjacent to the back of the statues. Another few dozen appeared atop the

building on the left side of the path, too.

Please, no. Just stop, Asuna prayed. Her heart couldn't handle any more

despair.

But the new red army continued to arrive, and continued, and continued. A

thousand, five thousand, ten thousand.

When it had passed thirty thousand, Asuna stopped trying to estimate the

number.

It was impossible.

They had just succeeded, at great cost, in removing all fifty thousand of the

American players from the simulation. The other side couldn't possibly have

arranged another such huge army in this short an amount of time. But they

couldn't be Japanese, either. If there was a misleading recruitment effort on the

Japanese Internet to get people to the Underworld, Klein and the others would

have noticed it.

It was an illusion. They were all shadows without form, created by sacred arts.

Even the Japanese players on the front line of battle, their victory all but

complete over the remaining American stragglers, stopped fighting and turned

to watch. An eerie silence settled over the huge battlefield.

Then the murmuring began.

The rustling and activity of the red soldiers crowding the rooftops of the

palatial temples reached Asuna's ears like a disquieting breeze.

With the voices all blended together, Asuna couldn't tell in the moment what

language they were speaking. She concentrated hard and eventually heard a

few voices speaking louder than the others.

"…Bigeopan Ilbonin."

"…Uri narareul jikida."

"…Han zhong lianmeng."

It wasn't English. It wasn't Japanese.

At Asuna's side, Klein uttered a wordless groan from deep in his throat.

"Uhhh…that's not good…That's really not good…That army ain't from Japan or

the US…"

Asuna felt a cold trickle of sweat run down her back as she waited for him to

finish.

"...Those are Chinese and Koreans."

3

The VR bang in Cheongjin-dong of Jongno District of Seoul was fairly crowded,

perhaps because the nearby university had just entered the summer vacation

period.

Wol-Saeng Jo signed in at the front, filled a paper cup with cola at the drink

bar, and sank into the reclining chair at a private booth with a heavy sigh.

It seemed like he was sighing a lot more lately. He knew the reason why—

Wol-Saeng was a sophomore in college, twenty years old, and he would have to

leave school next year for his two years of mandatory military service.

You could wait until thirty to serve, so he could put it off if he wanted, but

young men who hadn't finished their duty while in school were at a major

disadvantage when it came to the hiring season. Nearly all the sophomores

around him were taking time off to enlist, and given that his parents were

telling him to do the same, he didn't really have a choice.

He sipped the flat cola and sighed again.

Wol-Saeng wasn't the physical type, so he was worried about his ability to

withstand the fierce training, and the possibility of being hazed by his troop, but

what depressed him most of all was losing two years of the life he had now. Not

his real life, exactly—it was a life in the virtual world that Wol-Saeng had

become obsessed with ever since a friend invited him to try it out, shortly after

college started. Two years of no full-diving would probably be harder than any

training regimen.

"…If only they had these in the military…"

He picked up the AmuSphere full-dive interface off a rack on the desk. It was

quite ragged and well used, being the property of a busy public VR bang, but to

Wol-Saeng, it was as radiant as an angel's halo.

The device, which had gone on sale three years ago, in 2023, in Japan, had

spread to the rest of the world the following year, and it had led to a new

movement in South Korea, which had already been hugely into online gaming.

The Internet cafés that had been known in Korea as PC bangs quickly became

VR bangs, and young gamers across the nation became engrossed in Japanese

and American VRMMORPGs.

Even Wol-Saeng's favorite game for the last year and a half, Silla Empire, was

a Korean-localized edition of the Japanese game Asuka Empire. It wasn't just

translated into Korean; the town design, avatars, and quest content were all

modified to be based off the ancient Silla kingdom of Korean history. It had

immediately become the most popular game of its kind in the country since its

release.

Meanwhile, Korean players demanded purely domestic games tailored just

for them, and more than a few developers got into the practice of building new

VRMMOs using The Seed Package, an entirely free suite of tools. The package

itself was Japanese in design, and it couldn't make full use of all its features

without being connected to The Seed Nexus, a Japanese network—but virtually

all the Japanese VRMMOs blocked connections from Korea and China. So no

new games featured the quality of play that Silla Empire did, and the Korean

gaming populace was more than a little frustrated.

I'd love to play a Korean-made game before I join the army, but I doubt it'll

happen, he thought, sighing yet again. Wol-Saeng leaned back against the seat

and placed the AmuSphere over his head.

"…Link Start!" he stated, using the English voice command that was shared

across all countries of the world, and closed his eyes.

Wol-Saeng went through the rainbow-colored ring, entered the VR bang's

user ID and password, and descended into the game launcher interface, where

he looked for the icon of Silla Empire.

Before that, however, he noticed the social media window on the right side of

the darkened space scrolling past at incredible speed. Apparently, several

hundred of the accounts he followed were all sharing the same article.

"...What's this?" he wondered, craning his neck. He spun the launcher to the

left to put the social window front and center, then tapped on the article and

loaded it up. He read aloud the tweet that showed up.

"Let's see…A test server for a brand-new VRMMO created by a team of

Korean, American, and Chinese players working together…got hacked by

Japanese players, and the testers are being attacked…?! What the hell is this?!"

He couldn't really take it seriously. But there was a URL at the end of the

tweet that seemed to point to a video, so he tapped it, still feeling skeptical.

A video player opened and a fierce voice boomed out of it: "Front line,

charge!!"

Wol-Saeng had seen enough Japanese animation in his life to recognize that

the language was Japanese. On the screen, players in silver equipment who he

presumed were Japanese were attacking a group of players in dark-red gear and

cutting them down. With each swing of a shining sword, buckets of blood flew

outward, leaving behind only English shouts and screams.

There was no censorship of any kind on the brutal violence, which made it

clear that this was from a test server. As the original tweet said, it seemed like

the Japanese players were simply massacring the Americans.

When the thirty-second video finished, Wol-Saeng was left stunned. He'd

heard of server attacks, where hackers tried to shut down servers with excess

traffic or hack into websites, but diving into a VR world and literally attacking

testers was a new one to him. If he was to believe the video was real, that was

exactly what it seemed to be, but something still felt just a bit off about it.

Yes…going by the video, the Japanese players, who seemed to have better

gear and stats, were exterminating the American testers. But it wasn't the

Americans being attacked who seemed more desperate, it was the Japanese. A

server raid was a kind of vandalism, a prank…but these people seemed to be

fighting like their lives depended on it…

There was a high-pitched ding-dong sound effect, and Wol-Saeng flinched.

One of his guildmates from Silla was giving him a voice call. He hit the button,

bringing up a new window.

"Hey, Moonphase, did you see that tweet?!" an urgent voice said, calling him

by his character name.

"Y-yeah, I was just watching the video…"

"What are you waiting for, then? Download that client, man!"

"C-client…?"

He glanced back at the social media window and read further in the tweet

thread. According to this person, the call was going out to Korean VRMMO

players to rescue the test players from the dastardly Japanese attackers. If

anyone was interested in helping, they just had to download the client software

to their AmuSphere and connect.

"Is this it…? Hey, Hwanung, do you think this is all real?"

"Of course it is—did you watch the video or not?! Our comrades are being

slaughtered as we speak!!"

"I saw it…but on the video…," Wol-Saeng started, hoping to explain the odd

feeling it gave him, but he couldn't finish his sentence.

"Just install the damn thing already! Myeongwang and Helix already dived in;

I'll be waiting for you there!"

The voice-chat call ended, leaving his launcher space silent.

While he wasn't entirely gung ho about it, most of his guildmates were

already taking part, so he didn't want to get nasty comments later on if he

ignored it. If he dived in, he'd probably get more information—and in fact, it

seemed quite possible that this was all just some elaborate stealth marketing

for the new game. In that case, it would be stupid not to at least try it out while

he had the chance.

Wol-Saeng went ahead and pressed the download button to install the client

on the AmuSphere. A new icon appeared on the screen. It had the English

words HELP US written in black on a plain red background. He hit the icon and

found his mind being sucked into a different world.

Even after Critter finished guiding the Chinese and Korean connections into

the Underworld, he had difficulty believing it.

As Vassago Casals had instructed him just before diving back in, he'd spread

the connection client program for the Underworld to the Internet of the two

countries just northwest of Japan, but he found the whole thing rather

befuddling.

I mean, Japanese and Koreans are practically the same thing, right?

Many people in America didn't even know that Japan and South Korea didn't

share a physical border. Some people just thought the two countries were a

part of China. Critter wasn't that ignorant, of course, but he assumed that the

three countries, being so similar, were on good terms—that it was similar to

how the EU was all jumbled together.

So Critter didn't understand at all why Vassago told him to do what he did.

He didn't have time to build a new fake website, so he used social media to

spread the message. The first tweet he wrote said, JAPAN IS ATTACKING A PRIVATE

VRMMO SERVER SET UP BY AMERICANS, CHINESE, AND KOREANS!!

For the next one, he explained, JAPANESE HAVE HACKED THE SERVER, BECAUSE THEY WANT TO

MONOPOLIZE THE SEED NEXUS, AND THEY'RE GENERATING SUPERPOWERFUL CHARACTERS AND ATTACKING THE

AMERICAN, CHINESE, AND KOREAN TESTERS. THE SERVER DOESN'T HAVE A PAIN BLOCKER OR MORAL PROTECTION

CODE SET UP YET, SO OUR COMRADES ARE BEING SLAUGHTERED AND SUFFERING GREATLY, and attached a

video recording of battle in the Underworld.

It depicted the knights and soldiers of the human army fighting back against

the American players, but the Underworlders spoke Japanese, so there was no

way to tell the difference. The impact of the video was clear, because the

retweet numbers rocketed upward, and the download rate of the client

program was far more rapid than it had been for the Americans.

Critter was stunned.

This kinda makes it seem like Japanese, Chinese, and Korean VRMMO

players…don't get along very well?

In fact, you might even say they absolutely loathe each other.

Vassago Casals was back in the Underworld in the form of PoH, the character

who once led the murderous Laughing Coffin guild. A smirk was lying across his

lips, the only thing visible beneath his black hood.

He raised his right hand and spoke in Korean to the players in red behind him.

"Give those invaders a taste of their own medicine!! Make them feel pain!

Slice them to pieces!! Make sure they never try to mess with our people

again!!"

The huge mass of at least fifty thousand howled words of rage in two

languages. In their eyes, surely, the Americans being killed by the Japanese

players were testers from their own countries.

Vassago felt laughter bubbling up inside of him. He swung his hand

downward.

With a noise like a tumbling avalanche, the crimson horde leaped down onto

the Japanese below.

Now kill each other. Dance for me—so hideous, so pathetic, so comical.

"…Here he comes," Sinon muttered to herself.

She had spotted what looked like a black dotted line extending down from the

red sky like a thread.

She wanted to charge her Annihilation Ray to maximum power and destroy

the enemy as soon as he physically materialized. That way, he wouldn't be able

to defend or evade.

But the actual thing for her to do right now was buy time. If the enemy could

simply generate high-ranking accounts infinitely, for example, killing him was

meaningless.

First, she would get him into a patient battle of attrition to see how he

reacted. If he seemed to treasure his life, to play cautious, that would suggest

that this was a precious account that could be used only once. Then she would

attack with full power and destroy him so that he couldn't log in with the

account again.

If this was a mass-production account, however, she couldn't go ahead and

kill him. She needed to draw out the battle as long as possible, to give Alice

enough time to travel to the World's End Altar.

So Sinon did not draw her bowstring. She hovered in the air and waited for

the enemy to materialize. The black line of data descended upon the spot

where Commander Bercouli's body had lain until a few minutes ago.

Alice had put his corpse over the saddle of one of the dragons. She said that

she would have it taken back to another Integrity Knight waiting for him in the

human realm—a woman.

"A love rival?" Sinon asked.

Alice just smiled and said, "You're my rival."

Good grief.

After that, there couldn't be any easy logging out of this place. She had to stay

here in this world, no matter what it took, until the moment she saw Kirito

awaken.

Newly determined, Sinon kept her eyes fixed on the rock top. The black line

made contact with the center of the flat surface and pooled into a kind of sticky

puddle. It was as dark and thick as a bottomless hole going down into hell.

The end of the line at last sank into the pool, and—plish.

A little ripple spread across its surface, and a moment later, a hand thrust

through without a sound. When Sinon saw the five slender fingers wriggling and

grasping at empty air, she felt a kind of revulsion run down her back.

She continued waiting, holding back the urge to burn whatever it was right

this instant.

Slurd. A left hand appeared to join the right and grabbed the lip of the pool.

With a wet slosh, a man's head appeared.

It was a surprisingly unremarkable face. It certainly wasn't what she'd call

attractive. His short blond hair seemed plastered to his head, his nose was

narrow, and his lips were thin. It was a Caucasian face but oddly plain and

underwhelming.

She almost started to doubt herself. Was this really the new form of the same

person who was using the Vecta super-account earlier?

Then the man lifted his torso up out of the pool and looked around with

empty eyes like blue marbles and caught sight of Sinon floating above.

As soon as she looked into them, she paused.

She'd seen those eyes before. They seemed to reflect everything and yet

absorb it as well, all with an utter lack of emotion.

When they recognized Sinon, the eyes widened slightly. His lips twisted into

the faintest suggestion of a smile.

I know it. I know him. I know those eyes…that face. And it was recent, too.

Somewhere…

As she watched in a daze, the man pulled himself free from the pool all at

once, making an unpleasant sucking sound.

His clothing was odd, too. There wasn't a single piece of fine metal armor

anywhere on his body—it was most likely whatever gear had automatically

been converted with his character. He wore a leather vest over a matching

dark-gray top and bottoms and woven boots on his feet. It looked just like the

kind of battle gear a soldier in the real world would have. He possessed a

longsword at his left side and a crossbow at his right.

The puddle of black water did not disappear when the man left it. To her

shock, it pulled itself right off the ground and writhed like a living thing. In fact,

it was alive. The part that separated from the ground stretched and thinned

itself until it became a pair of wings that flapped rapidly.

It had a very strange shape, neither bird nor dragon. The body was round and

flat like a basin, with four round eyeballs attached to the front. Batlike wings

extended to the sides, and it had a long snake's tail in the rear.

The mysterious flying creature flapped its wings with the man standing atop it

and rose until it was the same altitude in the air as Sinon. It hovered about a

hundred feet away, and the man on its back smiled bloodlessly again.

He reached forward into empty air with his arms, for some reason. Sinon

tensed, preparing for a spell or something of that nature, but that was not it. He

curled his hands into a choking gesture and wrenched them together,

simulating wringing her neck.

At last, and all at once, Sinon remembered. Her voice escaped from her lips,

dry and hot.

"...…Subtilizer...…"

It was him. The American player in the fourth Bullet of Bullets tournament of

Gun Gale Online just two weeks ago, who'd caught Sinon in a sleeper chokehold

from behind during the grand final.

But why was he here?

Sinon was too stunned to remember to ready her bow. She just stared.

Through the center of the pyramidal megafloat Ocean Turtle ran an extremely

solid Main Shaft constructed of ultra-tough titanium alloy.

The cylindrical three-hundred-foot shaft housed at its very bottom,

surrounded by multiple layers of protective walls, a pressurized water reactor.

Above that nuclear reactor was the main control room, currently under enemy

control, and STL Room One.

The core of the Underworld and of Project Alicization itself—the Lightcube

Cluster—was located above that. All of this was known as the Lower Shaft.

Above the cluster was a horizontal pressure-resistant barrier that split the

shaft in two. The Upper Shaft above the barrier contained massive cooling

systems, the sub-control room, where Rath's staff was hiding, and STL Room

Two, where Kazuto Kirigaya and Asuna Yuuki were using The Soul Translators.

It was nine o'clock on the morning of July 7th. A humanoid robot was walking

down the staircase on the fore side of the Upper Shaft, all on its own. This was

Ichiemon, Rath's prototype model. Three armed military officers followed its

slow, plodding pace.

In the same moment, two small people were awkwardly making their way

down a ladder inside the cable duct located on the aft side of the shaft.

I'm so glad I don't have claustrophobia, fear of heights, or fear of the dark,

Takeru Higa thought, trying to bolster his spirits. But given the extreme

circumstances, it didn't seem like the presence or absence of phobias was going

to make a difference.

For one thing, the inside of the duct, which was lit by orange emergency

lights, went on for forty yards below him. If his sweaty palms slipped on the

rungs, or his shaking feet missed a step, he was going to have a very unpleasant

time falling down to the pressure-resistant barrier that closed off the duct far

below.

He should have had his fellow researcher Yanai go down first. At least then he

wouldn't have to keep staring down into that yawning vertical pit.

Also, he said he was going to protect me from gunfire. How will he do that if

he tells me to go down first? Higa thought spitefully, glancing up at Yanai, who

was a dozen or so feet above him on the ladder.

But when he saw the man's pale face looking even worse, and the way he

desperately clung to the rungs, Higa couldn't blame him. It was laudable of him

to have volunteered for this dangerous mission at all, and the presence of the

automatic pistol tucked into his belt was reassuring, at least.

Higa looked back down and resumed climbing. A calm voice came through the

earpiece on his left side.

"How is it going, Higa? Any problems?"

It was the voice of Dr. Koujiro, who was watching them from above, her face

poking over the hatch into the duct.

Higa whispered back into the mic at his mouth. "W-we're managing. Should

be down at the pressure barrier in about five minutes, I think."

"Got it. Once you're ready, I'll give the order to the Ichiemon team to send him

in. You're going to open the wall up once the enemy notices Ichiemon and starts

attacking."

"Roger. Whoa, I'm really getting that Mission Impossible vibe now."

"Let's shoot for Mission Possible, all right? I can't help but feel that the entire

situation inside the Underworld depends on Kirito's revival. Please, Mr. Yanai,

make sure my little friend can do his job."

Yanai gave the last part a quick affirmative in a tremulous voice. Higa couldn't

help but snort.

I'm still just her "little friend."

He shook his head and, with palms whose sweat had dried up at some point,

squeezed the next rung.

When he looked down, the barrier wall was much closer than he remembered

it being.

Critter watched the players from China and Korea swarm on the monitor

screen like a giant cloud, until an alarm out of nowhere jolted him to his feet.

"What was that…?!"

He glanced over the console and noticed that a single red alert was blinking

on a sub-monitor off to the right side.

"Whoa…The lock on the pressure-resistant barrier's been undone! Ssomeone, go check out the corridor!!" he shouted. Before the sentence had

even left his mouth, Hans the lanky assault trooper had grabbed an assault rifle

and sprinted out to see.

"I had a good hand, dammit!" snarled the bearded Brigg, who tossed a

number of similarly colored cards to the floor as he went after his partner.

Would Rath attempt a surprise kamikaze attack, knowing they don't stand a

chance in a regular fight? Or is this some kind of strategy…?

Critter got up from the controls and headed to the Maincon door. The

elevator had no power, so if anything was happening, it would be at the stairs.

Hans and Brigg thought the same thing; he could hear their boots clanking on

the metal steps.

Abruptly, however, the sound stopped, replaced by throaty bellows.

"Whoa!!"

"Are you kidding me?!"

It was quickly followed by rifle fire.

Higa already knew that the percussive kata-ta-ta-ta sound coming through

the walls of the cable duct belonged to semiautomatic guns.

At this point, poor Ichiemon was on the opposite side of the Main Shaft, his

body's muscle cylinders and titanium bone structure being pumped full of

holes. But because his battery and control systems were on the back of his

frame, he should have been able to keep walking for a time.

"Go ahead!" said Dr. Koujiro through the earpiece. "Open the barrier hatch!!"

Higa used all his strength to turn the handle of the hatch on the barrier that

separated the duct into two parts. The air hissed out briefly as the hydraulic

shock absorbers kicked in. The thick metal lid lifted upward.

Like the space above them, the duct in the Lower Shaft was lit with orange

emergency lights. The sound of combat coming from the stairway area on the

opposite side of the shaft grew noticeably louder.

Higa swallowed, adjusted the backpack with the little laptop inside, and made

his way through the hatch, which was even narrower than the duct. He got his

feet back on the ladder rungs and resumed descending.

"If this were an action movie, they'd be saying stuff like 'Go, go, go!!'" he

whispered to himself—but it was directly into his little mic.

"Did you just say something?" Rinko asked through the comm.

"Er, n-nothing…I've got another thirty feet to get the connector for cable

maintenance…Oh! There, I see it!"

A number of thick optic cables along the wall of the duct met at a black panel

box. If he hooked up the laptop to the maintenance connector there, he should

theoretically be able to perform direct operations on STL Units Three and Four

in the nearby STL room—and on Five and Six in the Roppongi office.

Just you wait, Kirigaya. I'm gonna wake you up!

Higa continued down the ladder with renewed vigor, momentarily forgetting

his fear.

Through his earpiece, he heard the voice say, "Well, I'll be back in Subcon

monitoring Kirito's fluctlight signals. Good luck, Higa!!"

It was the same kind of encouragement Dr. Koujiro would give him back in

college, when he knew her as Miss Rinko. Higa couldn't help but glance up.

All he saw, however, was Yanai's face twisted with concentration and fear as

he came down the ladder from above. Higa shook his head as he looked back to

the approaching control box.

The man in combat fatigues who appeared atop the scarred rock looked to

the south. In a monotone voice, he said, "So Alice escaped…Very well. I'll catch

her soon…"

Then he looked back at Sinon and smiled thinly at her.

"…I fought against you in a Gun Gale Online event, didn't I? Your name was…

Sinon? To think we'd run into each other again here."

Sinon fought desperately to keep her hands from trembling as she listened to

the vaguely inhuman voice of the man who was both Vecta, the god of

darkness, and Subtilizer. But her fingers cramped, sweat greased her palms, and

she knew that if she tried too hard to use Solus's bow now, she would drop it.

As he stood atop the round basin creature, Subtilizer spoke to her in smooth,

fluent Japanese, holding a smile without warmth all the while.

"What does this mean, I wonder? I'd heard that there were STLs in Japan

itself…Does this mean you're connected to Rath somehow? Or are you a

mercenary, too, and flew out to this distant place?"

The voice that came through Sinon's cracked lips was hoarse.

"Subtilizer…why are you here?"

"I am here because it was inevitable, of course," he explained, barely able to

contain his glee. He spread his arms wide, revealing gray sleeves. "This is fate. It

is the power of the soul that brings us together."

His tone of voice was changing gradually. Even the temperature of his tone

was dropping from moment to moment.

"That's right…I wanted you. And so we came into contact again. This will tell

us so many things. I'll learn if I can suck up the souls of not just the artificial

fluctlights, but real people in the real world, through The Soul Translator…And I

will learn just how sweet your soul really is, since I didn't get the chance in

GGO."

The bizarre words instantly brought back the thing this man had said to her at

the end of the fourth Bullet of Bullets event.

"Your soul will be so sweet."

She felt her body going cold. Everything felt tense, and even her breathing

went irregular.

"Now…come this way, Sinon. You must hand over everything to me."

Subtilizer's blue eyes shone coldly. The world shuddered and warped.

Air, sound, even light twisted—drawn and absorbed into Subtilizer's eyes.

"Wha...?"

What is this? But even the very thought was sucked out of her mind by an

incredible magnetic force.

Oh no. I can't. I have to resist. I have to fight, cried a voice in the corner of her

mind, but it was helplessly tiny.

Eventually, Sinon's blue-armor-clad body found itself being pulled toward the

man's outstretched arms. She slid helplessly, silently through the air, bowstring

still held between her numb fingers.

A few seconds later, with her wits fading, Sinon just barely sensed her body

being slickly surrounded by the darkness that was Subtilizer.

His left hand went around her back. The fingers of his right hand brushed her

cheek and swept away the hair over her ear. He brought his thin lips up to the

exposed cartilage and sent a voice like cold black water directly into her head.

"Sinon. Have you ever thought about the meaning of the name Subtilizer?"

"…?"

In her powerless state, Sinon shook her head.

"Is it some wordplay, as Americans so often like to do, on the Japanese word

satori, meaning 'enlightenment'? No, this is a purely English construction.

Subtilizer means one who sharpens, one who renders, one who chooses…and

one who steals."

Subtilizer's eyes flashed brighter, right before her own.

"I will steal you. I will steal your soul…"

Wol-Saeng Jo descended onto a stone surface that was cracked and mossy. It

was not natural, but carved. It looked like the roof of some massive, templelike

building, in fact. The space around him was bristling and crowded with other

Korean players, thousands of them…Perhaps as many as ten thousand.

There was no process for him to choose an avatar, so while the finer details

and weapon types were different, everyone around him wore the same darkred armor. Wol-Saeng glanced down at the red gauntlets on his hands before

looking forward.

It was hard to see through the throng, but it did seem like the battle was still

ongoing in a flat space in front of the temple. The reason that the other Koreans

around him weren't moving was probably because the battle was practically

won already. The colorful group that was presumably the Japanese players had

finished exterminating the other group of red-armored soldiers and was now

regrouping, but there was no cheering coming from their side.

Something was wrong. He just couldn't quite put it into words yet.

At the very least, this wasn't a promotional stunt for some new game, like he

had imagined before he started the dive. The terrain, with its ugly red sky and

featureless black earth, was too barren to be enticing, and there was no

mention of any regulations or warnings before he dived. It couldn't possibly be

an official event.

But still, he couldn't accept that tweet's claim at face value. For one thing,

what possible meaning could there be in raiding a test server and killing testers

within the game? You could inflict temporary pain and humiliation on them, but

that wasn't going to delay or cancel the game's development, by any means.

Nearly half the Koreans around Wol-Saeng seemed a bit taken aback by the

situation, too. He heard them asking questions like "What should we do?" and

"Are they really Japanese?"

But just then, he heard a voice call in Korean from the right.

"My comrades!"

Wol-Saeng stretched and looked in that direction, but the crowd was too

thick for him to identify the speaker. All he could see was a red marker reading

LEADER hovering above the mass of humanity. The same voice came from that

direction again.

"I am hugely grateful that you answered our summons! Sadly, the alpha

testers have already been slaughtered by the Japanese intruders—no, invasion!

But they've moved to a different test location to repeat the same thing!"

Wol-Saeng instantly sensed a bristling of anger, tangible among the crowd of

thousands.

It was the word invasion—chimnyak—that set off the Korean players. It was

clear within moments that whatever reservations or skepticism individual

players might have felt soon burned away, leaving behind only fiery hostility.

"…Bigeopan Ilbonin!!" someone shouted—"Cowardly Japanese!!"—and the

angry yells spread from there. When the wave died down, the leader addressed

the crowd again.

"The Japanese hacked the server, so they can create as much high-level gear

as they want! They stole admin access from us, so we only have default

equipment now! But I know that your righteousness and patriotism will triumph

over any sword or armor!"

He got a bellowed response.

"…Uri narareul jikida!!" ("Protect our country!!") Next, far to the right, there

was a fresh angry shout in a different language.

"Han zhong lianmeng!!"

Wol-Saeng didn't know what that meant, but he could tell that it was

Mandarin. Apparently, there were as many Chinese players present as there

were Koreans.

As the voltage of the gathering surged, Wol-Saeng still couldn't get over that

lingering feeling. At the same time, his instinct told him that there was no

stopping the momentum of the situation now.

On the other side of the throng, the "leader" raised a black-gloved fist.

"Go!!" he said in English, a command that players of both countries would

understand. The furious red army roiled like one massive being and burst into

motion.

"H-human forces! Supply team! Full speed ahead!!" cried Asuna, just before

the swarm of red soldiers atop the roofs of the temple buildings could go into

motion.

The Human Guardian Army's supply team was deployed at the entrance to

the temple grounds. The palatial ruins extended out on either side of the path

through the middle. In other words, the enemy was bristling with weapons,

thousands upon thousands of them, just overhead.

"Abandon your supplies! Wagons and priests, start moving now!!" she

instructed, but it wasn't going to be in time. The new connections, probably

Chinese and Korean, were just about ready to leap over the heads of the holy

statues lining the path to land right in the midst of the supply team.

Asuna gritted her teeth and raised her rapier.

She focused her imagination on the point of her weapon and swung it down

hard. A rainbow aurora shot straight out of the end and slammed into the

statues along the path.

A terrible, mind-bursting pain shot through her head, but she kept her

imagination focused until the statues started rumbling into motion. Their

square mouths opened, and they swung their short arms as they began to

attack the players crowding the roofs of the temple.

The red soldiers in the front line leaped backward to get out of the way but

collided with their own kind rushing up from behind, which started a dominolike chain reaction. While this was happening, the eight wagons and about two

hundred priests that made up the supply team began moving.

Asuna could control the statues for only about thirty seconds—after that

long, she fell to the ground in agony—but it did succeed in getting the weaker

rear unit out of the danger zone, past the north end of the temple grounds and

into the open wilderness. The surviving men-at-arms, less than five hundred in

number, and two thousand Japanese players moved forward and enveloped the

rear guard, preparing for battle.

But there was no real terrain to speak of here, and trying to fight tens of

thousands of enemies would inevitably involve a desperate defense on all sides.

They'd just barely defeated the American players and their numerical

advantage by using the walls of the temple ruins to limit the size of the front

line of combat and employing a thorough healing rotation system. If forty or

fifty thousand Chinese and Korean players surrounded them now, it would only

be a matter of time before their line crumbled.

"Hng…"

Asuna used what little willpower she had left to get to her feet and raised her

rapier again. We need a wall…Please, just let me make a wall that will protect

everyone, right at the end, she prayed, focusing her imagination once again.

Instead, however, she felt a tremendous jolt go through her, and she fell to

the ground, gasping. Something rose to her throat and erupted outward. She

looked down and saw a small puddle of blood on the ground.

"Don't press your luck, Asuna! Leave some of the glory for us!" Klein said

bracingly.

"That's right, let us handle this!" Agil chimed in.

They stood before Asuna, katana and great ax at the ready—when the red

army recovered from the chaos and began to leap from the roofs in earnest this

time. It was a drop of at least sixty feet, so more than a few of them landed

badly and suffered limb damage and mobility problems, but more of their

fellows used the injured as cushions to land on the ground unharmed.

"Dolgyeoooook!!"

"Tuuuujiiii!!"

Asuna had never learned Korean or Chinese in school, but she naturally

intuited that both of these words meant "charge."

The crimson wave fanned out to the left and right as it descended upon them,

and it was Klein and Agil who struck back first.

"Zeiryaaaaaaaa!!"

"Raaaaaahhh!!"

With air-shattering bellows, they unleashed wide-spread katana and ax skills.

White and blue light flashed together, and dozens of the enemy soldiers

erupted with blood.

At their sides, the territorial lords and ladies of ALO and their followers, and

the ferocious Sleeping Knights, opened battle with maximum strength. Metal

thrust like machine guns. Heavy impacts sounded like explosions. Swords, axes,

and spears roared, and with each colorful sword-skill blast, more red soldiers

toppled over dead.

Air creaked as it compressed, and the massive army's charge briefly stopped.

But…it was no more meaningful than fighting back against the rush of a

broken dam with one's bare hands.

Screams and shrieks of anger swirled over the battlefield, and above it all, a

faint sound of high-pitched laughter that Asuna could barely hear from the

ground where she hovered. She looked up through dazed wits and saw, atop

the roof of the ruined building, the man in the black poncho practically dancing

with glee.