Epilogue: August 2026 AD Part 2

Takeru Higa spent the better part of an hour racked with indecision.

An aged keyboard rested on his knees. The question was whether to hit the

smooth, worn-down ENTER key at the end of it.

His apartment in the Higashi-Gotanda district was stuffed full of electronics

that he'd been collecting since his student days. The room was miserably

humid, the air conditioner unable to keep up with all the heat exhaust. He kept

the lights off to limit whatever sources of heat he could, meaning that he sat in

darkness, surrounded by red, green, and blue LEDs flickering in different

patterns.

Across from Higa and his padded floor chair was a glowing thirty-two-inch

monitor placed atop his kotatsu, a low table covered by a blanket with a heater

underneath for the winter. Nothing was happening on the desktop—just a

single plain window displaying nothing.

Higa sighed, something he'd done dozens of times without moving, and

leaned back into the chair. Its rusty frame creaked.

He'd told his coworkers that he was going home to get a change of clothes, so

he'd have to go back to the Roppongi office in thirty minutes. Dr. Koujiro was

busy handling all the external business, now that Lieutenant Colonel Kikuoka

was officially "dead." Higa was now, for all intents and purposes, the one in

charge of Project Alicization.

But if anyone found out that he'd abused his position to take something out

of the office, he would certainly be scolded, if not demoted entirely.

The thing he'd taken was now resting on the right end of the kotatsu,

connected to an extremely complex and strange device. The device's handmade

frame was stuffed with boards and wires—and was easily the most expensive

and advanced piece of tech in the room. It was something that could not be

found anywhere outside of the Ocean Turtle, except in Alice's machine body: a

lightcube interface.

And the object connected to that device was a metal package two and a half

inches to a side. Higa stared at its cold, gleaming surface and muttered, "Of

course it's not going to work."

He withdrew his index finger from the space above the ENTER key.

"It's going to fall apart at once, obviously. That's what happened to the copies

of Kiku and me. Human souls saved onto lightcubes cannot bear the knowledge

that they are replicas. Even if…even if they're…"

He couldn't finish that sentence. Higa sucked in a deep breath, held it in—

then stretched out his finger again and tapped the ENTER key.

A program sprang to life. The large fan in his PC tower picked up in intensity.

In the middle of the dark window on the screen, a radiating circle of rainbowgradient color appeared, like the birth of a star.

Many little spikes jabbed out into the darkness surrounding it. It shook,

quivered, sparkled.

Eventually, out of the speakers to the sides of the monitor emerged a quiet,

familiar voice.

"...Mr. Higa, I presume?"

He swallowed and replied, "Th…that's right."

"So you didn't delete me. You just…copied me, I suppose."

"I couldn't…I couldn't delete you!!" cried Higa, arguing in defense of his own

actions. "You're the first fluctlight to survive a span of two hundred years! I

mean…you're the longest-living person in human history! I couldn't delete you…

I couldn't be the one to do that, Kirito!!"

Higa felt sweat dampen his palms. In the upper part of the window, a digital

timer that measured the time from activation was spinning rapidly. Thirty-two

seconds…thirty-three.

Kazuto Kirigaya—or at least, the copy of his fluctlight after awakening

following a two-hundred-year stay in the Underworld during its maximumacceleration phase—was aware that he was a replica.

In these experiments, every copy faced with that fact quickly lost rationality,

falling into madness and emitting bizarre squeals as they collapsed. Without

exception. Higa gritted his teeth and waited for an answer from the speakers.

Seconds later…

"…I had a feeling that something like this might happen…," said the voice,

almost muttering to itself. "Mr. Higa…was it only my fluctlight you copied?"

"Y…yeah. Yours was the only one I could sneak out from under Kikuoka's and

Dr. Koujiro's noses while I was performing the memory-deleting operation…"

"I see…"

There was another silence. The replicated consciousness within the lightcube

remained gentle and in control.

"I've talked to Her Majesty…to Asuna about this. About what we would do if

something like this happened. Asuna said if it was just she who was replicated,

she would want it deleted at once. If both of us were replicated, we would use

our limited time remaining for the purpose of harmony between the real world

and the Underworld…"

"And…if it was just you? What would you do then?" Higa asked, unable to

stop himself. The answer chilled him.

"Then I would fight only for the Underworld. I am the protector of that world,

after all."

"F…fight…?"

"The Underworld is currently in an extremely precarious state. Isn't that

right?"

"Well…that's true…"

"In the real world, it is tragically powerless. The energy costs, hardware,

maintenance, network…It is utterly dependent on real-world people to keep its

infrastructure intact. There is no way to ensure long-lasting stability and safety."

The conversation had already lasted two minutes. But the replica's manner

was very calm and showed no hints of disaster.

Higa leaned back in the chair and, without really intending to, argued back,

"There's no way around that, though. The actual Underworld—the Lightcube

Cluster—can't even be moved out of the Ocean Turtle. The ship is under

government supervision now. The government could order the power cut

tomorrow and wipe the entire cluster clean…"

"How long will the reactor fuel last?" said the voice, rather unexpectedly. Higa

blinked in surprise.

"Uh…well, that's a pressurized water reactor for submarines, so…if it's just

maintaining the cluster, another four or five years, maybe…"

"Then roughly speaking, for that time, there is no need to replenish the fuel. In

other words, as long as we prevent interference from the outside, the

Underworld will continue to exist, correct?"

"P-prevent interference…? The Ocean Turtle doesn't have any weapons

systems to begin with!"

"I said that I would fight," said the voice, quiet and gentle, but with a steel

edge.

"F…fight…? But the satellite connection is down, and we can't even contact

the Ocean Turtle…"

"There is a line. There must be."

"Wh-where?!" Higa said, leaning forward. The answer was not what he

expected to hear.

"Heathcliff…Akihiko Kayaba. We need his power. First we must search for him.

I trust…we'll have your help?"

"K…Kayaba…?!"

That man was dead now…In fact, he'd died twice.

The first time was at the retreat in Nagano. The second time was in the

engine room of the Ocean Turtle.

But Niemon's mechanical body, where Akihiko Kayaba's thought-mimicking

program was lurking, had vanished from the ship.

"He's still…alive…?" Higa gasped. He was in a daze—he had completely

forgotten about checking on the timer at the top of the window.

What was going to happen?

Former archenemies, a copy of Akihiko Kayaba and a copy of Kazuto Kirigaya.

If these two ever came into contact…what would happen?

Maybe…I've actually opened some kind of horrible Pandora's box…

But the trepidation lasted for only a moment in his mind before it was pushed

out by a cavalcade of excitement.

I want to see that. I want to know what will happen.

Higa inhaled deeply, exhaled, then said, "All right. I've got a few old contacts…

I'll try sending out some encrypted messages…"

There was no going back now.

Higa squeezed his eyes shut, wiped his sweaty palms on his T-shirt, then

began to type furiously at his keyboard.

On the monitor, the massive glowing cloud that stretched beyond the

boundary of the window frame flickered and pulsed periodically, gently

observing the movements of Higa's fingertips.

7

I looked around my room for the first time in two whole months.

A very plain computer desk and wall rack. A pipe-frame bed and simple

curtains.

I would have found it nostalgic…if I hadn't been put off by how barren it all

was. In subjective terms, it had actually been two years and eight months since I

was last in here—I'd spent two and a half years in the Underworld.

My room at the North Centoria Imperial Swordcraft Academy had had heavy

wooden furniture, beautiful carpet, painting frames, flower arrangements, and

all manner of pleasing and comfortable details. And of course, I'd always had

Ronie, Tiese…and Eugeo's smile nearby.

Though they were just memories now, a painful and vivid sting hit my chest

and put a lump into my throat.

I dropped my bag full of clothes onto the floor and walked a few steps to sit

down on the bed. I lay down on my side and smelled the fresh linen of the

sheets. They must have just been cleaned.

I closed my eyes.

I heard a faint voice.

If you're going to nap, you should finish your sacred arts lesson first. Or are

you going to copy mine again?

Oh, listen, I added a wrinkle to that technique you taught me. Let's go to the

training hall later.

Hey, you snuck out to buy sweets again! You'd better have some for me!

C'mon, wake up, Kirito.

Kirito…

I rolled over slowly and buried my face in the pillow.

Then I did something I'd been resisting ever since I woke up in the Roppongi

lab.

I clutched my sheets, gritted my teeth, and cried. I bawled like a baby, the

tears coming and coming, my body shaking.

Why…?

Why couldn't I have had all my memories removed?!

All of those two and a half years, starting from waking up in the forest,

walking along the brook, hearing the ax, and meeting that boy at the foot of the

great black tree!

I cried and cried and cried, and still the tears wouldn't stop.

At last, there came a soft knocking on my door.

I didn't reply. The knob turned, and I heard quiet footsteps. My face was still

pressed into the pillow. Then the bed sank a little.

Fingers hesitantly stroked my hair.

I didn't want to lift my head. A voice spoke that was gentle and soft but with a

firm insistence at its core.

"Tell me, Big Brother. Tell me what happened there—the fun things, the sad

things, all of it."

"...…"

I held my silence for a few moments more. Eventually, I turned my face to the

right and, through teary vision, saw Suguha—my only sister—smiling at me.

I was back. Back home. With my family.

The past gets further away, and the present continues. Onward and forward.

I shut my eyes, wiped the tears, and through trembling lips said, "When I first

met him…right at the start, in the deepest part of the woods…he was just a

lumberjack. It's impossible to believe, but they'd spent generations—over three

hundred years—trying to cut down a single cedar tree…"

It was August 16th, 2026, when I finished my physical therapy and returned

home to Kawagoe in Saitama Prefecture. I spent that entire night telling Suguha

about the things that had happened in the Underworld.

The next morning, I was awakened by a phone call.

It was an alert that Alice had vanished from Rath's Roppongi office.

Monday, August 17th, nine AM.

"V…vanished?! Like…electronically speaking?!" I said into the phone, dressed

in my nightwear of a T-shirt and boxers.

Dr. Koujiro was on the other end of the line. She kept her voice level, but

there was clearly a considerable amount of anxiety in it. "No…I mean her entire

machine body. According to security footage, she undid the security locks herself

at nine o'clock last night and snuck past the guards to get outside."

"All by herself…?" I asked, letting out the breath I'd been holding.

There were enough formal organizations and loose groups in Japan who did

not think highly of Alice that you couldn't count them on just two hands.

Beyond that, I couldn't begin to guess how many individuals might seek to

destroy her for practical, religious, moral, or emotional reasons. She didn't have

a sword or sacred arts to defend herself; if someone like that captured her now,

she would be helpless.

Rath had upped their security protocol at Roppongi to fortress-like tightness

in recognition of the danger. The one thing they hadn't counted on, apparently,

was Alice vanishing on her own.

The only other question was why Alice would do such a thing. I recalled

something I'd heard her mumble a week earlier, right before our voice chat was

cut off when I was in ALO.

With great distress, Dr. Koujiro said, "I was worried that we were putting too

much stress on Alice. But every time I asked her 'Are you tired? Do you need a

break?' she would just smile and shake her head…"

"Well…of course. She's a proud and noble knight—she would never admit

weakness to anyone."

"Except for you, that is. Kirigaya, I think that she's going to contact you. So…I

hate to ask this, considering that you just got out of the hospital, but…"

As she trailed off, I stepped in and said, "Yes, of course, I understand. If I hear

from Alice, I'll rush to her location. But, Doctor…is it even possible for her to get

that far?"

"That's what we're worried about. On her internal battery, a full charge will

last for about eight hours of walking, and half of that if she runs. If her power

runs out somewhere around Roppongi…and some unfriendly person happens

across her…"

"And she does stick out," I noted, grimacing. That was another thing to worry

about: Alice's bright-blond hair, pure and pale skin, and painstakingly crafted

features made her quite visible in a crowd, even before you got to the robot

part.

"We have every available employee out searching the area now. We're

tracking Internet posts, too, and even have a bot infiltrating public camera

networks and looking at the recordings."

"Then I'll just go to the office for now. If anything happens, I want to be able

to get there ASAP."

"That would be a great help. Thank you, Kirigaya," she said and promptly

hung up.

I pulled a random outfit out of the closet; stuck my arms and legs through it;

grabbed my backpack, smartphone, and motorcycle key; and rushed out of my

room.

Down the stairs, the first floor was quiet. My dad and mom were on vacation

for the Obon holiday and had gone somewhere together, and Suguha was

probably at morning kendo-club practice. We were supposed to be celebrating

my discharge from the hospital as a family tonight, but this was more

important.

I chugged some orange juice straight from the bottle while standing by the

fridge, popped the bagel sandwich Suguha must have left for me into my

mouth, and raced for the door. I stuck my feet into my riding shoes and was just

turning the doorknob when the intercom right next to me on the wall rang.

My heart nearly skipped a beat. Had Alice somehow found a way to get to my

location on her own?

"Ali…"

I opened the unlocked door, the name catching in my throat.

Instead, it was a young man in the blue uniform and cap of one of the major

delivery companies. It was exquisitely bad timing, but I couldn't help but notice

the beads of sweat on his face as he said "Hello, home delivery!" so I couldn't

just ask him to come back later.

I leaned over to grab the official family stamp left on top of the shoe cubbies

to stamp his shipping forms, but then he delivered the bad news: "Payment on

delivery!"

"Oh…right."

I started to get my wallet out of the backpack but then remembered that this

world had a convenient thing called electronic funds. Instead, I pulled my phone

out of my pocket and held it up to the tablet the man was carrying.

"Thanks!" he said, trotting off. I took a look at the box he'd left in the

doorway.

It was surprisingly large. The cardboard box had to be over two feet to a side.

If it wasn't perishable, I was going to leave it and continue on my way, but I

checked the sender just in case. It was labeled ELECTRONIC GOODS. And the sender…

"What…?"

OCEANIC RESOURCE EXPLORATION & RESEARCH INSTITUTION. That had to be one of the shipping

labels they kept around the Roppongi Rath office. My address was right there in

the destination field. I didn't recognize the awkwardly angular handwriting.

If Dr. Koujiro had sent this, she would have mentioned it in the call. So

perhaps it had come from Kikuoka or Higa. Which would mean…it was some

kind of electronics related to the Underworld or the STL?

I bit my lip, made up my mind, and reached for the edge of the tape seal,

carefully peeling it off. Then I lifted the two flaps out to the side, and…

"…Aaaaah!!"

…screamed in horror.

Packed tightly into the box, bent at awkward, unnatural angles, were human

hands and feet. I bolted backward, eyes bulging, and then screamed a second

time.

"Eyaaaaaa?!"

In the shadows beneath the hands and feet, a single eye stared back at me.

I flopped backward, but my right hand was still holding the edge of the

cardboard box. A pale hand reached up out of the box and grabbed my wrist.

Before I could scream a third time, an annoyed voice said, "Stop making noise

and pull me out already, Kirito."

Three minutes later, I was sitting on the lip of the wood floor in our

entranceway, holding my head in my hands.

I was valiantly attempting to come to grips with the real-life actualization of

that trope from popular fiction, "beautiful girl robot delivered to your door."

But it was not going well.

"…I can't!!" I shouted, giving up and jumping to my feet.

I turned around to see a beautiful girl robot dressed in a familiar uniform

rubbing the pillar in the hallway with a finger out of great curiosity.

Eventually, the robot—Electroactive Muscled Operative Machine #3—housing

a true bottom-up AI, the third-ranked Integrity Knight of the Axiom Church,

Alice Synthesis Thirty, smiled at me.

"This house is built of wood," she said. "It's just like the house in the woods of

Rulid. But much, much larger."

"Ah…yeah…It's probably been around for seventy or eighty years," I said

weakly.

Her blue eyes widened. "I am amazed that its life lasts for so long! They must

have used quite a mighty tree…"

"I suppose…I mean…Hang on!"

I stomped across the hallway, grabbed Alice by the shoulder, and tried to ask

her what the hell was going on, when she gave me a smile like a flower

blooming.

"Speaking of life, might I recover the life of this steel-element body? Let's

see…I believe that in your words, it is called 'recharging.'"

Allow me to elaborate on my earlier point: beautiful girl robot delivered to

your door who recharges using a standard home power socket.

While I'd been away in the Underworld, the real world had apparently

advanced quite a ways into the future.

"Oh…you need to recharge…? Go ahead, take as much as you need…," I said,

prodding her shoulder toward the living room.

She pulled a charging cable out of her uniform pocket; stuck one end into her

left hip, near the waist, and the other end into the wall socket; then sat on the

sofa with her back perfectly upright. From there, she continued to swivel her

head, looking around.

I guess I should make some tea for her, I thought, getting up—and then I

realized that Alice couldn't eat or drink anything here. I was still rattled by this

experience, I could tell.

The best way to calm down would be to solve some of the more basic

questions, so I asked, "Um…first of all, can you tell me how exactly you pulled

off the feat of putting yourself through the mail…?"

The golden-haired, blue-eyed girl shrugged her shoulders as if this was a very

stupid question and said, "It was simple."

According to her, she found pay-on-delivery shipping forms, packing tape, and

a reinforced cardboard box at the Roppongi office, and then she made sure the

security cameras recorded her leaving her living quarters.

Later, she put the box together away from the view of the camera at the

entrance, filled out the shipping form with my address, pasted it on, then undid

the joint locks of her body and got inside the box. She placed the tape on just

one side of the top lid, then pulled it down from the inside to seal it and ran

another line of tape on the underside for reinforcement.

Then she sent a message to the shipping company, announcing a package for

pickup. The deliveryman would have stopped at the security gate, but the

message was sent from the building's premises, and the package was there at

the entrance. Without realizing that a beautiful robot was hiding inside, the

courier redid the insufficient tape job and placed the box in his truck, where it

waited until it was delivered in Kawagoe, Saitama, the next morning…

"...I see...," I murmured, sinking back into the sofa.

Now it made sense that they hadn't been able to track her. She hadn't

actually taken a step outside the Roppongi building. What was most surprising

to me wasn't the sophistication of the trick but the fact that Alice had come up

with the idea after spending only a month in the real world. When I brought

that up, the uniformed girl just shrugged again.

"When I was a newly minted novice knight, I once snuck out of the cathedral

and went to visit the city."

"…I…I see."

What would happen once Alice was intimately familiar with information

technology? She could dive into virtual spaces without an AmuSphere; in a way,

she was already a child of the network.

But I pushed that frightening thought aside and sat up on the couch. It was

time to get to the real question.

"But…Alice, why did you do this? If you just wanted to visit my home, you

could have told Dr. Rinko, and she would have set aside time for you."

"I suppose so. She is a good person…She is very concerned for my well-being.

And therefore, if she had given me the chance to visit your home, it would have

been with a small squadron of men-at-arms in black."

Her long, delicate eyelashes lowered. It was hard to believe that they were

artificial.

"…I feel bad that I essentially fled from there. I'm sure that Dr. Rinko is very

worried and searching for me now. I will make whatever apologies are

necessary when I return. But…I just wanted this bit of time very badly. Time to

be with you…not in an assumed form, but in your real body, face-to-face, where

we can speak to each other alone."

Her large blue eyes were staring right into me. I knew that they were just

optical devices made of CMOS image sensors and sapphire lenses, but there

was something breathtakingly beautiful about them. Perhaps it was the light of

her fluctlight itself, shining through the brief circuit to those eyes.

Alice stood up in one smooth motion, motors whirring quietly. She rounded

the glass table and approached me, step by step.

Then the charging cable plugged into the wall went taut, preventing her from

walking farther. A faint look of frustration settled over her features.

I breathed in deep and stood up as well. Two steps put me right in front of

Alice.

Her eyes burned and flickered with intent, just below the level of mine. Her

lips moved, emitting a voice that was sweet and clear, but with a slightly

electronic aspect to it.

"Kirito. I am angry."

I didn't have to ask her what she was upset about. "Yes…I suppose you are."

"Why…why did you not tell me? Why did you not tell me there was a

possibility that we would never see each other again? That it could have been

an eternal farewell? If you had simply said that we would be separated by a wall

of two centuries, never to see each other again, when I was there at the

World's End Altar, then I…I would not have fled on my own!!" Alice shouted at

me. Her expression was such that if her body had had the ability to cry, tears

would have adorned her cheeks.

"I am a knight! To fight is my lot in life! So…why did you choose to face that

terrible foe alone, and why did you not wish to have me there beside you?!

What am I…what is Alice Synthesis Thirty to you?!"

She lifted a small fist and smacked it against my chest. And again. And again.

She tilted her small head down, trembling, and bumped her forehead against

my shoulder.

I enveloped the back of her golden hair with my hands.

"You are…my hope," I muttered. "And not just mine. You're the irreplaceable

hope of all the people who lived and died in that world. So I just wanted to

protect you. I didn't want to lose you. I wanted to make sure that hope lasted…

into the future."

"…The future…," she repeated tearfully in my arms. "And what exactly does

the future look like? When I have suffered and persevered through the

meaningless banquets and events of the chaotic real world, in this inconvenient

steel body, battling endless loneliness, what will I find?"

"…I'm sorry. Even I don't know that yet."

I squeezed her body harder and tried to put everything I was thinking and

feeling into whatever words I could find.

"But your being here will change the world. You will change it. And wherever

that leads, there will come a time when Cardinal's and Administrator's and

Bercouli's and Eldrie's…and Eugeo's wishes will be fulfilled. That's what I

believe."

And it didn't stop there. That other alternate world, the castle that floated in

a virtual sky, where many young people lived and fought and died—it was

connected to this place and this moment, too.

Alice left her forehead on my shoulder and held her silence for a long, long

time.

Eventually, the otherworldly knight pulled away from me and gave a slight but

noble smile, just like she had when I'd met her at that chalky-white tower.

"…I must make contact with Dr. Rinko. It would not be good to cause her to

worry," she said.

I continued staring into Alice's eyes. It didn't feel as though the tension within

them was resolved yet. But what more could I do? Perhaps it was a problem

that could be solved only through the passage of time.

"…Yeah, good idea," I said, pulling my phone out of my pocket.

When I told her what had happened, Dr. Koujiro was indeed stunned for a

good five seconds, but her first words when she found her voice were an

apology to Alice. She really was a good person. I could see why she was the one

woman to whom Akihiko Kayaba had ever opened his heart.

"I suppose I was taking things for granted," Dr. Koujiro said. "If anything,

we've been relying on Alice too much."

She followed that by giving me surprising instructions. After I hung up, I gave

Alice a reassuring smile—she was looking at me with concern.

"It's all right—she wasn't mad. If anything, she was sorry about the situation.

She also said that you could spend the night tonight."

"R-really?!" Alice's face lit up.

"Yup. But she asked that you turn your GPS tracker on, just in case."

"That would be a very small price to pay," Alice agreed. She blinked slowly

and got to her feet. "Now that that's decided, please guide me around your

home and yard. This is my first time seeing traditional buildings in the real

world."

"Yeah, of course. But…this is just a normal family home—there's not much to

see…," I mumbled. Then I had an idea. "Oh, hey, let's go outside, then."

Once Alice had put away her cable—she was done charging up—we headed

out the front door and around the gravel-covered yard. I showed the knight our

pond with koi and goldfish—and the gnarled pine tree, which she seemed quite

interested in.

But eventually, we wound up at the aging dojo building sitting quietly in the

northeast corner of the lot. As soon as she took off her shoes and stepped up

onto the wood-slat floor, Alice seemed to intuit what this building was for.

She turned to me and asked breathlessly, "Is this…a training hall?"

"Yeah. We call it a dojo here."

"Doe-joe…," Alice repeated. She faced the back wall and performed the

knight's salute of the Underworld: right hand to her chest, left hand to her

waist. I bowed in the Japanese style and stood beside her.

My late grandfather had built this kendo dojo, and only Suguha used it now.

The floor was polished to a shine. Despite it being midsummer, the wood was

cool on the underside of my feet. Even the air seemed to be different in here.

Alice first examined the hanging scroll on the wall, then walked to the shelf

set up next to it. She reached out and carefully lifted an aged shinai from it.

"This…is a wooden sword for practice. But it's quite different from those in

the Underworld."

"That's right. It's made of bamboo and built so that it won't injure you if you

get hit with it. The wooden swords over there could knock out a third of your

life if they landed in the right spot."

"I see…You have no instantaneous healing arts here, after all. I suppose that

training with the sword must involve quite a lot of difficult work…," Alice

murmured. She paused, thinking, for several moments.

Then, without warning, she spun around and, to my shock, pointed the shinai

handle right at me.

"Huh? What are you…?"

"Isn't it obvious? There's only one thing to do in a training hall."

"Wh…what?! Are you for real?!"

Alice already had another shinai in her left hand. I had no choice but to grab

the handle she was offering me.

"B-but, Alice, in that body you've—"

"No need for a handicap!"

Crack! She had thrown down the gauntlet.

My mouth hung open as the mechanical girl walked across the wooden floor.

Yes, Alice's machine body was an extremely high-quality example of what was

possible by the standards of the year 2026. Her mobility was far greater than

that of the first and second test models on the Ocean Turtle. Apparently, the big

secret to how the third was so much more advanced was the fact that her

presence in it removed the need for a balancing function.

Every moment that human beings stand on their feet, they unconsciously

balance their center of gravity between their right and left feet. If that function

is re-created in a mechanized program with sensors and gyros, the size of the

devices involved no longer fits within a realistic human form.

Alice was not subject to those limitations, however. Her fluctlight already

contained the same auto-balancing function found in any human being. All that

the actuators and polymer muscles in her frame needed were the fine control

signals from her lightcube.

And yet…

At present, she still couldn't keep up with the ability of a flesh-and-blood

human. I could tell as much from the clumsiness of the writing on the package's

shipping form. It was unimaginable to me that she could control swinging a

shinai—a practice sword—with the complex and speedy motions the action

required.

That was my snap judgment, and it left me concerned. But Alice took a

position with absolute assuredness five yards across from me and held the

shinai above her head in both hands, perfectly still.

That was the stance for Mountain-Splitting Wave, from the High-Norkia style.

Suddenly, a chill wind brushed my skin. I gulped and pulled back half a step.

Sword spirit.

Before I could even think about how impossible this was, my body was

moving on its own. I had my shinai, also doublehanded, at a level grip on the

right. Then I dropped my center of gravity and pushed my left foot forward.

That was the stance for Ring Vortex, from the Serlut style.

On the other hand, I was not only physically recovering, I was also just a

weakling gamer in the real world. I wasn't in any position to worry about the

ability of a machine body. Decorum required that I give this competition my all.

I found that a grin was crossing my lips, which Alice returned.

"It does remind me…of the first time we met in combat, in the garden on the

eightieth floor of the cathedral."

"And you destroyed me back then. It won't go so well for you this time."

We didn't have a judge to give us a cue to begin—but our smiles vanished at

the same time anyway.

Without breaking our stances, we began to inch closer to each other. The air

positively crackled between us, and the buzzing of the cicadas out in the yard

grew distant.

The silence grew louder and denser by the moment, until it was truly painful.

Alice's blue eyes narrowed.

There was a flash deep within their core, like a glimpse of lightning—

"Yaaaaah!!"

"Seeaaaaa!!"

We unleashed piercing battle cries in unison, and I found myself

dumbfounded by the sight of that golden hair whipping as the knight's sword

cut down at me.

Vweem!! Her actuators roared at max output, and a tremendous shock ran

through my hands. A dry smack filled the dojo. The two shinai fell out of our

hands and clattered left and right, spinning away over the floorboards.

Alice and I had failed to neutralize the force of the impact, so we collided and

toppled to the right. Out of pure instinct, I rotated so that I fell first.

My back hit the floor. Two dull impacts came afterward: The first was Alice's

forehead hitting my forehead—and the second was the back of my head against

the wooden floor.

"Aaah...," I grunted.

Alice looked down at me from inches away and grinned. "I win. The clincher

was my ultimate technique, Steel Headbutt."

"I've…never heard of…"

"I've just invented it," she said, giggling with delight. Her pale cheek

descended and pressed against mine. Her voice was in my ear like a spring

breeze.

"I'm fine now, Kirito. I can survive in this world. No matter where I am, I will

be myself as long as I can swing a sword. I've just realized that…my fight isn't

over. Neither is yours. So I will look forward, and only forward, and keep

moving."

That night was a tense, nerve-racking affair, for reasons different than our

impromptu duel.

We held a family party to celebrate my hospital discharge, a gathering so long

in the making that I couldn't remember the last time we'd done so—with one

extra-special guest.

Suguha and Alice were already friends in ALO, and they got along quickly on

this side, too, bonding over kendo. Alice found it easy to relate to my mom by

telling stories about things I'd done.

On the other hand, there was a terrible tension between my dad and me on

the other side of the table. My adoptive father, Minetaka Kirigaya, was almost

the polar opposite of me in every regard. He was serious. Hardworking.

Talented. He graduated from a top college and went to business school in

America, then found work at the largest securities business there. He'd barely

spent any time in Japan the last several years. It was a wonder that he didn't

have any issues with my rather outgoing mother—if anything, they still seemed

to be madly in love.

Despite having had plenty of beer and wine, Dad didn't seem any different

from his usual self. He gave me a serious look and got right to the most

important topic of the night.

"Kazuto, there's lots to talk about, but first of all, there's something I need to

hear directly from you."

The left side of the dining table suddenly went quiet. I set down the chicken

wing I was eating, cleared my throat, and stood up. I placed my hands on the

edge of the table and lowered my head.

"…Dad, Mom, I'm sorry for putting you through all this heartache again."

My mother, Midori, just beamed at me and shook her head. "We're used to it

by now. And it was a really big, important thing you did this time, right, Kazu?

When a person takes on a job, they have to see it through to the end. If you say

you're going to write a novel, you write it. If you say you're going to stick to a

deadline, you do it!"

"Mom, you're taking that in a more personal direction," Suguha teased.

Things relaxed briefly before my dad tightened the screws again.

"Now, your mother says that, but while you were missing, she was under an

incredible amount of stress. The people from the Oceanic Resource Exploration

& Research Institution explained the situation, and from that young lady's

presence, it's clear that you played a big role in this, but you mustn't forget one

crucial question. What are you, Kazuto?"

It would've felt good to say, A swordsman! But that wasn't the right answer

for this situation.

"A teenager in high school."

I was deflated, a child being lectured by his parents. I could sense Alice's

stunned gaze on my cheek, and it stung. After all the tremendously powerful

foes I'd fought in the Underworld, this was my truth in the real world.

Dad nodded and continued sternly, "That's right. And therefore, it should be

clear where the brunt of your effort should be going."

"…To studying and focusing on getting into college."

"You're at the summer of your second year. Your mother told me you want to

study abroad, in America. Have you been making progress toward that end?"

"Ah…well, about that," I mumbled, looking at Mom, then Dad. I bowed again.

"I'm sorry. I want to change my focus."

Behind his metal-framed glasses, Dad's eyes narrowed. "Explain," he

commanded.

I steeled myself and revealed the goal that I'd told only Asuna about so far.

"I want to enter an electrical engineering program at a Japanese school…

preferably Tohto Industrial College. Then after that, I'd like to get a job with

Ra…with the Oceanic Resource Exploration & Research Institution."

Ka-thunk!

Alice bolted upright from her chair.

She had her hands clutched together before her, and her eyes were wide

open. I glanced briefly at those blue pools and gave her the tiniest smile.

A long, long time ago—or two months, depending on how you measured it—

I'd told Asuna that I wanted to go to America to study brain-implant chips. That

was because I'd thought BICs were the proper evolution of full-diving that

began with the NerveGear. I had a familiarity and an attachment to classic

polygonal 3-D modeling spaces, rather than the STL and its fundamentally

different Mnemonic Visualizer system.

But…the time I'd spent in the Underworld had totally flipped my perception

around.

I couldn't drift away from that world now, and I had no intention of doing so.

I'd finally found the theme I could make my life's work.

The melding of the Underworld and the real.

Alice stared at me, smiling like a blooming flower, then turned to Dad and

said, "Father…"

That earned a shocked look from Suguha.

"My father never did give me his blessing to become a knight. But I no longer

have any regrets about that. I made what I felt clear through my actions, and I

believe that my father understood that. Kirito—I mean, Kazuto—is someone

who can do that, too. He may only be a student in this world, but in the other

world, he is the mightiest swordsman of them all. He fought bravely and

valiantly to rescue the lives of so many. He is a hero."

"Alice…," I said, trying to stop her. I knew that talking about knights and

battles wasn't going to mean anything to the man.

But to my shock, there was a tiny smile on his stern lips. "Alice," he said, "his

mother and I both know that already. Kazuto's already a hero in this world. Isn't

that right, Black Swordsman?"

"Ack…" I grimaced, pulling away. Had they both read Full Record of the SAO

Incident, as full of hearsay and nonsense as they were?

Dad's smile disappeared, and he fixed me with that American-style direct

stare. "Kazuto, deciding your path, studying, taking tests, advancing to college,

and getting a job are only a process you go through, but at the same time, they

are the fruit of life. You can be unsure and change your mind, but make sure

you live your life without regrets."

I closed my eyes, took a deep breath—and bowed a third time.

"I will. Thank you, Dad, Mom." I lifted my head and smirked a bit. "It's not

exactly payment for that valuable advice…but if you happen to have any stock

in Glowgen Defense Systems or their affiliates, I would sell them as soon as

possible. I hear they gambled big and lost."

It was a tiny bit of payback, but the only response my dad had was a little

twitch of an eyebrow.

"Ah. I'll have to keep that in mind."

I guess this is how ordinary life gets back to being ordinary, I thought, rolling

back onto my bed.

Our little home party was over. Dad and Mom retired to their bedroom on the

first floor, and Alice slept in Suguha's room upstairs. Imagining what they might

be talking about together was frightening, but at least they were getting along.

It was a good thing for Alice to get used to the real world like this, one step at a

time.

Summer vacation would be over soon, and second term would begin.

I was over two and a half years away from high school classes in subjective

time, so I was going to spend the last two weeks of vacation in study boot camp

with Asuna. It was time to overwrite all those memorized sacred arts from the

North Centoria Imperial Swordcraft Academy with equations and English vocab.

Despite what Alice had said, I probably wasn't ever going to engage in a true

sword fight again. It was time for me to expend all my time and energy on

fulfilling my goals in the real world. I had to study, graduate, and get a job—

whether my first choice or not—in as straightforward a path as I could.

That was a very important battle, too. Even if it left me feeling a bit lonely.

The years of my youth were always going to end someday.

By the time I was able to recognize the precious nature of my teenage years

with their sunlight and breeze, cheers and excitement, adventure and the

unknown, they would already be in my past, never to return.

I was probably a very fortunate child.

How many alternate worlds had I raced through, heart pounding, sword in my

right hand, blank map in my left? So many memories, like precious jewels, that

my soul could barely contain them all.

Outside my window, somewhere in the distance, the final train of the night

crossed the metal bridge.

In the grass of the yard below, the insects sang the song of summer's end.

A chilly breeze blew through the screen, rustling the curtain.

I breathed deep of the scents and sounds of the real world and shut my eyes.

"…Good-bye," I murmured.

Bidding farewell to a passing age.

8

Or so I had thought.

Up until the moment I drifted off to sleep in my bed, late at night on August

17th.

"…Kirito. Wake up, Kirito."

Someone was shaking my shoulder, pulling me back from a bittersweet

sentiment.

"...…Mm…," I grunted, my eyelids rising against my will.

Right in front of me were pure-blue eyes framed by golden lashes. I froze atop

my sheets.

"Fhwah…?! A-Alice?!"

"Shh, don't raise a fuss."

"L-listen, I don't know what you're thinking, but this isn't really appropriate

behavior for…"

"What are you thinking?" she said, pulling on my earlobe until my brain began

to function properly at last.

Blearily, I looked over at the clock next to my bed: It was just past three in the

morning. The moon was still round and bright, high in the sky through the

window.

I looked back to my room.

Under the dim moonlight, Alice knelt at my bedside, dressed quite

inappropriately in a plain blue T-shirt and nothing else. Her white legs extended

from its long hem, so bright that they seemed to be giving off a light of their

own. With as dark as it was, I couldn't see the seams in the silicone skin, and it

was impossible to believe that those graceful lines were man-made.

"D-don't stare at me like that," she said, pulling the shirt hem lower. I jerked

upright, breath catching in my throat. I forced my eyes to rise, but that only

revealed a rising curve through the thin fabric and, above that, shining hair like

molten gold. Altogether, the sight dulled my ability to think.

In fact, my flustering was so obvious that it started to embarrass Alice. She

pouted and turned her face away. "You may not remember this, but we slept in

the same bed for half a year. You needn't be so self-conscious after all this

time."

"Wha…? W-we did?"

"Yes, we did!!" she shouted, then covered her mouth with her hands. I

hunched my neck, listening for sound from the adjacent room; fortunately,

Suguha didn't seem to have woken up. She was the kind of person who could

sleep through an earthquake or a typhoon, provided that it was more than

thirty minutes before the time she usually woke up for morning practice.

Alice cleared her throat and glared at me. "I haven't been able to get to the

point because you keep acting strange."

"Oh…s-sorry about that. Um, I…that is…I'm fine now."

She sighed, got to her feet with a faint motor whir, composed herself, and

announced, "Roughly five minutes ago…I received a message via remote

relayed arts—or what you would call, er…'the network'—with most alarming

content."

"An e-mail, you mean? From whom?"

"There was no name. As for the content…I suppose it would be faster for you

to read it yourself."

She turned and looked at the printer sitting atop my desk. To my disbelief, the

printer's exhaust fan suddenly whirred to life. Alice had just given it a remote

signal to print. When did she learn to do such a thing?

But the shock of that revelation was knocked clean over the horizon when I

picked up the piece of paper the printer spat out and saw what was actually

written on it.

Written horizontally on the white sheet was the following: Climb the white

tower, and ye shall reach unto yon world.

Cloudtop Garden.Great Kitchen Armory.Morning Star Lookout.Holy Spring

Staircase Great Hall of Ghostly Light

For at least five full seconds, I could not process what I was reading.

As my half-working brain continued getting up to speed, I finally understood

why Alice had called this "alarming content."

The first part was one thing.

But the big problem was the second. It was a string of place names…that I

recognized.

Cloudtop Garden…Morning Star Lookout…these were the names of floors in

the Axiom Church's Central Cathedral, the main feature of Centoria, human

capital of the Underworld.

But then, who had sent this message?

There were only two people in the real world who had intimate knowledge of

the inner details of the cathedral: Alice and me.

Rath personnel like Kikuoka and Higa could monitor the names of

organizations like the Axiom Church from the outside, but they had no way of

knowing the names of individual floors of the building. And there were many

VRMMO players who'd logged in to help in the fight to save the Underworld,

like Asuna and Klein, but they had all been in the Dark Territory, miles and miles

from Centoria, and had logged out there as well. None of them would have

even gotten a chance to glimpse that structure for themselves.

But…

When I read through the message again, I noticed something even more

bizarre.

Near the end of the second part was the name Holy Spring Staircase. I

couldn't recall having passed such a floor. That meant that whoever had sent

this e-mail had written information even I didn't know.

I glanced at Alice, who looked nervous, and asked, "Is this…Holy Spring

Staircase a place in the cathedral?"

"Yes…it absolutely does exist," the knight confirmed. She wrung her hands

with nervous energy. "But…it is a hidden place. It's a structure from long before

the cathedral was a hundred-story masterpiece—back when it was only a tiny

three-story church! It was sealed below the great stairs on the first floor, so it

was almost impossible to ever see. The only people who ever even knew about

it were Uncle, me, and…the pontifex, Administrator…"

"Wha…?" I gaped, even more stunned.

Alice stepped forward and clutched my hand. Her fingers were actually

trembling, possibly a malfunction of her electroactive-polymer cylinders.

"Kirito…you don't think…you don't think…she's alive, do you…? That half

goddess…the pontifex…?"

Her voice shook with deep, deep fear.

I put a hand to her delicate shoulder and squeezed. "No…that's not possible.

Administrator is dead. I saw her and Chudelkin get blasted into light and

dissipate. Here…look at this," I said, lifting the printout to show her.

"This is what the first part says: 'Climb the white tower, and ye shall reach

unto yon world.' The white tower is Central Cathedral, and I assume that 'yon

world' is the Underworld. If Administrator was sending this, she wouldn't write

'yon world'—she would write 'my world.'"

"That…is true, I suppose. I can confirm that," Alice said, her face so close to

mine that her golden bangs nearly brushed my cheek. "But then…who would

have written this…?"

"I don't know. There's too little here for me to guess. My suspicion is…that if

we crack the meaning of the message, we'll understand who sent it…"

"Meaning…?"

"Yeah. If you look closer, there are a couple odd things about it."

I motioned for Alice to sit next to me on the bed, then traced the printed

message with my finger.

"It says to climb on the first line…but then the second part doesn't make

sense, does it? It starts with Cloudtop Garden—that's the floor where you and I

first fought. That was really high up there. But next it says Great Kitchen

Armory. I don't know what this kitchen is, but there was an armory way down

at the bottom, on the third floor. And then the next item is the Morning Star

Lookout. That was the floor where we climbed back up the outside wall and

finally got back inside the cathedral. That was practically at the top of the

building. So the order is going back and forth."

"Yes…that's right…Ah, so many memories…I seem to recall that when we

were hanging from a sword on the outside of the tower, you called me an idiot

about eight times."

"Y-you don't have to hold on to details like that, you know," I muttered,

hunching my shoulders.

Alice smiled, though. "It actually meant something to me. That was the first

time in my life I ever truly argued with someone with all of my being."

Her smile was so pristine, so transparent, that I couldn't help but stare. Was it

my imagination, or were those sapphire-lensed eyes actually moist?

It took all my willpower to tear my eyes away from those deep pools. I

resumed my explanation, my throat a bit hoarse.

"And then there's the location of the periods—that doesn't make sense. Why

is there no dot between 'Great Kitchen' and 'Armory,' or 'Holy Spring Staircase'

and 'Great Hall of Ghostly Light'?"

Alice looked back to the sheet, her fine motors whirring. "I don't suppose…

they merely forgot them…"

We inclined our heads at the same angle out of curiosity, but no ideas came

to us.

Eventually, I gave up and took a small device off my wall rack so that I could

summon a helper who was extremely good at cracking codes.

The black half sphere, small enough to fit in my palm, was a very high-quality

network camera called an AV interactive communication probe. I mounted the

probe on my shoulder, powered it on, tested that it had a wireless connection

to my desktop PC, then spoke into it.

"Yui, are you awake?"

Two seconds later, a sleepy-sounding voice came through the probe's

speaker.

"Yesh…Good morning, Papa." Then the camera inside the little dome swiveled

to catch the person sitting next to me. "Good morning, Alice."

"Oh…g-good morning, Yui."

It was Alice's first time seeing the probe, but she'd spoken with Yui several

times in Alfheim. Alice must have figured out that the device on my shoulder

was Yui's real-world body, because she smiled right away.

Yui's camera rotated back and forth a few times, and when she spoke again,

her voice was grave.

"Papa…what am I looking at?"

"T-trust me, it's nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing suspicious here. At all."

"The time is 3:21 AM, and you are alone in your bedroom with Alice. I cannot

identify a scenario in which this would be considered a normal set of

circumstances."

"W-well, we…All right, I'll admit, it's not normal, but it wasn't something I

asked for…," I protested desperately.

Instead, Alice stepped in to explain, trying to hide a gleeful smile. "Yui, it's

really nothing. I received a strange missive—an 'e-mail'—and I asked Kirito what

it could mean."

"If you say so, Alice, then I will record it as such. But, Papa, you shouldn't keep

secrets from Mama."

"Why, of course," I agreed, relieved. Alice held up the sheet of paper so that

Yui could see it, then explained its contents.

Watching them interact gave me a very strange, indescribable feeling.

Yui was a top-down AI, a program made possible by pushing traditional

computing architecture to its limits. And Alice was a bottom-up AI, a model of

the human brain built into a totally new kind of architecture called the

lightcube.

Two artificial intelligences, created from completely opposite approaches,

interacting naturally and enjoyably. It seemed like an impossible miracle…

The two girls exchanged ideas and comments, totally ignoring the fact that I

was getting a little teary-eyed. Eventually, Yui picked up on something.

"Oh…I'm noticing that the spacing of the first and second parts is a bit

different."

"What, really?" I leaned over the paper in Alice's hand to stare at the teenytiny black spots.

Yui was right. There was a comma and a space after the word tower in the

first part. But in the second part, the three instances of periods separating

different items were squished in there, with no space. It was almost like they

weren't periods, but dots or pixels.

Pixels...

"Oh...…Oh!!" I gasped, rising from the bed. "Th-that's it. The cathedral only

goes to a hundred floors…and that's why they stuck two together…which makes

this…"

I felt around my headboard for a pen, popped the cap off, and asked in a

voice high-pitched with nerves, "Alice, what floor was the Cloudtop Garden?"

"…Have you truly forgotten? The very place where you and I first fought?"

"N-no, I didn't forget. It's, uh…"

"The eightieth floor," she replied, sounding a bit peeved.

I wrote the number on a blank part of the paper. "Right, right, of course.

And…the Great Kitchen?"

"Tenth floor."

I wrote each number down in order, filling up the blank space.

"And the lookout was…And then…the Holy Spring Staircase was the first

floor…and the Great Hall…"

When I stopped writing, there were four numbers in a row, separated by

three dots.

It wasn't just a familiar structure. It was a particular kind of written protocol

that people like me were used to seeing just about every day.

Yui recognized it at once, too. "Oh…Papa, that's an IP address!"

"Yes, it's gotta be."

It wasn't an IPv6 address, which nearly everything had switched to using by

2026, but the older IPv4 protocol. It was still possible to use v4, however, so…

In other words, this e-mail was pointing us toward a server somewhere in the

real world.

I got out of bed and sat in the mesh chair at my desk, grabbing the mouse.

When the monitor popped out of sleep mode, I opened the browser and tried

to reach the address via http first, then FTP. Both methods refused access.

"Maybe RTSP…or telnet…?" I muttered.

The next step would be to open up the command prompt, but at my shoulder,

Yui suddenly warned, "Papa! Remember the content of the message again!"

"Huh…?"

Alice held out the paper. When it was within Yui's view, she said, "The 'white

tower' to be climbed would seem to be indicating the address in the second

part."

"Uh-huh."

"And once climbed, it leads to 'yon world.' Which would mean that this

address points to…"

"Oh…! Th-that's it…of course!!" I said, feeling my fingertips going cold and

numb. I spun around. "Alice, this is the way…This is the path that leads to the

Underworld!!" I hissed.

Her eyes were wide with shock. "The path…that leads…In other words, this is

how we can go—I mean, get back. To that world…to my world…," she

whispered. I nodded, sure of my answer.

Alice's actuators buzzed to life as she leaped straight toward me. I caught her

in my arms. There were sobs in my ear, and a wet sensation on her cheek where

she touched me, but that was probably just an illusion.

Her body of metal and silicone wasn't capable of producing such things.

Neither Alice nor I had the patience to wait for a more sensible hour to take

the next step. So I liberally interpreted four AM as "early morning" rather than

"middle of the night" and placed a call to Dr. Rinko's phone.

Fortunately, she was staying at the Roppongi office. At first, she seemed

totally bewildered by what I was telling her, but once I got to the end of my

explanation, she practically shrieked into the phone, "Is this t-true?!"

"It is. I don't think we can trace the source of the message, but the contents

tell me that it has to be real."

"Oh…oh. In that case, we should get to the bottom of this at once," the

scientist said.

I promptly said, "Please let me and Alice be the ones to test it."

"What…?" She let out a breath that sounded like half shock and half

exasperation. "Kirigaya…after what you went through…"

"If I was going to learn my lesson from that, I would never have agreed to

work with Rath in the first place!" I protested.

She exhaled again. "No…I suppose not. And it's that nature that helped you do

what you did and that same nature that will help confront what lies ahead. But

this time…please get your parents' permission."

"Of course, don't worry. But…I do need to confirm something first. If Alice

connects to the Ocean Turtle from over there, will she need to use an STL?"

"No, it won't be necessary. Alice's lightcube package combines the exact

capabilities of your biological brain and the STL together. All she'll need is a

single cable."

"Ah, that's good. In that case…um, hold on a moment." I glanced over at Alice,

who was wringing her hands nervously. "Alice, I know this is asking a lot, but…

do you mind if we bring Asuna along, too?"

One of her eyebrows twitched and rose. Instead of a sigh, there was a quiet

motor buzz.

"…I suppose not. If something unforeseen should happen, there is no harm in

having extra power on our side."

"Th-thanks, that's great…Well, you heard her, Doctor…"

After a few more comments, the call was over. I got in touch with Asuna,

waking her up so I could explain the situation. All I had to do was tell her that

we'd found a route to connect to the Underworld for her to understand what

was going on.

Within a minute or two, we were done talking. I took the probe off my

shoulder and looked into the lens. "I'm sorry, Yui…We still haven't found a way

to take you into the Underworld."

My daughter listened patiently…but a bit sadly, too. "Yes, Papa, I understand.

Please be careful."

"We'll find a way to take you there someday," I promised, placing the probe

on the desk. Next to it was a stack of manuals and textbooks that I'd been

planning to look through later today. Sadly, they would have to wait a little

longer.

I pulled a blank sheet of paper from the printer tray and scribbled on it with

the pen. Alice went over to Suguha's room to get her uniform. We turned our

backs to each other to get dressed, then snuck out of the room.

When we got down to the living room, I left my note on the table. Then I

carefully, quietly slid open the old-fashioned door, and the two of us headed

out into the chilly air of early morning.

To avoid causing too much noise, I pushed my 125cc motorcycle a good

distance away from the house before straddling the seat. Suguha's helmet went

onto Alice's head, and I put my own on before starting the engine; it kicked to

life nicely for having been abandoned for three months.

Then I revved it a little and called out to my tandem rider, "Hold on tight! I'm

gonna gun this thing like a dragon!"

Alice put her hands around my stomach and said, "Who do you think I am?!"

"Ha-ha, of course, Miss Integrity Knight. Then…let's go!!"

The note I left in the living room said, Dad, Mom, Sugu: I've got one little

adventure left. I'll be back right away. Don't worry about me.

The roads were empty before dawn. We headed down Kawagoe Highway,

then Kannana-Dori Avenue, then Route 246 in quick order. When we got to

Rath's Roppongi branch, Asuna had already arrived via taxi.

She started to wave with a big smile, then froze when she noticed that Alice

was riding behind me.

"…Kirito…what exactly does this mean?"

"W-well, uh…To put it briefly, some things happened…but nothing

happened…The end…"

"Define 'some things' and 'nothing.'"

I'd known this was going to happen. I'd known it would, but I'd shown up here

without a plan anyway. There was no innocent way to explain the situation.

"I'll explain everything later, I promise! We'll have plenty of time…when we're

old and sipping tea…," I murmured, parking my bike in the employee lot.

When I turned around, what I feared was already coming to pass.

There was Asuna, hands on her waist. Alice had her arms folded. The air

crackled like lightning between the two of them.

Very, very carefully, I said, "Pardon me…but I thought you two were past

that…You know, at the Human Guardian Army's campsite…"

"It was only a cease-fire, nothing more!"

"And a cease-fire signals an intent for the battle to resume!" the two women

said before glaring at each other again.

I observed the two warriors, their hostility and rivalry blazing—and did the

one thing that I could do in this situation.

I made myself as small as possible, backed away, and tried to evacuate into

the building. But when I submitted my ID card, fingerprint, and retinal scan at

the door's security terminal, it let out a high-pitched beep, drawing their

attention.

"Ah! Hey! Kirito!!"

"You shall not run from us!!"

But I was already rushing into the building. Asuna and I arrived at the STL

room sweating and out of breath, and while Alice had no respiratory system to

speak of, her mechanical body was giving off more heat than usual. Dr. Koujiro

looked at us with alarm.

"I understand that you want to hurry, but you didn't have to sprint here. The

Soul Translators and Underworld aren't going anywhere in the next few

minutes," she said, a bit annoyed.

I flashed her a very snarky smile. "Oh, gosh, we just wanted to get connected

without a moment to waste! After all, whether or not we can successfully dive

will have a huge influence on the future security of the Under-wuaaa!!" Asuna

pinched me hard on the side.

After that, I retreated to the nearby changing room so I could get into the

sterilized robes for diving with the STL—and not just so that I could avoid a

follow-up attack from Alice.

As a matter of fact, what I'd told the scientist was my honest opinion. The

Ocean Turtle was still anchored out at sea in the Izu Islands, and its future was

uncertain, to say the least. At the moment, there was only one strategy for

ensuring its operation and independence.

We had to promote exchange between the artificial fluctlights of the

Underworld and humans from the real world and breed friendly relations. If we

could get a majority of people in the real world to accept the Underworlders as

human beings, countries and corporations would not be able to simply have

their way with the tech.

But…while it was extreme, there was another way as well.

Seizing actual defensive power. Arming the Ocean Turtle with the lightcubebearing unmanned fighter drones that the nation was already developing, so

that it could go independent as its own nation.

For now, that was just a pipe dream. How would the Ocean Turtle get the

UAVs? How would they fund basic functions and be self-sufficient? How many

months—if not years—would it take for Underworlders to transition from flying

their dragons to properly operating supersonic jets? There were just too many

challenges to overcome.

In either case, one absolute requirement for continued existence would be a

high-capacity wireless connection aside from government-owned

communication satellites. Only then could the Underworlders dive into the

brand-new world of The Seed Nexus and allow people of the real world to

understand them. Whether this would be possible depended entirely on the IP

address written down on the paper in my pocket.

I finished changing, left the room, and held the memo out to Dr. Rinko. She

hesitated for a moment, then lifted her hand and took the piece of paper.

"…I'm guessing he has something to do with this," she murmured. I gave her a

little nod.

I didn't know how he knew about the names of the various floors of Central

Cathedral. But there was only one man who could have set up a secret

connection to the Internet from the Ocean Turtle.

Akihiko Kayaba…Heathcliff.

In a sense, my battle couldn't end without a direct confrontation between

him and me. Heathcliff had passed very close by the STL where I slumbered,

then vanished back into the darkness of the network. He would show himself

again, though. He would gather all the fragments born of that floating steel

fortress to one place and bring a conclusion to it all.

I faced away from Dr. Koujiro, who was setting up for the dive, and booted my

smartphone. "Yui, have you figured out anything about that address?"

Her cute little face shook side to side on the screen. "The location of the

server is in Iceland, but I think it's only a relay point. Its defenses are very strong,

and I can't search for any route beyond that."

"I see…Thanks. Were you able to trace the source of the message to Alice?"

"Well…I spotted traces that resembled it on Node 304 of The Seed Nexus, but I

lost the signal there, too," she said, drooping her shoulders.

I rubbed the touch screen with a fingertip. "No, you've done enough. If it's in

the three hundreds, that would be the United States…You don't need to search

any further. Even for you, making direct contact would be dangerous. He's

essentially the same kind of being as you now."

"Well, I'm better!" she protested, puffing out her cheeks.

I smirked and poked her. "At any rate, I'm going now. This time it's not going

to involve all these dangers…I think."

"If anything happens, I'll come to help you at once!"

"And I'm counting on that. So long."

She held up a tiny hand on-screen, and I brushed it with a finger, then turned

off the device's power. Alice and Asuna were just emerging from the women's

changing room at that moment. Fortunately, they seemed to have forged a

second cease-fire; their faces were shining with expectation.

I shared a look with each of them in turn and said, "Remember, two hundred

years have passed. We can't begin to guess what the human and dark realms

look like at this point. That's shorter than the three centuries Administrator

ruled over things, of course, so it probably won't be dramatically different,

but…"

Alice's head bobbed. "At the very least, it seems certain that Central

Cathedral will still be standing. So I think we can assume that the Human

Empire will be the same."

Asuna brushed Alice's arm and grinned. "And we have to go and wake up

Selka first thing."

"That's right!"

We shared a moment of firm resolution—then headed over to the two STLs

and one reclining seat. I lay back against the chilly gel bed. Dr. Rinko operated

the control that lowered the large headblock down over the top of my head.

"All right…here we go," she said.

The three of us replied in unison. "Right!"

The enormous machine began to hum. My fluctlight—the light quantum

network that constituted my very consciousness—split off from my flesh,

removing me from my bodily senses and gravity.

My mind was translated into electronic signals and thrown into a vast

network without boundaries.

I flew at ultra-high speed down a high-capacity optical line, soaring toward

another familiar world I considered home.

Into a new adventure.

Into the next story.

First, I saw a light.

A tiny little speck of white that stretched and grew into rainbow gradient,

until it covered my entire vision—and beyond.

Within it a space of pure dark appeared.

I dived straight through the tunnel of light toward the darkness.

But it was not, in fact, total darkness.

Black was only the background, with a frightening number of colored dots

that quietly flickered against it.

They were stars. A night sky...

But not quite. No, because…

"…Aaaaah!!"

I screamed when I looked down at my feet.

Because there was no ground beneath them.

I flailed and swung my legs, but the bottoms of my boots touched nothing.

The boundless starry sky continued in every direction—sides, top, bottom.

Stars, stars, stars.

"Eeeeek!!"

"Wh…what is this?!" said other voices to my sides.

Other hands grabbed my outstretched ones. On my right floated Asuna,

dressed in the clothing of the goddess Stacia: pearl-white half armor and skirt

and a beautiful rapier.

On my left, Alice was in her golden breastplate and long white skirt, with a

white whip and a golden-yellow longsword at her sides.

Both of them were in a panic, gazing wide-eyed at the endless sky of stars

before us.

But in truth…this was not even a sky.

"…Outer space…?" I mumbled, hardly daring to say it.

Suddenly, I was aware of a ferocious chill. Alice and Asuna both sneezed

spectacularly. The temperature was so low here that I could easily feel the rapid

decline of my life value by the moment.

The fact that I could hear their voices meant that we weren't in the actual

vacuum of space, but it must have been very close. And we were simply floating

there, without protection.

I focused hard, generating a defensive wall of light elements in a sphere large

enough to surround all three of us. Once the thin shining layer was enveloping

us, that piercing chill finally began to subside.

Once the immediate danger was behind us, I looked around at the stunning

sight before me again. A tight belt of stars ran from the upper right of my field

of view to the lower left. It was like the Milky Way—but no matter how I tried

to connect the brightest stars, I couldn't find a single familiar constellation.

This was the Underworld.

But in that case, where was the land…and where was the sky over it?

I felt a terrible chill steal over me and shivered.

It couldn't have…vanished, could it?

After two hundred years, had the very earth that made up the human realm

and the Dark Territory simply run out of its own life? Had the tens of thousands

of people who lived on it all ceased to exist when it happened…?

"No way…It can't be…," I murmured in a trembling voice.

Suddenly, Alice squeezed my hand so hard it creaked. "Kirito…look there."

I turned to my left. The golden knight had turned herself around to look

behind us. Her arm was outstretched, gesturing toward a single point.

Breathlessly and oh so slowly, I turned to see.

There was a star.

Not a true stellar star, like those twinkling in the great distance—but a planet,

vast and close, taking up a large part of our view.

The upper half of the sphere was sunk into thick darkness. But around the

middle, the black transitioned to navy, then to ultramarine and azure. And on

the lower half of the sphere, right at its lip, the planet shone bright blue.

The blue was steadily growing brighter and brighter. A white orb bulged from

the center of the curve, spraying rays of light in a straight line.

It was dawn.

The sun—Solus—hiding on the far side of the planet was coming into view.

I shielded my eyes from its brilliance and examined the surface of the planet

again. The parts of the curve that had been deep navy blue before were

transitioning into brighter hues already.

Through scraps and trails of white cloud, I could see the outline of a

continent.

It was shaped like an inverted triangle, wider across than it was from top to

bottom.

At the upper right of the continent was a concentrated mass of lights. At the

top left, an even larger spread of light.

This was a clear sign of civilization. And upon further examination, there were

several glowing lines extending from those two central sources, grids stretching

farther downward.

From the locations of the cities on the continent, I instantly knew exactly

what I was looking at.

The city on the right was Obsidia, capital of the dark world.

The city on the left was Centoria, capital of the human realm.

That continent—the planet it was on—was the Underworld where I'd lived

and fought for so long.

I tore my eyes from the planet and looked over at Alice. The only thing I saw

in her face was deep shock and profound awe.

Then her eyes bulged. She let go of my hand and rummaged in the small

pouch attached to her sword belt, then drew out two eggs small enough to fit in

the palm of her hand.

One was faint green, while the other shone blue. The light they gave off

pulsed stronger and weaker in two-second cycles. Like breathing. Like a

heartbeat.

Alice clutched the two eggs to her chest and closed her eyes. Tears ran

silently down her cheeks and fell free, floating as little droplets.

I could feel tears coming to my own eyes. I looked over to the person still

holding my right hand and saw that Asuna's eyes were damp, too.

As the two of us watched, Alice took one step forward across the sea of stars.

She held the two eggs in her left hand and reached toward the vast planet with

her right.

Her eyes the same color as the dawning star and sparkling with unlimited

brilliance, the golden Integrity Knight called out in a voice pure and crisp and

regal, "Hear me, land!! Underworld where I was born and land that I love!! Is

my voice reaching you?!"

The stars in the endless universe trembled, and the blue planet below briefly

shone brighter, as though taking a breath.

I closed my eyes and listened well.

I listened to the words that ushered in a new era, carving them into my

memory for all eternity.

"I have returned to you! ...I am here!!"