".........."
Silence fell again. But unlike before, the nature of it was different.
The people who had made it up to the Third Floor were, by definition, elites. They were the ones fighting monsters on the front lines, honing their senses, and taking it upon themselves to clear Aincrad.
And among those front-line players, the leaders of the two biggest guilds naturally weren't lacking in skill compared to anyone else.
And yet those very people had just been toyed with by a single self-proclaimed solo player.
Anyone with half a brain could tell the wound I'd deliberately made by bringing my sword down at the end had been intentional. Of course it had. I'd done it to rub it in their faces. Nothing more, nothing less.
The method might have been extreme, but it was one of the few ways I could both vent Asuna's anger and steer the situation where I wanted it to go.
The conditions for pulling it off had been pretty tight, so just succeeding at all was satisfying enough.
If anyone could read my thoughts right now, they'd probably call me absurdly malicious. I'd look like nothing but a troublemaker stirring up conflict and splitting the whole for the sake of a smaller cause.
Even so, I didn't regret it. I believed this was the right move. It wasn't exactly news that the way I thought was different from normal people. I'd crushed their spirit, so they probably wouldn't be barking for a while.
Thinking that, I kept an artificial smile on my face and looked at the guys sitting there in a daze before speaking.
Heh "Wow, maybe I was too full of myself. You two are better than I expected. Pretty impressive, really. You didn't actually think I'd lose, did you?"
"W-what the hell are you saying...? What the hell are you..."
".........."
"If a useless guild member like me joined, I'd only drag you down, so I won't be joining now or ever. Good for you. That way, your forces won't end up concentrated the way you 'wanted.'"
I didn't need to hear a reply. I turned and stepped down from the platform, and Kazuha came over like always and grabbed both my hands at once.
"Kazuma, how's your hand? Is your HP okay?"
"I'm fine, I'm fine. One healing potion and it's solved. Actually, since we're inside a safe zone, it'll recover on its own with time anyway."
I waved her off lightly, refusing treatment, and Kirito and Asuna came over too. As for Asuna, her expression looked especially bad.
"Um... Kazuma, because of me..."
"I told you, Asuna. We may only be temporary party members, but knowing how to use the cards in your hand properly is a skill too. All I did today was show you an example of that."
"But then their hostility is all going to turn toward you...!"
I could see her fists trembling. And yes, just like Asuna said, my actions had effectively shut the door on me ever joining a guild. More accurately, I'd shut it myself.
"I'd already had friction with that side since the First Floor, and since things were already bad, it didn't matter if they got worse. I was the right person to do it. I just used the right person in the right place. That's all this was."
I glanced toward Egil's party and gave a slight bow of my head. Egil answered with a bitter smile and a small nod. After confirming that, I patted Asuna on the shoulder twice and started walking toward the entrance to Zumft.
**
After leaving Zumft and following the road until we entered the forest, nobody said a word. Heavy silence kept tearing through the space between us.
"Come on... I keep telling you I'm fine, and you're still like this. Honestly, every time I see this side of you all, I think none of you are cut out to be solo players."
I scratched my head for a moment, then spoke with an awkward smile.
"If it really bothers you that much, then just say you all owe me one. Actually, I only need to collect from Asuna."
"H-huh?"
"Then it's settled, right? End of discussion! ...And with that, you can come out now, Kizmel."
I forced the conversation to a close and played my trump card for changing the subject. When I glanced to the side, I saw a faint shimmer in the air, and then the dark elf appeared, sweeping her long cloak back dramatically.
"...Truly, Kazuma, the more I see of you, the more you surprise me. So in the end, I was discovered."
That was what she said, but since she obviously already knew that herself, the only thing left on her face was a playful smile.
The others, apparently having failed to notice her presence at all, just stared blankly, unable to process what they were seeing.
"I mean, if you suddenly hear the voice of someone who isn't there right beside you, unless it's a ghost, the logical assumption is that they're hiding somehow, right?"
"A very logical conclusion... though I must admit, that one got me."
"Though to be fair, I only noticed from the moment you spoke to me. Since when were you following us?"
Of course, that was a lie. The timing had just worked out well. She'd arrived not long after we all gathered at the meeting hall.
Even so, what she'd done had been bold. Even if dark elves had [Stealth Sorcery], sneaking into a crowd of human warriors whose intentions weren't clearly friendly, at least from Kizmel's point of view, really drove home that not just anyone could be a knight.
"Since the middle of your briefing at the assembly hall."
"B-but was it really okay to come this deep into a human town? What were you going to do if you got caught...?"
Asuna, finally recovering enough to speak, asked Kizmel that, and Kizmel proudly adjusted her cloak as she answered.
"The sorcery woven into this [Cloak of Phantasmal Night] is strongest at dusk and dawn, when sunlight and moonlight trade places. A slight touch is not enough to break it."
"N-no... that wasn't really the point..."
Kirito let out a long sigh, clearly baffled, and Kizmel briefly looked a little embarrassed—or maybe that was just my imagination—before returning to a serious expression.
"Of course, I know that. If I must answer, then yes, one reason would be my mission."
"Mission?"
"Mm. My current orders from the commander are to watch over and escort you, are they not? You left camp this morning and did not return for quite some time, so I merely came to check on your situation."
"Well, we definitely didn't have an ordinary day."
I didn't deny it, and the other three all gave bitter smiles in agreement. Rare weapons, a Unique Skill, even a hidden quest. It had been such a nonstop festival of events that it was enough to make your head spin.
Kizmel tilted her head for a moment at the strange mood hanging over us, then quickly let it go as something already past.
"So then... what now? Since Kizmel is here too, how about we just head back to camp like this?"
"I don't mind. That's why we went to Zumft to resupply in the first place. And the strategy meeting is over now."
Unlike Kirito's immediate answer, Asuna lowered her eyes to the ground and hesitated, tapping the toe of her boot against a purple mushroom. Kazuha also fidgeted with her index fingers and didn't speak right away.
"...You know, what if we just keep using the camp as our base until the boss fight?"
"Mm... I was thinking the same thing."
The answer they gave was both exactly what I expected and a little surprising. As two of the very few female players in the game, they'd probably gotten pretty fed up with the aggressive atmosphere of a meeting like today's.
That said... the so-called "I don't want to be around players" syndrome—obviously a made-up term, but still—was troublesome if you thought about human nature in general. But considering what had happened today, maybe it didn't really matter for a while.
"I see... If that's what you want, then Kizmel, could you let us stay in the tents for about a week?"
"I would welcome it. A tent filled with warmth is far better than a lonely one. If anything, I should be the one asking."
"Seriously, who would've thought I'd start missing that tent?"
"Heh heh heh Don't be coy. I would be glad if you thought of it as your own home. Let us stay together until each of us has fulfilled our duty."
As an aside, that line must have been pretty embarrassing, because both the one who said it and the ones who heard it ended up blushing awkwardly.
**
Getting back to the dark elf camp was even easier than before. The reason, of course, was Asuna's rapier, which had outstanding performance.
Kazuha had sulked for a bit because she still couldn't equip the unique curved sword due to the level restriction, but she pulled herself together quickly and, maybe because she was determined to level up, her hunting speed noticeably increased.
Because of that, rather than simply "passing through the forest," we practically swept through it like we were trying to clear the whole field the way we had on the Second Floor, making enough noise to reach the marker near the entrance.
That was when I noticed Kirito walking along with one hand on his chin, lost in thought.
"...Hey, Kirito. What're you thinking about?"
"Huh?! Ah... yeah. Just a few things..."
"And I am very interested in the details of those 'few things,' you know~"
Dragging out my words like that, I subtly slowed down and drifted a little away from the girls. Keeping enough distance that they wouldn't hear us muttering, I spoke.
"...Kizmel. Whether she's really some advanced AI, or maybe a GM is controlling her..."
"Ahh... so that's what you meant? Yeah, I was surprised she followed us all the way to the plaza too. Honestly, at this point, even if the performance is still limited, she feels advanced enough that I could almost believe she's capable of 'deep learning.'"
"So you think that too..."
"...If I had to say, I'd still put the odds higher on the former. The image I have of Kayaba isn't really that of a zookeeper looking down at the animals while toying with them. He feels more like the type to sit back and observe without interfering, like he's watching TV."
"...I want to think that too, but..."
"Kirito. Kazuma."
At the sound of our names, we looked up and found black and hazel eyes shining as they stared straight at us.
"What have you two been whispering about this whole time?"
"N-no, it's nothing. We just had something we wanted to discuss because it came to mind..."
"Hm...? If you have concerns, I think it would be good to talk about them."
Then Kizmel followed up, and Asuna, getting even more fired up, added on.
"Yeah, exactly. I've started noticing lately that the two of you whisper together sometimes, right? Is it some kind of information? If it's not that sensitive, can't you tell us?"
"W-well, it's not... not sensitive exactly..."
"It really wasn't anything important."
It was still a pretty technical subject, and more importantly, not the kind of thing we could talk about in front of Kizmel, so I took a slight step back. But for some reason Kazuha stepped in too, looking at us like she wasn't going to let us escape.
"We were just thinking how strong and dependable all three of you are~"
Hey, Kirito. Isn't that phrasing kind of weird? Did your logic circuits short out because there are girls in front of you?
Completely unaware of the dead-cold look I was giving him, Kirito faced Asuna, who raised one eyebrow like she had no idea what he was talking about.
"How is that even something you'd need to think about?"
"N-no, I mean, um, how do I put it, like... if you were choosing a... a bride, which one would be better, something like that..."
"Oh my."
"You idiot...!"
Thunk!!!
With reflexes so fast even I was surprised, I slammed my fist into Kirito's head.
"Ugh..."
I stared coldly at Kirito as he went down like he'd been hit with [Stun]. Once the words were out of his mouth, there was no avoiding the well-deserved backlash.
"Are you an idiot?!"
I gently closed my eyes and searched for inner peace, letting it all wash over me as if I were sitting in meditation. Mm. Excellent mindset.
"...That just looks like reality avoidance to me, Kazuma."
"No, you heard what we were talking about. Why are you agreeing with them?"
I protested to Elia in disbelief, but maybe she was just teasing me, because all I got in return was a soft laugh and no answer. For now, putting out the immediate fire was the safest move for my future.
As I steadied myself with that thought, Kizmel, for some reason still wearing a serious expression, delivered another blow.
"My apologies, Kazuma. For that, you would need Her Majesty the Queen's permission."
"Please stop saying things like that. You're going to destroy your whole character identity. And that wasn't even the topic to begin with, so you two calm down too. Kirito's brain just stopped functioning properly because he was surrounded by girls."
"Wha—! W-we weren't surrounding him!"
"Ugh... I wasn't."
"What, so that wasn't it? How unfortunate."
Maybe because of my usual behavior, they accepted my explanation surprisingly quickly. One person—well, one NPC—had made a dangerous remark, but... I'd let it slide. It might be a flag, so just keeping an eye on it would do.
"Wouldn't this count as a kind of karma too, Kazuma?"
"You be quiet too... It's been a while since that idiot Kirito gave me a headache this bad..."
Beyond the drifting night mist, a fluttering triangular banner told us we'd reached the dark elf camp. Dragging Kirito along by the back of his neck, I finally came to the end of our short but exhausting walk through the woods.
**
In the distant primordial age,
the land had been divided among the [Kingdom of Kares O], founded by the forest elf race, the [Kingdom of Ruisula], home of the dark elf race, the human [Nine-United Kingdom], the dwarves' underground kingdom, and various smaller nations inhabited by other races. They fought now and then, but for the most part, a peaceful age had continued for a long time.
But at some point, triggered by [something], a cataclysm struck, and one hundred major regions of the world were sliced away in disc-shaped chunks and drawn up into the sky.
The smallest of those discs was three kilometers across, the largest reached ten kilometers, and they were stacked in a cone shape to create a massive floating castle of one hundred layers.
Because of that upheaval, the magical power that had sustained the old civilization vanished, and all nine human kingdoms died out. Most cities became self-governing cities, exchange between floors disappeared, and then vast ages passed once more.
Even now, the only races that still preserve legends connected to the past [Sundering of the Land] are the two elf races, whose royal lines remain intact to this day.
"That's about the rough history of Aincrad, I guess. As expected—or maybe not—it doesn't really seem connected to the main quest or anything that important."
Inside the tent, Kirito and I sat facing each other, comparing and piecing together all the information we'd uncovered so far. As for Kazuha, Asuna, and Kizmel, they'd gone to bathe.
Remembering the excited look on Asuna's face as she grabbed Kazuha and Kizmel by the arms and ran off to wash away the day's fatigue, I let out a small snort of laughter.
In the end, all we'd really learned was that aside from some slight additions, there wasn't much difference from SAO's original early setting. Once it became clear we weren't making any more progress, we both shook our heads and flopped down, lying in opposite directions.
"Of course, in reality Kayaba would've cut things apart and assembled the floating castle himself, but then in this world, what is supposed to have created it...?"
"Yeah. If we really had to guess, it'd have to be some kind of god. Or maybe, like in some novel, cosmic horror entities got involved."
"...Come to think of it, the presence of gods here feels really faint, doesn't it? Even though there are plenty of myths serving as motifs."
"Well, looking at the history and the elves and all that, it still feels like they borrowed the basic framework from the Middle Ages and the race concepts from Norse mythology, doesn't it?"
"Ugh, sometimes you really do know way too much useless stuff..."
"Says the guy who has game knowledge memorized like an encyclopedia, which is basically the king of useless knowledge."
"You really never let a single comment go, do you..."
I listened to Kirito sigh and admit defeat while staring blankly up at the cloth ceiling, my idle mind still turning over one thought after another.
At this point, it wasn't just the main quest anymore. I had to clear the linked questline too—and damn it all, there were still eleven more of those gigantic quests left—so I had no idea where to even begin.
What was the key, exactly...?
With that question weighing on me, I shook my head to organize my thoughts for a moment, then silently stepped outside the tent. Evening was already nearing night. The twilight had deepened, and a dark curtain spread across the sky as if to make the world more comforting.
And decorating that curtain were countless jewels, glittering here and there like a display of the universe's mysteries. Unlike the real world, this virtual otherworld had no pollution at all, and under a cloudless sky every single star shone through in perfect clarity.
At some point, as I stood there staring in a daze, I instinctively began tracing constellations in line with the zodiac signs I was thinking of... and then I realized one thing and froze in shock.
"...Well, I guess if this were a real other world, it wouldn't even have the same constellations to begin with..."
All twelve zodiac constellations were gathered together in one place.
And Taurus had vanished.
From a real-world perspective, it sounded like nonsense. But with my enhanced vision, using Polaris as the central point of a dome and seeing the stars arranged in a ring around it, sketching out constellations I barely even remembered learning, that nonsense was impossible to deny.
And as if it had been waiting for me to discover that, a ding sounded, and something changed in the upper right corner of my vision.
*********************************
Quest [UL. HE.]
Conditions:
Possess the quest [Albricion's Request].
Confirm the zodiac constellations.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Complete: "First, defeat the [Bull with the Stars at Its Back]."
Reward: EXP 3000
*********************************
Right after that, I heard the level-up sound ring in my ears twice in a row, and a hollow laugh escaped me.
"...Hah."
In this death game, SAO, the best EXP efficiency only comes from hunting in zones appropriate to your level, whether you're low-level or high-level. In other words, if a high-level player wipes out monsters in a low-level hunting ground, the bigger the level gap, the worse the EXP gets—sometimes dropping to single digits.
Right now, even if only by a single level, I was the highest-level player in SAO. And I'd already noticed after clearing that quest before the strategy meeting that my EXP efficiency had started to drop. In other words, I was nearing the level cap for the Third Floor.
So the first thing that shocked me was that this quest had given enough EXP to raise me two levels at once. And from that, there were about three things I could conclude.
There were still eleven more quests like this left.
The difficulty of those quests was, generally speaking, around this level.
And I had to do quests of that difficulty alone.
"...I've always wondered why gamers are so consistent about cursing out developers, but I think I finally understand now."
"It's insane... I can't think of any other word for it."
It was a harsh way to put it, but Elia was right. The difficulty was completely deranged. In a death game like this, being told to clear brutally hard content alone, with no idea what might jump out at you next, was basically the same as being told to live as close to death as possible.
Just as I was making that assessment, another quest window appeared in my vision, interrupting my thoughts.
*********************************
Quest Start.
Second, [The Twins Who Tried to Open the Starry Sky]
Restriction: Level 25 or lower
*********************************
"...And there goes the option of just leaving it alone."
"Well, if you simply abandon the quest, that would still be possible."
Elia sounded exasperated by the creator's cruelty, but by now I was almost calm.
There was no point getting angry at a creator who wasn't even here. It was just a restriction. It wasn't like I'd die if I didn't do it.
This was simply an opportunity. A chance to walk a path different from everyone else's—one far too valuable for a solo player to just throw away.
So I calmed myself. If I could do it, I would. I'd wait for the right opening, search for a method, and prepare as thoroughly as possible.
There is no such thing as something without a reason in this world.
That truth applies anywhere, whether in everyday life or in a game. No teacher gives a student a problem with no solution. And no developer makes a quest in a "game" that cannot be cleared. Especially not if that developer is Akihiko Kayaba.
"In that sense, it really does fit Kirito's creed perfectly."
In this game, the only path to survival is endless self-enhancement.
That was what this quest was. A system designed to let someone push their own growth to the extreme. Put simply, a training program.
"At least the hopeful part is that it's incredibly lucky I have a Unique Skill."
"That really is fortunate. If you were an ordinary player, this would basically be a quest designed to make you give up..."
"Hm? Kazuma, why are you out here?"
"Are you feeling sick or something?"
"Hmm... I would be pleased if you had come out to greet us."
The girls' voices came at me one after another, and I shoved my thoughts into a corner of my mind and quickly pulled myself together.
"Haha, I just came out for some air because I had something to think about, but I guess it turned into greeting you. All done washing up?"
"Yeah. You and Kirito should go too. It feels a lot like a real hot spring."
"All right, then I guess I'll go too."
Putting on a natural smile as camouflage, I dragged Kirito out of the tent, and after enjoying the hot spring bath, we brought that day to an end.
**
Sunday, December 18.
Three days had passed since the first strategy meeting for the Third Floor was held in the residential district of Zumft. Just as planned, we used the dark elf camp as our base and pushed our levels as far as we could.
As a result, Kirito reached 16, Kazuha and Asuna both rose to 15, and Kizmel also leveled up to 16. And with those level gains as our foundation, we began pushing through the Third Floor campaign quest.
Chapter 1, [Secret of the Jade Key], Chapter 2, [Subjugation of the Venomous Spider], Chapter 3, [Farewell Flower]... It was fortunate that we were able to break through smoothly all the way to Chapter 5, [The Missing Soldier], with no real trouble, probably because the quests weren't much different from the beta version.
The final objective of Chapter 5 had been to discover the forest elves' large camp, but the quest paused there for the time being.
Which made sense. Today was the day the entire clearing group gathered to subjugate the field boss.
The subjugation itself was a success. There were no casualties. Kirito got the LA again this time too, and I got to see how pleased he was.
He'd probably tried to hold it in because he felt bad showing it in front of everyone, but the twitching at the corners of his mouth gave him away, and the result was a pretty ridiculous expression. Unfortunate, really.
And maybe it was because everyone was gathered here like this, but since I hadn't gone back down to the residential district, I could now vaguely feel that the current clearing group was slowly changing.
I'd sensed it before too, but now it was clearer than ever: the two factions were splitting apart and engaging in a cold war. It felt like a smoldering fuse had entered the stage right before the bomb finally exploded.
I need more, god damn this is a masterpiece