War of Underworld

Alice Synthesis Thirty

October 21, 380 HEC, four months after the ACTF defeated the Pontifex

To the far north of the Underworld is a small, quiet village called Rulid. However, the true destination is a small cabin outside the village, next to a tree large and hollow enough to fight a sleeping white dragon. Outside of the cabin is a young girl of nineteen years with long golden hair spilling out of her white hood pulling vegetables out of the ground and collecting them. She stands up and exhales as she looks over her hard work.

“Sister!” She turns around ad with her one uncovered eye she finds a younger girl racing to the garden. The newcomer has orange hair and wears a nun’s dress, but it doesn’t hamper the girl’s speed in the slightest. “Good morning, sister!”

“Selka.” Selka runs into her sister and hugs her big sister, which the elder hesitates but eventually returns. “Welcome, Selka. What brings you here today?”

“Since it’s so nice out, I wanted to go to the eastern hill. And Kirito can come too, right, Alice?” The pair stare at the house, where within, a young man sits alone in a mobile chair, alive in body but dead in mind.

“It’s such a lovely day. It’d be a shame for him to spend it inside. Shall we go, Kirito?”

Alice sets the black scarf around Kirito’s neck and nods to herself. “All right. Let’s get going.” Alice pulls the chair back, but she doesn’t get far before Kirito wordlessly reaches out towards the swords hanging on the wall. She had forgotten all about his desire to have two of the blades with him at all times. “I’m sorry. I’ll get them right away.”

She walks over and picks up Kirito’s black sword, the Night-Sky Blade, and picks up the ice-blue one that belonged to his and her past self’s friend, the Blue Rose Sword. She hands them to Kirito, in his arms and smiles. “Hold on tight so you don’t drop them, all right?”

Eventually, they join Selka and begin the trek to the eastern mountains. Alice has long enjoyed the peacefulness of her birthplace, having no time to do so when she returned with the ACTF to deal with Clamps and magical beasts. The fall colors of the forest are especially beautiful compared to the early summer’s green.

Alice looks down at Kirito. “Do you think he’ll be cold?”

Selka looks back. “Really. You’re such a worrywart. You’ve piled enough clothes on him to make him sweat. Right, Kirito?” The boy doesn’t answer, and Selka turns away, although Alice hears her talking to herself. Meanwhile, they make it out the woods, coming to a giant blue lake below the road. Birds float and fly off the pristine surface, and Alice can only say one thing about it.

“It’s beautiful. Far more beautiful than any painting on the Cathedral’s walls. It’s the world you and Jaymes saved, Kirito.” Alice takes a moment to think back on it all. The defeat of the Pontifex, Kirito’s all, the appearance of the Cathedral Cedar, the rise of the ACTF, her union with Jaymes, Eydis Synthesis Ten, Medina Orthinanos, Ronie Arabel, Tiese Shtolienen, and Sortiliena Serlut, their travels and trials across the four kingdoms, and their final victory against Administrator and her envoy Hersyrian. Afterward, Jaymes asked her to take care of Kirito, leading her back home. Though she was denied by her father to stay in the village proper as she is, to him, unabsolved of the crime that got her taken away, Alice found comfort in helping the village from the outside whenever she could.

“Sister?”

“It’s okay. Shall we head back?”

“Okay?”

Alice leads the way back, but she can hear her sister’s slow footsteps, a sign that something troubles her. She fully stops and addresses it. “What is it, Selka? Is something troubling you?”