Virtual Reality||Sword Art Online

|Labyrinth of Blood|pt. 2

Time had stopped. Literally. Weird black and purple diamonds floated around her, creating a wall engulfing her and Nelson. It was like Heidi was in a dream. She stopped, the clear tears still pooling in her eyes, and looked around, wondering if she had gone crazy, or had died. Everybody was frozen in motion, weapons in the air, hitting the giant, who was as still as stone. Max's fighting face was on, as she blocked an attack from a monster, and Remi looked terrified as she looked towards Heidi's an Nelson's way, her hand outstretched. Thomas was holding her back, his face in a grimace, his short, golden blonde hair sweaty. It was so strange.

"What.. The hell." She muttered, her voice echoing around the room, adding to the eerie feeling. After that it was silent again. But then, she moved her gaze to Nelson- the Giant's club hadn't hit him yet, and he was staring up at it, his sword halfway there to block. Heidi knew he wouldn't make it in time.... Time. If.. Time was frozen, couldn't she just, move him out of the way? The thought dawned on her, as if a light bulb had went off inside of her head. She bit her lip, playing with her long, blue hair. What would happen if she did? What even was this? Was it a glitch? If it was, there was a chance of corrupting the whole system if she tampered with it.

But there Nelson was, the frightened glint just starting to shine in his eyes, about to be hit and die in an instant. She just couldn't leave him like that, without doing something.

Taking two trembling steps forward, her hands shaking, Heidi grabbed Nelson under the armpits and tugged with all her might, dragging him a few feet out of the way. He should be safe now, at that distance.

As soon as she let go of Nelson's torso, a large flash appeared before her eyes, blinding her with white light. When she blinked her eyes open again, the rush of battle overwhelmed her, the yells and clashing taking over once more. An ear-splitting screech of stone hitting stone sounded in front of her, as the Giant's club scraped against the floor, missing it's target, which was, of course, Nelson. A choke left Heidi's throat- he was safe. Whatever that glitch was, he was safe. She had never felt so relieved.

"What the..." Nelson muttered, looking up, and then at Heidi, as he realized he was still alive. "What the hell did you do? How am I still alive?!" He gulped, staring at her, with his deep brown eyes.

"Not enough time to explain, just keep fighting, once this is all over, I'll explain!" Heidi yelled back, tears overflowing. Nelson was alright. He was fine.

"Everybody, keep fighting! Backup is here!" Kibaou's voice sounded from across the room- indeed, at the door was everybody's saviour; the raiding party had arrived. It was a goddamn miracle.

"We still have two bars to go through, everybody! Don't take any chances, we can beat this guy with numbers!" Cried the raiding party leader, sending his troops in pairs of two to join each formation.

Eight people joined Heidi's side for fighting the giant, making fending off the mini-monsters easier, and a better block system was quickly formed, for more efficient switching. Soon, everybody fell back into the rhythm of fighting, though every once in a while, a player would drop, making a wrong move. But people didn't have time to be fazed by it; right now, it was fight, or die.

Slowly, bit by bit, the monster's health went down, and by about two hours after the raiding party, it was down to it's final half bar.

"Come on Remi, Heidi, we can do this!" Yelled Max, her curly electric blue hair seeming to crackle. "We're almost done!"

"Hey, what about us?!" Eren protested, huffing as he cut off a monster's head. "We deserve encouragement too!"

"You're doing very well boys!" Remi called out, stopping the babble of argument that was surely going to arise between the two.