27 February 2022
Katalysis, 43rd Floor
The few players looking up to watch a familiar above the city weren't running in panic.....yet.
True enough, familiars were as rare as they could get. It's not everyday that you get to see an instance of a dragon soaring through the air.
In the case of these orange players however, it might very well be their last.
Grace's feathered dragon was taking us to a building near the Gladiorium. I kept my eye on the entrance of the city, hoping that something would happen there soon.
It would take at least 5 minutes for that to happen, if they didn't get lost in the labyrinth first.
We landed on top of a building that was tall enough to show the entirety of the Gladiorium. I slid off the dragon's back, which it didn't seem to mind, though I swore I could hear it growl a little.
"I'll start the air support in 5 minutes," Grace affirmed.
"Our main targets are the Council," I reminded her as I fiddled quickly with my system menu. My bow behind my back was replaced with my new double-bladed spear, as I felt a little surprised by its weight, and how differently it weighed compared to Binarium Edge.
"Covering fire over the whole city's the only thing I can do," Grace stroked the neck of her dragon gently. "I'm afraid the collateral damage is unavoidable."
"Mmm, can is can, I guess," I pulled on my hood over my head.
Grace tilted her head in confusion. "I'm sorry, what did you just say?"
"Oh, just a slip of my tongue," I waved my last words off in a hurry. "Just try to watch where you're firing, is all I'm saying."
"You should look out for where you're standing," Grace ruffled the feathers of her dragon, and it got up at her cue, flying off from the roof.
Maybe her air strikes could be avoided by taking shelter. I didn't think that dragon fire would have any significant effect on buildings made out of stuff from a canyon.
But I guess there was only one way to find out.
I first vaulted over the roof of the building I was on, trying to get down to the ground. Without the Climbing skill, I could only try to claw at the outer wall of the building as I helplessly slid down, hoping to not take any fall damage.
Maybe I should seriously consider having the Climbing skill, like Krieg did. Thankfully, the random grooves scattered across the wall made the clawing easier.
Landing in a not-so-great manner in a pretty narrow alley, I slid to the wall right away, noticing the throngs of players strolling on the street that the alley led out of.
If there was any way to get to the Gladiorium on foot with absolutely no one spotting me, I would have gladly used it. Having Grace drop me into the central structure of the city directly deprives me of any surprise factors I could use against the Council.
Only the well-lit streets would eventually lead to the centre of the city if you followed it long enough in the right direction. The dark alleys only served as connectors to the streets themselves.
There wasn't much of a choice. I made doubly sure that my hood was over my head before bolting out of the alley and into the bustling scene.
It was clear that the panic hadn't sink in yet. To my surprise, a flying dragon landing in Katalysis wasn't able to stir as much shock in the players here as I expected, probably because there wasn't enough players to spot it from below. I won't be complaining that it worked to my favour, though.
Barely a minute into my swerving among the crowd, the chaos started.
No, it was more like it exploded right off the bat, as soon as that word rang through the street.
"We've been breached! The KoB's here!"
It took just that holler from that random guy to send everyone around me rushing in shock. Shouts and screams flew across the street, as they pulled out their weapons, despite the sheer confusion sweeping through them.
This.....was exactly what I wanted. A cover for me to blend into while on my way to the Gladiorium. An almost perfect way to sneak into the real enemy territory.
A message icon popped into my vision, almost stopping me from moving, but I decided to ignore it until I reached the end of the street. Being in the midst of players scrambling desperately to prepare for battle wasn't a great time to check on messages anyways.
Touching down on the open space surrounding the Gladiorium, I touched the message icon as I continued to run to the arena's entrance. The message window opened and as it shook a little violently due to my running, the message from its sender, Misuko, only consisted of a single sentence:
"We're in."
It was all I needed to see. The guys from Horizon's Edge must have followed the KoB through the city's entrance. The invasion was a success.
As soon as I set my eyes in front of me again, I was already in a dilemma. I was about to crash into a player I'd recognised as one of those Council members.
Pulling out my spear instinctively, I charged at him without warning. There was never any time to waste during these circumstances. I had to silence him quick.
The Council member reacted as fast as me, pulling out his sword to make its blade meet mine.
For some reason, seeing the sparks fly again got me excited. My battle senses were tingling with joy.
My opponent seemed to be caught up in my surprise attack, pulling back his sword to land another strike at me. In a bid to answer to that, I rotated my spear like a windmill, bringing the backward-facing blade of my spear forward in an under-handed swinging trajectory.
I was trying to attempt a parry, as my spear's apparently blue-coloured blade met the downward-swinging sword from above.
CHING.......!!!
It was as if the spear had bounced the sword's blade off. The Council member, clearly not expecting the surprising amount of force that my spear had against his weapon, flinched.
It was the worst timing for him to flinch, and the perfect timing for me to have my turn for a strike at him.
The blades of my spear glowed a dark blue ( I don't know how that kind of glow works, but it works), and initiated a full-on and direct assault of the 8-hit Double-bladed Spear skill, Storm Vector, onto my unfortunate opponent.
The first 4 hits saw the spear blade running through the Council member's body, each hit a little faster than the previous one as it felt easier and easier to pull out and stab the blade into my target.
Pulling out the blade for the fourth time, I swung around, allowing the blade on the other end of my spear to have its turn at the target, this time with the blade swinging a deep cut across the chest. Normally that action would have taken around a second, but that felt like half of it.
Or maybe, it really was half a second. 3 more swings followed just as fast, completing Storm Vector of its entirety.
It was my first time seeing a high-level skill from the Double-bladed Spear skill tree directly hitting a target. I had just unlocked it, fully aware of its perk of granting a speed buff to the user for every clean hit the skill makes.
I had just gotten a whole lot quicker than before, and with the HP gauge of my opponent falling instantly into the red zone, I knew that I had to finish the job, and simply charged at him again with the blue blade facing him.
The blade finally got through his body clean, as red crystals spurted out of the impalement. I landed while reaching out my spear, right in front of him. I tried to look up at his face, but I was only allowed a second.
A second was more than enough to stare at his face, full of shock and fear, as his body shattered into glowing crystals.
I stood frozen in that spear-holdong pose for a good 10 seconds, as I took in my first deep breath I'd had in a long while.
Hearing my sigh echoing throughout the empty space, I recovered, knowing full well of what I'd just done.
Was it necessary?
I spun around, trying to pinpoint the source of the voice, in a space where it was clear that no one else was nearby.
The commotion in the city area behind me raged on in the distance. I was about halfway through the open area that surrounded the Gladiorium, clueless about the voice that seemed loud enough to reach my ears.
But I wasn't lost on that question for some reason. That question, which was clearly seeking for an answer from me.
The necessity to do that, huh......
I placed my new spear back into its sheathe, and turned back to face the Gladiorium.
".....Yeah, it was."
I didn't give a shit about who my answer was for. It might as well be for myself. After all, it was necessary for my survival.
That was, all it was for me.
The beeline to the underground prison took about a minute. Meghan and Alexis should be tearing through there by now, but I wondered if they could deal with the Council members there as well as I did.
Maybe not. If they couldn't bear to land their last hits on the enemies' red HP gauges, things might get troublesome.
Practically jumping down the stairs leading down to the prison, I was treated to utter chaos.
Meghan and Alexis, against a handful of Council members, obviously being outnumbered and having a hard time to push through the prison area, apparently.
And when I meant 'prison area', it was simply just a path sandwiched between the prison cells.
With a swift grab of my spear, I continued to run towards them, and activated the Armament Swap skill. Just before reaching them, I was already holding the handle of Picturesque Brancher in my hand, ready to take on the enemies in front of them.
The SoH duo didn't seem to do anything other than the fact that they were on guard with their weapons up. The Council members that they were facing were well in the red zone, causing an apparent stalemate between both sides.
One of them was even holding a red HP crystal, and was about to heal himself. The blade of Picturesque Brancher glowed yellow, as I let the 1-hit sword skill, Vorpal Strike, fly past Meghan and Alexis and straight into the Council member's chest.
He shattered instantly. The HP crystal hit the ground with a clinking sound. I went immediately for the next Council member, first by blocking his incoming 4-hit sword skill, Horizontal Square.
It was then that I realized that, playing defence was never an issue while wielding Picturesque Brancher.
With its infinite durability, it could basically double up as a shield. Just by holding the blade up, I blocked all 4 of those hits flawlessly, before pouncing forth at the Council member with a well-timed slash through his body.
I didn't even need to use a sword skill for this one, reversing the swing to cut him down further in half. Glowing blue crystals covered my body for a while, before I recovered and turned to the SoH duo, who were still stunned about the broken stalemate.
Their hesitation to kill their opponents was blindingly obvious. Clearly, they weren't prepared for such actions that they couldn't bear to do.
"Just search the cells!" I instructed. "I'll take care of the rest!"
I would've liked to say that taking on the rest of the Council members in the underground prison was a walk in the park.
But I'm no liar. A couple of players with levels close to mine was a tall order to overcome. It just wasn't logical to fight more than one player at once.
Without Picturesque Brancher, I didn't think I would've gotten this far anyway.
The next 2 Council members have full HP gauges. I couldn't take that lightly, but I was at a loss on what to do as well.
A hand grasped my shoulder from behind, and I noticed Meghan popping beside me, glaring at the opponents.
"Eh, wait--"
"You take care of the last hits."
I started to caution her, but she blasted off from my side in the next second, opening an attack at a Council member front in swift presicion with her own sword. Alexis followed up from her, tapping into my shoulder as she went for the other one.
I got the idea of what Meghan had suggested instantly. In other words, they were simply setting up the stage for me to make the performance, simply because they didn't want to perform themselves.
Both of them were incredibly skilled. It was the first time that I had witnessed their style of combat in real circumstances. In literal seconds, both Council members were reduced to red HP gauges.
Meghan and Alexis turned to me almost at the same time, and gave the signals.
"Now!"
Bolting forth, I took down the Council members with a simple swing each, being showered in glowing blue crystals again.
"Let's clean up the prison in this way!" I corrected my instructions. "Don't forget to search the cells!"
The SoH members nodded, before dashing forth, as if they were hungry for more action.
We repeated the cycle for each encounter we had with the Council members. And each time, I heard the occasional scream piercing through my ears as the owners of those screams perished into glowing crystals.
And when those crystals seeped into nothingness, I would give a look at the path behind me.
The path, where I had willingly killed players minutes before, completely empty and void of any evidence of my actions, as if nothing happened there in the first place.
If there was one thing SAO was superb in doing, that would be wiping crime scenes clean.
"That should be all of them," Alexis confirmed as I struck down another Council member.
The path ahead seemed to have rooms stone doors with opaque walls instead of the cells with metal bars. There weren't that many of those rooms, just 4 of them, and the dead end of the path could be seen right after.
The SoH duo searched the 2 nearest rooms. I went for one of the remaining 2, swinging the door a little carefully. The interior was built with black bricks, which made the room almost impossible to look into, if not for the lamps lighting up the path from the ceiling.
I could discern the outline of a person huddling itself to a corner of the room, before getting up to face me. As the figure stepped into the light, I found myself squinting my eyes a little, gradually realising that I knew the player trapped in this room.
"You're of the Gazette guild.....right?"
I knew better than to think of the 'why' of the matter. The Gazette guild member, Jacelyn, pulled out her sword to react, clearly shaken.
"What's happening out there?" She asked with both her hands grasping shakily on her one-handed weapon.
Wanting to not scare her any further, I sheathed Picturesque Brancher quickly.
"A war."
".....A what?"
"Which means you're free now."
I got straight to the point, which seemed to work effectively to her understanding, as Alexis peeked from behind me, spotting the prisoner.
"We checked the last room, and there's no-- oh my....."
Alexis must've noticed it as well. The state in which Jacelyn was in wasn't great in the slightest. A mostly withered down HP gauge and a face of despair-induced fatigue were the prime indicators of that.
I turned to Alexis. "Would you mind escorting her out of the city? Make sure to heal her up too."
"Well sure," Alexis went to Jacelyn's side and offered her a red HP crystal. "Are you going to find Raku?"
"Isn't it obvious enough?" I unsheathed Picturesque Brancher as I stepped out of the room. "You don't mind if I borrow Meghan along? She'd love to see Raku anyway."
"Well, isn't Meghan the one to decide that?" She stifled a sigh.
"Someone called?"
Meghan popped by my side, having heard her name. I swiftly activated the Tracking skill and selected Rakuno's name, as the system highlighted a path leading out of the prison.
"We're gonna save Raku's ass." I declared, bolting out of the prison.
Meghan automatically followed suit. I didn't even need to look back to see her big, fat smile.
"That's what I fucking like to hear!"
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