The Night Sky Swordsman (Sword Art Online X OC)

War of Underworld Finale Chapter 94 End of World

No one's POV

Monday, August 17th, nine AM.

Sora: V...vanished?! Like...electronically speaking?!

Sora said into the phone, dressed in his 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.

Rinko(phone): 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.

Sora: All by herself...?

Sora asked, letting out the breath he'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, Sora 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. Sora recalled something he'd heard her mumble a week earlier, right before their voice chat was cut off when he was in ALO.

Rinko(phone): 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...

Sora: Well...of course. She's a proud and noble knight—she would never admit weakness to anyone.

Rinko(phone): Except for you, that is. Sora, 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, Sora stepped in.

Sora: Yes, of course, I understand. If I hear from Alice, I'll rush to her location. But, Ms. Rinko... is it even possible for her to get that far?

Rinko(phone): 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...

Sora: And she does stick out.

Sora 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.

Rinko(phone): 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.

Sora: Then I'll just go to the office for now. If anything happens, I want to be able to get there ASAP.

Rinko(phone): That would be a great help. Thank you, Sora.

She said and promptly hung up. Sora pulled a random outfit out of the closet; stuck his arms and legs through it; grabbed his backpack, smartphone, and motorcycle key; and rushed out of his room.

Down the stairs, the first floor was quiet. His stepdad and stepmom were on vacation for the Obon holiday and had gone somewhere together, Kazuto was probably still asleep, and Suguha was probably at morning kendo-club practice. They were supposed to be celebrating his discharge from the hospital as a family tonight, but this was more important.

Sora chugged some orange juice straight from the bottle while standing by the fridge, popped the bagel sandwich Suguha must have left for him into his mouth, and raced for the door. Sora stuck his feet into his riding shoes and was just turning the doorknob when the intercom right next to him on the wall rang. Sora's heart nearly skipped a beat. Had Alice somehow found a way to get to his location on her own?

Sora: Ali...

Sora opened the unlocked door, the name catching in his 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 Sora couldn't help but notice the beads of sweat on his face as he said "Hello, home delivery!" so Sora couldn't just ask him to come back later. Sora leaned over to grab the official family stamp left on top of the shoe cubbies to stamp his shipping forms, but then delivery man delivered the bad news:

Delivery man: Payment on delivery!

Sora: Oh...right.

Sora started to get his wallet out of the backpack but then remembered that this world had a convenient thing called electronic funds. Instead, he pulled his phone out of his pocket and held it up to the tablet the man was carrying.

Delivery man: Thanks!

Sora took a look at the box the delivery man 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, Sora was going to leave it and continue on his way, but he checked the sender just in case. It was labeled ELECTRONIC GOODS. And the sender...

Sora: What...?

OCEANIC RESOURCE EXPLORATION & RESEARCH INSTITUTION. That had to be one of the shipping labels they kept around the Roppongi Rath office. His address was right there in the destination field. Sora didn't recognize the awkwardly angular handwriting.

Sora(mind): 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?

Sora bit his lip, made up his mind, and reached for the edge of the tape seal, carefully peeling it off. Then he lifted the two flaps out to the side, and... screamed in horror.

Sora:...Aaaaah!!

Packed tightly into the box, bent at awkward, unnatural angles, were human hands and feet. Sora bolted backward, eyes bulging, and then screamed a second time.

Sora: Eyaaaaaa?!

In the shadows beneath the hands and feet, a single eye stared back at him. Sora flopped backward, but his right hand was still holding the edge of the cardboard box. A pale hand reached up out of the box and grabbed Sora's wrist. Before he could scream a third time, an annoyed voice interrupted him.

Alice: Stop making noise and pull me out already, Zora.

(Timeskip)

Three minutes later, Sora was sitting on the lip of the wood floor in their entranceway, holding his head in his hands. Sora 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.

Sora:...I can't!!

Sora shouted, giving up and jumping to his feet. Sora 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 him.

Alice: This house is built of wood. It's just like the house in the woods of Rulid. But much, much larger.

Sora: Ah...yeah...It's probably been around for seventy or eighty years.

Her blue eyes widened.

Alice: I am amazed that its life lasts for so long! They must have used quite a mighty tree...

Sora: I suppose...I mean...Hang on!

Sora stomped across the hallway, grabbed Alice by the shoulder, and tried to ask her what the hell was going on, when she gave Sora a smile like a flower blooming.

Alice: 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 Sora to elaborate on his earlier point: beautiful girl robot delivered to your door who recharges using a standard home power socket. While he'd been away in the Underworld, the real world had apparently advanced quite a ways into the future.

Sora: Oh...you need to recharge...? Go ahead, take as much as you need...

Sora 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.

Sora(mind): I guess I should make some tea for her.

Sora thought, getting up—and then he realized that Alice couldn't eat or drink anything here. Sora was still rattled by this experience, he could tell. The best way to calm down would be to solve some of the more basic questions.

Sora: 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.

Alice: 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 Sora's 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...

Sora:......I see......

Sora 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 Sora 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 Sora brought that up, the uniformed girl just shrugged again.

Alice: When I was a newly minted novice knight, I once snuck out of the cathedral and went to visit the city.

Sora:...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 Sora pushed that frightening thought aside and sat up on the couch. It was time to get to the real question.

Sora: 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.

Alice: 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.

Alice:...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 Sora. Sora 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 Sora, 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. Sora breathed in deep and stood up as well. Two steps put him 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.

Alice: Zora. I am angry.

Sora didn't have to ask her what she was upset about.

Sora: Yes...I suppose you are.

Alice: 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 him. Her expression was such that if her body had had the ability to cry, tears would have adorned her cheeks.

Alice: 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 Sora's chest. And again. And again. She tilted her small head down, trembling, and bumped her forehead against his shoulder.

Sora enveloped the back of her golden hair with his hands.

Sora: You are...my hope.

Sora muttered.

Sora: 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.

Alice:...The future...

She repeated tearfully in Sora arms.

Alice: 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?

Sora:...I'm sorry. Even I don't know that yet.

Sora squeezed her body harder and tried to put everything he was thinking and feeling into whatever words his could find.

Sora: 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 his shoulder and held her silence for a long, long time. Eventually, the otherworldly knight pulled away from him and gave a slight but noble smile, just like she had when Sora had met her at that chalky-white tower.

Alice:...I must make contact with Dr. Rinko. It would not be good to cause her to worry.

Sora continued staring into Alice's eyes. It didn't feel as though the tension within them was resolved yet. But what more could he do? Perhaps it was a problem that could be solved only through the passage of time.

Sora:...Yeah, good idea.

Sora said, pulling his phone out of his pocket. When Sora 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. Sora could see why she was the one woman to whom Akihiko Kayaba had ever opened his heart.

Rinko(phone): I suppose I was taking things for granted. If anything, we've been relying on Alice too much.

She followed that by giving Sora's surprising instructions. After he hung up, Sora gave Alice a reassuring smile—she was looking at him with concern.

Sora: 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.

Alice: R-really?!

Alice's face lit up.

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

Alice: That would be a very small price to pay.

Alice agreed. She blinked slowly and got to her feet.

Alice: 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.

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

Sora mumbled. Then he had an idea.

Sora: Oh, hey, let's go outside, then.

Once Alice had put away her cable—she was done charging up—the two headed out the front door and around the gravel-covered yard. Sora showed the knight their pond with koi and goldfish—and the gnarled pine tree, which she seemed quite interested in. But eventually, they 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 Sora and asked breathlessly.

Alice: Is this...a training hall?

Sora: Yeah. We call it a dojo here.

Alice: 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. Sora bowed in the Japanese style and stood beside her. Kazuto's late grandfather had built this kendo dojo, and only Suguha used it now. There were times where Suguha would ask Sora to train with her. The floor was polished to a shine. Despite it being midsummer, the wood was cool on the underside of his 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.

Alice: This...is a wooden sword for practice. But it's quite different from those in the Underworld.

Sora: 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 on the Underworld could knock out a third of your life if they landed in the right spot.

Alice: 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 Sora's shock, pointed the shinai handle right at him.

Sora: Huh? What are you...?

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

Sora: Wh...what?! Are you for real?!

Alice already had another shinai in her left hand. Sora had no choice but to grab the handle she was offering him.

Sora: B-but, Alice, in that body you've—

Alice: No need for a handicap!

Crack! She had thrown down the gauntlet. Sora's 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. Sora 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 Sora's snap judgment, and it left him concerned. But Alice took a position with absolute assuredness five yards across from him 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 Sora's skin. He gulped and pulled back half a step. Sword spirit.

Before Sora could even think about how impossible this was, his body was moving on its own. Sora had his shinai, also doublehanded, at a level grip on the right. Then he dropped his center of gravity and pushed his left foot forward. That was the stance for Ring Vortex, from the Serlut style.

On the other hand, Sora was not only physically recovering, he was also just a weakling gamer in the real world. Sora wasn't in any position to worry about the ability of a machine body. Decorum required that he give this competition his all. Sora found that a grin was crossing his lips, which Alice returned.

Alice: It does remind me...of the first time we met in combat, in the garden on the eightieth floor of the cathedral.

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

They didn't have a judge to give them a cue to begin—but their smiles vanished at the same time anyway. Without breaking their stances, they began to inch closer to each other. The air positively crackled between them, 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—

Alice: Yaaaaah!!

Sora: Seeaaaaa!!

They unleashed piercing battle cries in unison, and Sora found himself dumbfounded by the sight of that golden hair whipping as the knight's sword cut down at him.

Vweem!! Her actuators roared at max output, and a tremendous shock ran through his hands. A dry smack filled the dojo. The two shinai fell out of their hands and clattered left and right, spinning away over the floorboards. Alice and Sora had failed to neutralize the force of the impact, so they collided and toppled to the right. Out of pure instinct, Sora rotated so that he fell first.

Sora's back hit the floor. Two dull impacts came afterward: The first was Alice's forehead hitting his forehead—and the second was the back of his head against the wooden floor.

Sora: Aaah......

Sora grunted. Alice looked down at him from inches away and grinned.

Alice: I win. The clincher was my ultimate technique, Steel Headbutt.

Sora: I've...never heard of...

Alice: I've just invented it.

Alice said, giggling with delight. Her pale cheek descended and pressed against his. Her voice was in Sora's ear like a spring breeze.

Alice: I'm fine now, Zora. 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.

Sora: Yeah.

Sora smile rubbing her steel hair head. Then suddenly, the two of them heard some giggling on the door of the dojo. When they turned their head to see who it was, Kazuto was grinning from ear to ear.

Kazuto: Oh. Don't mind me. Just continue this brother and sister bond you two have.

Sora: 💢 Why you.

It appear that the noises had woken him up and from that grin, both Sora and Alice could tell he'd been listening for awhile now.

(Timeskip)

That night was a tense, nerve-racking affair, for reasons different than their impromptu duel. They held a family party to celebrate Sora's hospital discharge, a gathering so long in the making that he couldn't remember the last time they 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 Sora's stepmom by telling stories about things he'd done.

Alice: Do I really look like Zora, I mean, Sora's Big Sister?

Midori: You do! When I first saw you, my first thought is that, his older sister had been brought back to life!

Suguha: Right!

Kazuto: When we first met in ALO, I actually slip up and called her Big Sister, Rumia.

On the other hand, there was a terrible tension between Sora's dad and himself on the other side of the table. Sora's adoptive father, Minetaka Kirigaya, was almost the polar opposite of him 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 Sora's rather outgoing stepmother—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 Sora a serious look and got right to the most important topic of the night.

Minetaka: Sora, 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. Sora set down the chicken wing he was eating, cleared his throat, and stood up. Sora placed his hands on the edge of the table and lowered his head.

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

Sora's mother, Midori, just beamed at him and shook her head.

Midori: We're used to it by now. And it was a really big, important thing you did this time, right, Sora dear? 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 Wattpad Fanfic, you write it. If you say you're going to stick to a deadline, you do it!

Kazuto: Mom, you're taking that in a more personal direction.

Kazuto teased. Things relaxed briefly before Sora's dad tightened the screws again.

Minetaka: 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, Sora?

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

Sora: A teenager in high school.

Sora was deflated, a child being lectured by his parents. He could sense Alice's stunned gaze on his cheek, and it stung. After all the tremendously powerful foes Sora had fought in the Underworld, this was his truth in the real world. Dad nodded and continued sternly.

Minetaka: That's right. And therefore, it should be clear where the brunt of your effort should be going.

Sora:...To studying and focusing on getting into college.

Minetaka: You're at the summer of your second year. Your mother told me, both you and Kazuto want to study abroad, in America. Have you been making progress toward that end?

Sora: Ah...well, about that.

Sora mumbled, looking at Mom, then Dad, then finally Kazuto. Sora bowed again.

Sora: Mom. Dad. Brother. I'm sorry. I want to change my focus.

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

Minetaka: Explain.

He commanded. Sora steeled himself and revealed the goal that he'd told only Kotone about so far.

Sora: 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. Sora 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—Sora had told Kotone that he wanted to go to America to study brain-implant chips. That was because Sora had thought BICs were the proper evolution of full-diving that began with the NerveGear. He 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 Sora had spent in the Underworld had totally flipped his perception around. Sora couldn't drift away from that world now, and he had no intention of doing so. Sora had finally found the theme he could make himself life's work. The melding of the Underworld and the real.

Alice stared at him, smiling like a blooming flower, then turned to Dad.

Alice: Father...

Suguha and Kazuto: "Father"?

That earned a shocked look from both Kazuto and Suguha.

Alice: 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. Zora—I mean, Sora—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.

Sora: Alice...

Sora said, trying to stop her. He knew that talking about knights and battles wasn't going to mean anything to the man. But to Sora's shock, there was a tiny smile on his stern lips.

Minetaka: Alice, his mother and I both know that already. Even after joining our family for a year, Sora's already a hero in this world. Isn't that right, Night Sky Swordsman?

Sora: Ack...

Sora 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.

Minetaka: Sora, 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.

Sora closed his eyes, took a deep breath—and bowed a third time.

Sora: I will. Thank you, Dad, Mom.

Sora lifted his head and smirked a bit.

Sora: 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 Sora's dad had was a little twitch of an eyebrow.

Minetaka: Ah. I'll have to keep that in mind.

(Timeskip)

Sora(mind): I guess this is how ordinary life gets back to being ordinary.

Sora thought, rolling back onto his bed. Their little home party was over. Dad and Mom retired to their bedroom on the first floor, Kazuto into his 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. Sora was over two and a half years away from high school classes in subjective time, so he was going to spend the last two weeks of vacation in study boot camp with Kazuto, Kotone and 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, Sora probably wasn't ever going to engage in a true sword fight again. It was time for him to expend all his time and energy on fulfilling his goals in the real world. Sora had to study, graduate, and get a job—whether his first choice or not—in as straightforward a path as Sora could. That was a very important battle, too. Even if it left him feeling a bit lonely.

The years of his youth were always going to end someday. By the time Sora was able to recognize the precious nature of his teenage years with their sunlight and breeze, cheers and excitement, adventure and the unknown, they would already be in his past, never to return.

Sora(mind): I was probably a very fortunate child.

How many alternate worlds had Sora raced through, heart pounding, sword in his right hand, blank map in his left? So many memories, like precious jewels, that his soul could barely contain them all. Outside his 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. Sora breathed deep of the scents and sounds of the real world and shut his eyes.

Sora:...Good-bye.

Sora murmured. Bidding farewell to a passing age. Or so he had thought. Up until the moment Sora drifted off to sleep in his bed, late at night on August 17th.

Alice:...Zora. Wake up, Zora.

Someone was shaking his shoulder, pulling him back from a bittersweet sentiment.

Sora:.........Mm...

Sora grunted, his eyelids rising against his will. Right in front of him were pure-blue eyes framed by golden lashes. Sora froze atop his sheets.

Sora: Fhwah...?! A-Alice?!

Alice: Shh, don't raise a fuss.

Sora: L-listen, I don't know what you're thinking, but this isn't really appropriate behavior for...

AliceL What are you thinking?

She said, pulling on his earlobe until Sora's brain began to function properly at last. Blearily, Sora looked over at the clock next to his bed: It was just past three in the morning. The moon was still round and bright, high in the sky through the window. Sora looked back to his room.

Under the dim moonlight, Alice knelt at his 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, Sora couldn't see the seams in the silicone skin, and it was impossible to believe that those graceful lines were man-made.

Alice: D-don't stare at me like that.

She said, pulling the shirt hem lower. Sora jerked upright, breath catching in his throat. Sora forced his 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 Sora's ability to think. In fact, his flustering was so obvious that it started to embarrass Alice. She pouted and turned her face away.

Alice: 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.

Sora: Wha...? W-we did?

Alice: Yes, we did!!

She shouted, then covered her mouth with her hands. Sora hunched his 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. While Sora was trying to asses the whole situation, Alice looked around his room and saw the picture of him and Rumia.

Alice: Is this your sister?

Alice stare at the picture. She had heard numerous time from Sora's friends in ALO, that she looked like Rumia. Kotone, Kazuto, Asuna, Suguha, Shino, Lisbeth, Silica, Klein, Agil, and Yuuki. Even his step parent had told her the same. Now seeing the picture, Alice could finally understood why.

Sora: Yeah. When I first saw you, I accidentally called you, Bis Sis.

Alice: Now that you mentioned it, I do remember hearing you muttering that. Anyway, we're getting sidetrack!

Alice cleared her throat and glared at Sora.

Alice: I haven't been able to get to the point because you keep acting strange.

Sora: 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.

Alice: Roughly five minutes ago...I received a message via remote relayed arts—or what you would call, er...'the network'—with most alarming content.

Sora: An e-mail, you mean? From whom?

Alice: 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 Sora's desk. To his disbelief, the printer's exhaust fan suddenly whirred to life. Alice had just given it a remote signal to print.

Sora(mind): When did she learn to do such a thing?

But the shock of that revelation was knocked clean over the horizon when Sora 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, Sora could not process what he was reading. As his half-working brain continued getting up to speed, Sora 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 Sora recognized.

Sora(mind): 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 himself.

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 Philia and Asuna, 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 Sora read through the message again, he noticed something even more bizarre.

Near the end of the second part was the name Holy Spring Staircase. Sora couldn't recall having passed such a floor. That meant that whoever had sent this e-mail had written information even he didn't know. Sora glanced at Alice, who looked nervous.

Sora: Is this...Holy Spring Staircase a place in the cathedral?

Alice: Yes...it absolutely does exist.

The knight confirmed. She wrung her hands with nervous energy.

Alice: 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...

Sora: Wha...?

Sora gaped, even more stunned. Alice stepped forward and clutched his hand. Her fingers were actually trembling, possibly a malfunction of her electroactive-polymer cylinders.

Alice: Zora...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. Sora put a hand to her delicate shoulder and squeezed.

Sora: No...that's not possible. Administrator is dead. I saw her and Chudelkin get blasted into light and dissipate. Here...look at this.

Sora said, lifting the printout to show her.

Sora: 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.'

Alice: That...is true, I suppose. I can confirm that.

Alice said, her face so close to Sora's that her golden bangs nearly brushed his cheek.

Alice: But then...who would have written this...?

Sora: 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...

Alice: Meaning...?

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

Sora motioned for Alice to sit next to him on the bed, then traced the printed message with his finger.

Sora: 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.

Alice: 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.

Sora: Y-you don't have to hold on to details like that, you know.

Sora muttered, hunching his shoulders. Alice smiled, though.

Alice: 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 Sora couldn't help but stare. Was it Sora's imagination, or were those sapphire-lensed eyes actually moist? It took all his willpower to tear his eyes away from those deep pools. Sora resumed his explanation, his throat a bit hoarse.

Sora: 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.

Alice: I don't suppose...they merely forgot them...

They inclined their heads at the same angle out of curiosity, but no ideas came to them. Eventually, Sora gave up and took a small device off his wall rack so that Sora could summon a helper who was extremely good at cracking codes.

The black half sphere, small enough to fit in his palm, was a very high-quality network camera called an AV interactive communication probe. Sora mounted the probe on his shoulder, powered it on, tested that it had a wireless connection to his desktop PC, then spoke into it.

Sora: Rio, are you awake?

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

Rio: Yesh...Good morning, Papa.

Then the camera inside the little dome swiveled to catch the person sitting next to him.

Rio: Good morning, Alice.

Alice: Oh...g-good morning, Rio.

It was Alice's first time seeing the probe, but she'd spoken with Rio and Yui several times in Alfheim. Alice must have figured out that the device on Sora's shoulder was Rio's real-world body, because she smiled right away. Rio's camera rotated back and forth a few times, and when she spoke again, her voice was grave.

Rio: Papa...what am I looking at?

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

Rio: 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.

Sora: W-well, we...All right, I'll admit, it's not normal, but it wasn't something I asked for...

Sora protested desperately. Instead, Alice stepped in to explain, trying to hide a gleeful smile.

Alice: Rio, it's really nothing. I received a strange missive—an 'e-mail'—and I asked Zora what it could mean.

Rio: If you say so, Alice, then I will record it as such. But, Papa, you shouldn't keep secrets from Mama.

Sora: Why, of course.

Sora agreed, relieved. Alice held up the sheet of paper so that Rio could see it, then explained its contents. Watching them interact gave Sora a very strange, indescribable feeling.

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

Rio: Oh...I'm noticing that the spacing of the first and second parts is a bit different.

Sora: What, really?

Sora leaned over the paper in Alice's hand to stare at the teeny-tiny black spots. Rio 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.

Sora(mind): Pixels......

Sora: Oh.........Oh!!

Sora gasped, rising from the bed.

Sora: Th-that's it. The cathedral only goes to a hundred floors...and that's why they stuck two together...which makes this...

Sora felt around his headboard for a pen, popped the cap off, and asked in a voice high-pitched with nerves.

Sora: Alice, what floor was the Cloudtop Garden?

Alice:...Have you truly forgotten? The very place where you and I first fought?

Sora: N-no, I didn't forget. It's, uh...

Alice: The eightieth floor.

She replied, sounding a bit peeved. Sora wrote the number on a blank part of the paper.

Sora: Right, right, of course. And...the Great Kitchen?

Alice: Tenth floor.

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

Sora: And the lookout was...And then...the Holy Spring Staircase was the first floor...and the Great Hall...

When Sora 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 Zora were used to seeing just about every day. Rio recognized it at once, too.

Rio: Oh...Papa, that's an IP address!

Sora: 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 them toward a server somewhere in the real world. Sora got out of bed and sat in the mesh chair at his desk, grabbing the mouse. When the monitor popped out of sleep mode, Sora opened the browser and tried to reach the address via http first, then FTP. Both methods refused access.

Sora: Maybe RTSP...or telnet...?

The next step would be to open up the command prompt, but at his shoulder, Rio suddenly warned.

Rio: Papa! Remember the content of the message again!

Sora: Huh...?

Alice held out the paper. When it was within Rio's view, she said.

Rio: The 'white tower' to be climbed would seem to be indicating the address in the second part.

Sora: Uh-huh.

Rio: And once climbed, it leads to 'yon world.' Which would mean that this address points to...

Sora: Oh...! Th-that's it...of course!!

Sora said, feeling his fingertips going cold and numb. Sora spun around.

Sora: Alice, this is the way...This is the path that leads to the Underworld!!

Sora hissed. Her eyes were wide with shock.

Alice: 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. Sora nodded, sure of his answer. Alice's actuators buzzed to life as she leaped straight toward Sora. He caught her in his arms. There were sobs in his ear, and a wet sensation on her cheek where she touched him, but that was probably just an illusion. Her body of metal and silicone wasn't capable of producing such things.

(Timeskip)

Neither Alice nor Sora had the patience to wait for a more sensible hour to take the next step. So he 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 Sora was telling her, but once he got to the end of his explanation, she practically shrieked into the phone.

Rinko(phone): Is this t-true?!

Sora: 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.

Rinko(Phone): Oh...oh. In that case, we should get to the bottom of this at once.

Sora: Please let me and Alice be the ones to test it.

Rinko(phone): What...?

She let out a breath that sounded like half shock and half exasperation.

Rinko(phone): Sora...after what you went through...

Sora: If I was going to learn my lesson from that, I would never have agreed to work with Rath in the first place!

She exhaled again.

Rinko(phone): 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.

Sora: 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?

Rinko(phone): 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.

Sora: Ah, that's good. In that case...um, hold on a moment.

Sora glanced over at Alice, who was wringing her hands nervously.

Sora: Alice, I know this is asking a lot, but...do you mind if we bring Philia along, too?

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

Alice:...I suppose not. If something unforeseen should happen, there is no harm in having extra power on our side.

Sora: Th-thanks, that's great...Well, you heard her, Doctor...

After a few more comments, the call was over. Sora got in touch with Kotone, waking her up so he could explain the situation. All Sora had to do was tell her that they'd found a route to connect to the Underworld for her to understand what was going on. Within a minute or two, they were done talking. Sora took the probe off his shoulder and looked into the lens.

Sora: I'm sorry, Rio... We still haven't found a way to take you into the Underworld.

Sora's daughter listened patiently...but a bit sadly, too.

Rio: Yes, Papa, I understand. Please be careful.

Sora: We'll find a way to take you there someday.

Sora promised, placing the probe on the desk. Next to it was a stack of manuals and textbooks that he'd been planning to look through later today. Sadly, they would have to wait a little longer. Sora 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. They turned their backs to each other to get dressed, then snuck out of the room.

When they got down to the living room, Sora left his note on the table. Then he carefully, quietly slid open the old-fashioned door, and the two of them headed out into the chilly air of early morning.

To avoid causing too much noise, Sora pushed his 125cc motorcycle a good distance away from the house before straddling the seat. Suguha's helmet went onto Alice's head, and Sora put his own on before starting the engine; it kicked to life nicely for having been abandoned for three months. Then he revved it a little and called out to his tandem rider.

Sora: Hold on tight! I'm gonna gun this thing like a dragon!

Alice put her hands around his stomach and said.

Alice: Who do you think I am?!

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

The note Sora left in the living room said, Dad, Mom, Bro, Sis: I've got one little adventure left. I'll be back right away. Don't worry about me.

(Timeskip)

The roads were empty before dawn. They headed down Kawagoe Highway, then Kannana-Dori Avenue, then Route 246 in quick order. When they got to Rath's Roppongi branch, Kotone had already arrived via taxi. She started to wave with a big smile, then froze when she noticed that Alice was riding behind him.

Kotone:...Sora...what exactly does this mean?

Sora: W-well, uh...To put it briefly, some things happened...but nothing happened...The end...

Kotone: Define 'some things' and 'nothing.'

Sora had known this was going to happen. He'd known it would, but he'd shown up here without a plan anyway. There was no innocent way to explain the situation.

Sora: I'll explain everything later, I promise! We'll have plenty of time...when we're old and sipping tea...

Sora murmured, parking his bike in the employee lot. When he turned around, what Sora feared was already coming to pass. There was Kotone, hands on her waist. Alice had her arms folded. The air crackled like lightning between the two of them. Very, very carefully, Sora mutter.

Sora: Pardon me...but I thought you two were past that...You know, at the Human Guardian Army's campsite...

Kotone: It was only a cease-fire, nothing more!

Alice: And a cease-fire signals an intent for the battle to resume!

The two women said before glaring at each other again. Sora observed the two warriors, their hostility and rivalry blazing—and did the one thing that Sora could do in this situation.

Sora made himself as small as possible, backed away, and tried to evacuate into the building. But when Sora submitted his ID card, fingerprint, and retinal scan at the door's security terminal, it let out a high-pitched beep, drawing their attention.

Kotone: Ah! Hey! Sora!!

Alice: You shall not run from us!!

But Sora was already rushing into the building. Kotone and Sora 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 them with alarm.

Rinko: 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.

Rinko said, a bit annoyed. Sora flashed her a very snarky smile.

Sora: 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!!

Kotone pinched him hard on the side. After that, Sora retreated to the nearby changing room so he could get into the sterilized robes for diving with the STL—and not just so that Sora could avoid a follow-up attack from Alice. As a matter of fact, what he'd told the scientist was his 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.

They had to promote exchange between the artificial fluctlights of the Underworld and humans from the real world and breed friendly relations. If they 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.

Sora(mind): But...while it was extreme, there was another way as well.

Seizing actual defensive power. Arming the Ocean Turtle with the lightcube-bearing 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.

Sora 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.

Rinko:...I'm guessing he has something to do with this.

She murmured. Sora gave her a little nod. Sora 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.

Sora: Akihiko Kayaba...Heathcliff.

In a sense, Sora's battle couldn't end without a direct confrontation between Kayaba and himself. Heathcliff had passed very close by the STL where Sora 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.

Sora faced away from Dr. Koujiro, who was setting up for the dive, and booted his smartphone.

Sora: Rio, have you figured out anything about that address?

Her cute little face shook side to side on the screen.

Rio: 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.

Sora: I see...Thanks. Were you able to trace the source of the message to Alice?

Rio: 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. Sora rubbed the touch screen with a fingertip.

Sora: 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.

Rio: Well, I'm better!

She protested, puffing out her cheeks. Sora smirked and poked her.

Sora: At any rate, I'm going now. This time it's not going to involve all these dangers...I think.

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

Sora: And I'm counting on that. So long.

She held up a tiny hand on-screen, and Sora brushed it with a finger, then turned off the device's power. Alice and Kotone 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. Sora shared a look with each of them in turn.

Sora: 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.

Alice: 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.

Kotone brushed Alice's arm and grinned.

Kotone: And we have to go and wake up Selka first thing.

Alice: That's right!

They shared a moment of firm resolution—then headed over to the two STLs and one reclining seat. Sora lay back against the chilly gel bed. Dr. Rinko operated the control that lowered the large headblock down over the top of my head.

Rinko: All right...here we go.

The three of them replied in unison.

Sora, Kotone, Alice: Right!

The enormous machine began to hum. Sora's fluctlight—the light quantum network that constituted his very consciousness—split off from his flesh, removing him from his bodily senses and gravity. Sora's mind was translated into electronic signals and thrown into a vast network without boundaries. Sora flew at ultra-high speed down a high-capacity optical line, soaring toward another familiar world he considered home. Into a new adventure. Into the next story.

(Timeskip)

First, Zora saw a light. A tiny little speck of white that stretched and grew into rainbow gradient, until it covered his entire vision—and beyond. Within it a space of pure dark appeared. Zora 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...

Zora:...Aaaaah!!

Zora screamed when he looked down at his feet. Because there was no ground beneath them. Zora flailed and swung his legs, but the bottoms of his boots touched nothing. The boundless starry sky continued in every direction—sides, top, bottom. Stars, stars, stars.

Philia: Eeeeek!!

Alice: Wh...what is this?!

Other hands grabbed Zora's outstretched ones. On his right floated Philia, dressed in the clothing of the goddess Lunaria: dark-blue half armor and skirt and a beautiful dual dagger. On Zora's 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 them. But in truth...this was not even a sky.

Zora:...Outer space...?

Zora mumbled, hardly daring to say it. Suddenly, he was aware of a ferocious chill. Alice and Philia both sneezed spectacularly. The temperature was so low here that Zora could easily feel the rapid decline of his life value by the moment. The fact that Zora could hear their voices meant that they weren't in the actual vacuum of space, but it must have been very close. And they were simply floating there, without protection.

Zora focused hard, generating a defensive wall of light elements in a sphere large enough to surround all three of them. Once the thin shining layer was enveloping them, that piercing chill finally began to subside. Once the immediate danger was behind them, Zora looked around at the stunning sight before him again. A tight belt of stars ran from the upper right of his field of view to the lower left. It was like the Milky Way—but no matter how Zora tried to connect the brightest stars, he couldn't find a single familiar constellation.

Zora(mind): This was the Underworld. But in that case, where was the land...and where was the sky over it?

Zora felt a terrible chill steal over him and shivered.

Zora(mind): 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...?

Zora: No way...It can't be...

Zora murmured in a trembling voice. Suddenly, Alice squeezed his hand so hard it creaked.

Alice: Zora...look there.

Zora turned to his left. The golden knight had turned herself around to look behind them. Her arm was outstretched, gesturing toward a single point. Breathlessly and oh so slowly, Zora 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 their 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. Zora shielded his 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, Zora 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, Zora instantly knew exactly what he 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 Zora had lived and fought for so long.

Zora tore his eyes from the planet and looked over at Alice. The only thing he saw in her face was deep shock and profound awe. Then her eyes bulged. She let go of his 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. Zora could feel tears coming to his own eyes. Zora looked over to the person still holding his right hand and saw that Philia's eyes were damp, too.

As the two of them 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.

Alice: 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. Zora closed his eyes and listened well. Zora listened to the words that ushered in a new era, carving them into his memory for all eternity.

Alice: I have returned to you! ......I am here!!

(Elsewhere)

Stica: This is Blue Rose 73. I have confirmed atmospheric escape. Transitioning to interstellar cruising speed.

Integrity Pilot Stica Schtrinen said into the voice transmitter near her mouth, pushing the control rod forward with her left hand. The dragoncraft's silvery form shuddered. Its widespread wings began to shine a faint blue. It was collecting the scarce resources of the vacuum of space and transferring them to the drive mechanism.

The eternal-heat elements locked in the core of the mechanism screamed in response, sending white flames from the primary thrust apertures on either side of the craft's long tail. She felt her body being pressed back against the pilot seat. The sensation of powerful acceleration was something she couldn't experience within the planet's atmosphere, and it put a smile on her face.

Laurannei: Blue Rose 74, affirmative.

Came a brief response from the transmitter. She looked at the auxiliary visual board on the right. Her number two was following to her side, jets burning bright.

The pilot of the second craft had been Stica's partner since they'd been ordained together, Integrity Pilot Laurannei Arabel. She was silent most of the time, and when piloting her dragoncraft, she was even less chatty. But even Stica's addiction to speed paled in comparison to hers. Stica grimaced and warned her.

Stica: You're going too fast, Laura.

Laurannei: You're too slow, Sti.

Stica(mind): Oh yeah?

The rules of the Underworld Space Force were absolute, but even their drill instructor couldn't see them out beyond the atmosphere. And it was a whole three-hour journey to reach the companion star of Admina. That meant there was room for a little error.

Stica gave the control rod another push, pulling away from the second craft just a tiny bit. She leaned back in her seat, grinning. When her eyes drifted upward, she caught sight of the detailed art relief on the canopy of the cramped pilot's chamber.

Three vertical swords, gold, white and black, and Twin daggers, White and Black. Blue roses and golden osmanthus flowers entwined around them. The insignia of the Star King, a figure now turning into legend.

Thirty years had passed since the Star King and Queen left their palace of Central Cathedral on the main star, Cardina.

Stica and Laurannei were only fifteen years old, and four years into their service as Integrity Pilots, so they never had the chance for a royal audience. But they'd grown up on the stories their mothers, also pilots, had told them about the royal couple. And those mothers had heard plenty of stories from theirs, and so on.

The Schtrinen and Arabel families had served as Royal Pilots—originally called "knights"—for all two hundred years of the Star King's long reign. Seven generations ago, the knights Tiese Schtrinen and Ronie Arabel protected the Star King before he was king, and they achieved great deeds in the battle against the four emperors who sought power on Cardina's First Continent. The imperial families and higher nobles' corrupt and abusive power was stripped from them, and the common people enslaved on their private property were freed.

After that, the king developed the first dragoncraft and used it to fly over the Wall at the End of the World, which surrounded the continent and rose all the way to the edge of the atmosphere.

In the uncharted lands he found there, the king patiently negotiated with the ancient god-beasts and occasionally defeated them in singular battle, taking and developing their fertile lands, then giving them over to the goblins and orcs, who had suffered prejudices under the label of "demi-humans," so that they could have their own nations.

Once the king had traveled all of Cardina, he set his sights on the endless universe above.

The dragoncraft were improved again and again, until they were capable of leaving the atmosphere altogether. He found the companion planet that orbited Solus with Cardina, and he named it Admina.

Then he created large interstellar dragoncraft capable of undertaking regular routes, established the first colony city on Admina, and was urged to take on the role of the Underworld's first Star King.

Under the rule of the king and queen, who possessed eternal life without aging, the two stars prospered—and would do so for eternity, all thought. But one day, the two of them left behind a prophecy and entered a long sleep. Thirty years ago, without ever returning to face their people, they vanished from the world.

Since then, governing had been conducted by a council of representatives from the military and civilians. With no enemy to fight at this point, the ground force and the space force were shrinking, but in accordance with the king's prophecy, pilots underwent the same fierce training they always had since ancient days. This was the king's last message:

Star King: One day, the gate to the real world will open again. When it does, a great upheaval will come to both worlds.

Stica couldn't grasp this event in practical terms, but it was said that when the gate to the other world was opened, it would usher in a time when the continued existence of the Underworld itself would come into flux. They could not just hope for coexistence and brotherly love. They would have to prove their strength in order to maintain their pride and independence. Otherwise, the five human races of man, giant, goblin, orc, and ogre would suffer a tragedy even greater than the Otherworld War of two centuries past.

But Stica was not afraid. No matter what world she might visit and what age might arrive, she would fight valiantly as long as she had the wings of her dragoncraft.

Stica(mind): I'm a member of the proud Integrity Pilots, maintainers of a tradition stretching back to the days of creation.

She thought, looking up at the insignia on the roof again. Without warning, red blazed on the bottom of the main visual board. Both a written message and an alarm indicated the detection of an element agglomeration of abnormal scale.

Stica: Wh-what?!

She yelped, sitting up again. Over the voice transmitter, she heard Laurannei say nervously.

Laurannei: Blue Rose 74, detecting the approach of an ultra-life-form of darkness! Element density...twenty-seven thousand?!

Stica: It's the mythic spacebeast...the Abyssal Horror...

Even as she spoke its name in the sacred tongue, an empty darkness covered the right edge of the main visual board, like a pot of ink had been dropped there. Of all the known spacebeasts, the Abyssal Horror was the most dangerous. It was over two hundred mels at its largest, with its twelve huge tentacles fully extended from its spherical body. That was twenty times the size of a single-seat fighter dragon.

Its vast body was made entirely of high-density darkness elements, meaning that it shrugged off essentially all types of attacks. The reason it was so dangerous was something else, however.

Unlike many of the other god-beasts, the Abyssal Horror refused to engage in any communication with humans. It seemed to run solely on the impulse to destroy and slaughter. When it spotted any dragoncraft on an interstellar journey, it would pursue them directly until it devoured them.

The Star King was said to have treated all the god-beasts with respect—but when he heard reports of the large passenger dragoncraft destroyed on the way to Admina, he attempted to destroy this particular creature. But even the king, whose powers were greater than an entire army's, could not completely destroy the Abyssal Horror.

Through careful observation, they learned that the spacebeast orbited between the two planets on a fixed speed and trajectory. The best they could do to minimize its threat was to restrict interstellar flight so that they could safely avoid its path.

Naturally, Stica and Laurannei had taken off from Cardina at a time that the spacebeast would have been on the far side of Admina. It didn't make sense.

Stica: Why...? It's appearing too early...

Stica murmured, hands trembling on the control rod. She recovered her spirit quickly, however, and shouted into the transmitter.

Stica: Left turn, one-eighty degrees, then withdraw at full speed! Retreating to Cardina's atmosphere!

Laurannei: Affirmative!!

Laurannei replied, a spike of nerves in her voice. Stica steered the craft left and pulled the rod as far back as she could. White flames shot from the stabilizing thrust apertures, pressing her body so heavily into the seat that she could barely breathe. The stars in the visual boards blurred from points into lines toward the bottom right.

When the turn was complete, the main visual board featured the blue shine of the planet Cardina, which she'd left less than an hour before. It felt close enough that she could reach out and grab it yet devastatingly far away.

She put on maximum acceleration, praying. The eternal-heat elements screamed and roared. But the speedometer's needle came to a stop five whole pips short of its maximum value. The Abyssal Horror was taking resources from such a vast range that the resource-collection tanks in the dragoncraft's wings couldn't reach their maximum potential.

The rear view on the auxiliary vision board made it clear that the spacebeast's black form was much larger than before. She could even see its writhing tentacled appendages already. Soon the ends of two especially long arms began to glow a faint bluish purple.

Laurannei: Sti, it's going into attack position!

She acted instantly.

Stica: I see it, too! Deploying rear light shield!!

She hit one of the buttons on the control board to her left. The craft's pelvic armor opened with a series of clunks. Stica took a deep breath and focused.

Stica: System Call! Generate Luminous Element!!

Through the conducting channels within the control rod in her hands, ten light elements were shot out of the craft's wings into space. They followed Stica's mental command, transforming into a circular defensive wall. Right then, the spacebeast's arms hurtled past the bright, purplish light they were harboring. With a shriek like tearing metal, the blasts of darkness roared through empty space. Just three seconds later, they made contact with the light walls.

Stica: Aaaah!!

Stica screamed when the dragoncraft shuddered with the impact. She could hear Laurannei screaming through the voice transmitter, too. The two blasts broke through the light shield Stica had deployed as though it were paper, tearing deep into the rear side armor of the craft. Instantly, her instruments glowed red. Something went wrong with the resource conducting channels, and her speed slowed noticeably.

Through the auxiliary vision board, she sensed the Abyssal Horror, which was no more than an amorphous blot of darkness, somehow leer at her. On the auxiliary vision board, the second craft was missing a wing and rapidly dropping in speed.

Stica: Laura! Laura!!

She shouted, and she was relieved to hear a response.

Laurannei:...It's all right. I'm fine. But...she won't fly anymore...

Stica: We won't have any choice but to eject out of the crafts. We'll have to find a way to get back to Cardina with just the thrusters on our pilot suits...

Laurannei: I can't! I mean...I won't! I can't leave her behind!!

Stica couldn't tell her anything to the contrary. A dragoncraft was not just a steel construction the pilot sat inside. It was your one and only partner, a piece of your heart. Just like the flying dragons that the Integrity Knights of the distant past were said to ride.

Stica:...No. No, I suppose not.

Stica murmured, carefully squeezing her control rod. She took a deep breath, smiled, and said.

Stica: Then let's fight to the end. Make another turn, then fire main cannons at maximum power. Will that suffice, Laura?

Laurannei:...Affirmative.

Her last transmission was short and brusque, just like she always was. Still smiling, Stica pulled back on the rod, leading her wounded dragon into another one-eighty turn. The main visual board displayed the massive oncoming beast. Eight of its writhing tentacles were glowing with its next round of blasts now.

Abyssal Horror: Ooooooooohng!

The Abyssal Horror roared. Or perhaps it was laughing.

Stica(mind): At least let me give it a good stinging as I die. Anything to prolong the time until it attacks this route again.

Stica thought, pushing the red button on top of the rod halfway in. The main cannon on the tip of the dragoncraft clanked into position. Normally she would generate whatever the most effective element was for the target, but since the Abyssal Horror's bodily form was thin at best, even its opposite element of light would do very little damage.

Instead, she decided to go with a frost-element attack, her best type. The dragoncraft's jaws glowed a clear blue. She glanced over at the other craft—its cannon was glowing red. Laurannei had chosen heat elements. The spacebeast was just a thousand mels away now. It stretched out its eight tentacles, preparing to attack. Stica inhaled, ready to give the command to fire. But instead...

Laurannei: W-wait, Sti!! What's that...?!

Laurannei gasped into her right ear.

Stica(mind): What could it possibly be now?

But then Stica saw it, too. A shooting star. Just above the main visual board, a shining white light was approaching at incredible speed. For an instant, she thought it was a dragoncraft. But she ruled that out right away. It was much too small. It was less than two mels, only the size of a human being... In fact, it was a human being.

Stica: Is that... a human?

What she'd thought was a star was the shine of a spherical wall of light elements. On the inside, she could clearly make out a black shadow in the shape of a person. The figure came to a stop about a hundred mels in front of the two dragoncraft. At nearly the same moment, the Abyssal Horror bellowed and unleashed eight light blasts. Before she could even grasp the shock of seeking an unprotected person in the freezing chill of outer space, Stica was shouting at them.

Stica: What are you doing?! Hurry—get away!!

But the person did not budge at all. The end of their long coat flapped violently as they remained stationary, arms crossed boldly. That thin defensive wall was going to be less useful than wet paper against the Abyssal Horror's blasts. Stica could already imagine the figure transforming into a spray of blood and flesh as soon as it made contact with the roaring purple blasts.

Stica: Run awaaaaay!!

Laurannei: Watch out!!

She and Laurannei shouted together. Eight bursts of purple light roared closer, each one nearly three mels in size. They stopped in the middle of nothing, as if colliding with an invisible wall and bouncing off in random directions. Space shook.

Before Stica's stunned eyes, the stars seemed to waver, like the surface of a pond struck to produce ripples. The shock wave reached her dragoncraft, rumbling and vibrating it. Speechless, she glanced at the little gauge on the right end of the main visual board. It had instantly shot all the way to its top.

Stica: No way...Th-that's impossible...

Stica had never seen the Incarnameter swing as much as 20 percent at a time. With fear in her voice, Laurannei said.

Laurannei: I don't believe it...Such incredible Incarnate strength...As though the entire universe is shaking...

But there was no denying what was happening before them. The small, unprotected human being, without an elemental wall, used his Incarnate power—the greatest technique of the Integrity Knights of yore—to deflect the spacebeast's attack.

Abyssal Horror: Ooooooooooooh...

The Abyssal Horror roared in the distance. But was it in anger or in fear? The beast seemed to sense that its remote darkness blasts would not work, so it began to charge, thrusting its multitude of appendages forward. The small figure reached his arms behind his back and pulled loose the two longswords that were equipped there.

Stica: He's not going to fight it...with swords, is he?!

Stica gasped, leaning forward and placing her hands on the vision board. The Abyssal Horror was over two hundred mels in size. And its body was an amalgamation of darkness without form. No little sliver of metal less than a mel long could do anything to a monster like that. But the mysterious swordsman calmly, easily pointed the white sword in his left hand toward the mammoth creature. He shouted something. Through the vacuum of space and the thick armor of the dragoncraft, Stica somehow heard his voice loud and clear.

Zora: Release Recollection!!

A bright light flashed, covering her main vision board. When she could see again a moment later, there were many beams of light shooting from the swordsman's blade toward the monster.

They looked as tiny as threads compared to the huge spacebeast, but as they pierced through and tangled around its shadowy form, the creature clearly began to lose speed. The twelve appendages writhing on their own stiffened—as though they were freezing solid. But that wasn't possible. The Abyssal Horror was designed to thrive in the ultra-cold region of outer space. There couldn't possibly be any chill colder than that. Stica's shock didn't last long, however; Laurannei's voice in her ear obliterated it.

Laurannei: That technique...isn't that a Perfect Weapon Control art...? No, a Memory Release art...?

Stica: What...? Only Supreme Integrity Pilots should be able to use that!

Laurannei: But...I can't see how it could be anything else...

A third roar from the spacebeast cut them off.

Abyssal Horror: Awooooooooh!!

Its tied-up body trembled, and three new tentacle arms appeared. They became like great spears of night, bearing down on the mysterious swordsman. But the man remained calm and composed, drawing his right-hand sword this time. Again, he shouted.

Zora: Release Recollection!!

The blade erupted with dense darkness, deeper and heavier than that of the spacebeast's arms. A preposterously huge blade over fifty mels long met the three appendages. When the two sides made contact, there was another shock wave, which seemed powerful enough to bend space itself. The dragoncraft rocked, and purplish lights crawled about in empty space, lighting up the vision boards.

Stica could no longer put her shock into words. There were only seven Supreme Integrity Pilots, and this man was using their greatest power—multiple times at once. Not even a fleet of destroyer craft could handle the Abyssal Horror's full power, and he was handling it all—just a single man. Even her own parents back in Centoria wouldn't believe her if she told them about this swordsman. But the true shock was yet to come.

Laurannei: Sti!! There's a...another person!!

Stica looked around until she saw, coming from the same direction that the mysterious dual swordsman had come from, another human figure arriving. This one was smaller. Through the defensive layer of light elements, she could see long hair and a skirt. In her left and right hand was an incredibly delicate-looking daggers.

Philia:...

The swordswoman raised her arm—then swung it down to point forward. A Lunar aurora appeared in the blackness of space, flickering and wavering in beautiful fashion. There was also a very strange sound that accompanied it, like a chorus of countless voices singing at once. The needle on the Incarnameter rattled and vibrated at its upper end.

A beam of light appeared out of nowhere, passing just overhead with fire wreathing its surface. Any dwarf planets that had existed between Cardina and Admina had been obliterated decades ago. But the sense of gravity that shook the entire dragoncraft could not possibly be an illusion.

The Abyssal Horror roared, sensing the huge rock plummeting toward it. It generated two more new appendages, holding them out to catch the satellite. The impact was silent. The tip of the burning meteor instantly obliterated the spacebeast's arms and sank easily into the center of its enormous body. The beast that was an agglomeration of condensed darkness turned to dust in a single blow.

Abyssal Horror: Ooooooooooooo......

Its death scream overlapped with the explosion of the meteor; the combination rattled across the universe. Stica's eyes stung at the sight of resources exploding outward, from white to red to purple.

Stica: D...did they beat...that monster......?

She whispered, her voice trembling. But...

Laurannei: Oh...no! Not yet!!

Her second craft pilot always seemed to keep her cool and spot things a moment before Stica did. The fragments of the Abyssal Horror, which had appeared to be obliterated and burned into nothing by the explosion, were now moving. Each one was only a portion of a single mel in size, tiny pieces of the original whole. They wriggled and wandered away like a swarm of flies.

According to the records, the Star King had pushed the beast to this point, too. But he was unable to eradicate all the thousands of pieces of the Abyssal Horror as they escaped. So the beast fled to the ends of the universe to escape until it could heal its wounds and attack the stellar route again. This was only going to be a repeat of that legend.

Stica: No...you can't let it get away!! You have to burn all those things!!

Stica found herself shouting. But the dual swordsman and the dual dagger swordswoman did not seem capable of moving yet. And no wonder, after the tremendous exhibition of Incarnation they'd just managed.

The shards of the Abyssal Horror squirmed away, seemingly mocking the humans. And yet—suddenly the swarm of flies scattered. They buzzed and fled, disjointed, all in a panic. Stica held her breath and touched the main vision board, magnifying its image. She saw golden light. Something was there, shining bright and pure like a tiny Solus. She magnified it further.

Stica:......A person......

Yet another swordswoman. Hair like flowing gold. Armor of the same color. A brilliant-white skirt. And eyes that stared down her foes with the color of the blue sky.

Stica(mind):......I know her.

Stica: I...I know this swordswoman...I mean, this knight.

Stica whispered. She heard Laurannei whisper back.

Laurannei: Me too.

The golden knight looked exactly as she was painted in the huge portrait hung in the throne room on the fiftieth floor of Central Cathedral. She was one of the greatest Integrity Knights in history, who'd achieved great feats in the ancient Otherworld War and disappeared in the midst of the fighting. In fact, her name was...

Stica: Lady...Alice...?

The knight's hand moved, almost in recognition that her name had been called. She drew a longsword from her side with a smooth motion. The yellow blade reflected the light of Solus to an almost blinding degree. In their fear, the minute fragments of the spacebeast lost whatever controlling force they might have had, fizzling away in random directions.

The knight held the sword before her body. She called out in a voice like wind that blew through space. The dragoncraft's Incarnameter burst right off its mount.

Alice: Release Recollection!!

The sword blazed even brighter. Its body made a sound like scraping metal and fragmented into a million tiny pieces. The hilt was still in the knight's hand, however, and she swung it easily. The fragments spilled forth into the void, spreading like flower petals on a light breeze. It turned into a golden meteor shower.

Each and every little bit of light exhibited frighteningly precise aim, piercing the fleeing scraps of the dark beast. Each bit of darkness, once shot through, was burned away into nothing by the brilliance of the golden line.

Stica:......Incredible...

It was all that Stica could find the words to say. You could line up every last craft in the Integrity Pilothood, fire all their main cannons at once, and not hope to exhibit this much precision and power. When the last little scrap of the Abyssal Horror, the deadliest spacebeast in all of the Underworld, succumbed to a golden arrow, it let out a scream that put all its others to shame.

Abysall Horror: Gyeeeiiieeeooooo.........

And with that, the creature was finally, truly gone. Stica watched, dumbfounded, as the golden swarm of shooting stars gathered at the knight's hand and returned to being a whole sword again.

But if the golden knight really was the very Integrity Knight Alice of old, then who were the other two people? On the vision board, the knight returned the sword to her sheath and flew through space toward the warriors in black and white and dark blue. The three had a brief discussion, then turned to face Stica and Laurannei.

They were too far away for Stica to see their faces clearly. But she could tell that all three of them were smiling. Then the swordsman with the white and black swords put them behind his back again and waved to the pilots. In that moment, Stica felt some tremendous emotion she couldn't describe piercing her heart deep, deep inside its core. A kind of lonely pain that took her breath away.

Stica: Ah...ahhh...

She murmured. Quietly, Laurannei murmured.

Laurannei: Sti, I know him. I know who that is.

Stica: Yes, Laura. So do I...so do I.

She nodded again and again. It wasn't something she knew because she'd seen his portrait in the throne room. It was something else. Her heart. Her fingers. Her soul knew him. She felt the scent of honey pie, sweet and fragrant, tickling her nostrils. A calming breeze blowing across the field. The warm light of the gentle sun.

Faint laughter in the distance. In a daze, Stica put on her airtight helmet and pulled a handle on the right side of the pilot's seat. The temperature-controlled air squeaked and escaped. The layer of armor protecting the dragoncraft's control seat moved away, revealing the sea of stars overhead. Her second was opening her own cockpit as well.

Stica stood up in her seat, staring at the three warriors standing thirty mels away, waving at her. But in fact...there was another. Stica's maple-red eyes beheld the figure of a fourth person flickering into existence. He stood just to the left of the one in black, smiling gently. He was wavering like heat haze, translucent and fragile, like he might vanish if she took her eyes off him for an instant. The flaxen-haired young man looked at Stica and nodded firmly, just for her. She felt tears burst from her eyes.

The warm liquid trickled down her cheeks, spilling into her airtight helmet. In time, the sight of the young man melted away into the light of Solus as it appeared around the edge of Cardina. At that moment, the young Integrity Pilot understood: This instant, right now, was the starting of the new age that the Star King had prophesied.

They were messengers, appearing from the past to open the door to the future. Starting from here, the world was going to change. The door to the other world would open, and the tide of a new age would rush through it. That would not be the arrival of an age of paradise. This would be a time of revolution and turbulence in the Underworld, an age that none of them could imagine.

But Stica was not afraid. She couldn't be—not when her heart was leaping with joy. This encounter was something her soul had been dying to experience. She blinked the tears away and stared straight ahead.

From a standing position, she reached to tilt the control rod forward. The damaged dragoncraft wing took on a blue glow. The eternal flame elements breathed, putting a tiny bit of life into the craft.

She looked over to Laurannei, and the two of them shared a knowing glance.

The girl of the Underworld, Integrity Pilot Stica Schtrinen, gently flew her dragon along. Onward toward the unfamiliar strangers waving at her.

Toward the door to the new era.

Toward the future.

And there you go. There marks the end of the Sword Art Online: Alicization, War of Underworld. It has truly been a journey writing this book. Sword Art Online was my very first book, and I had some trouble here and there. I've written this book since 2020, and now reached its conclusion in 2023. After three years of writing, Zora's journey has truly come to an END.

I Truly enjoyed it, and sometimes thought of myself as Zora the Triple Bladed Swordsman in the Night Sky. From the day his parents was framed and their death. Zora's journey from one family to another. Meeting Rumia, and going into Online Gaming. And her death, meeting Philia, Kirito, and Asuna, the three people whom helped him the most in SAO. Then Suguha from ALO. Sinon from GGO. And Eugeo and Alice from Underworld.

And lastly, to all you readers who followed along with the story to this point, my undying gratitude.
But, that doesn't mean its finish. I was thinking of writing Progressive, but that's a story for another time.
Thank you all so much. I hope you'll continue to love the SAO series.
And finally Last.

Zora will Return!