Sword Art Online - Volume 8 - Early and Late Read online

  Asuna held onto the pink crystal as she looked tense and got ready. I can’t help but look at her face.

  “…What is it?”

  “Nothing…well, I didn’t think that you’d worry about me like that…”

  The moment I said that, Asuna’s white face was immediately dyed into the same color as the crystal. She then angrily said to me again,

  “Of…of course not! Wait, it’s not exactly like th…ARGH! JUST STAB IF YOU WANT TO DO SO!!”

  EHHH!? I immediately grabbed the pick again.

  “I, I’m going to stab then.”

  I declared, and forcefully took a deep breath——

  I then proceeded to do the beginner level throwing skill «Single Shot» at my extended left hand.

  My two fingers on my right hand held onto the pick, and with a slightly dark light effect, it pierced through my hand.

  With an impact, the uncomfortable numbness and slight pain passed through my nerves.

  The HP bar deducted more HP than what I expected, and I lost about 3%. Now that I remember, I swapped the ordinary picks with a rare drop.

  I endured this uncomfortable feeling and turned to look at the metal needle that’s stabbed into my hand. 5 seconds later, the red light effect flashed again, and the HP dropped by 0.5%. This is the «Continuous Pierce Damage DOT».

  “…HURRY UP AND ENTER THE AREA!”

  Asuna’s tense voice prompted me, and I immediately nodded and stared at the HP bar and the pick before heading to the gate leading to the area.

  The moment my feet stepped from the wet grassland to the hard stone floor, my sights see the words «Inner Area».

  And then —— the HP bar stopped dropping.

  Every five seconds, there would be a red light effect, but the hit points showed no sign of decreasing. As expected, any damage would be nullified inside the area.

  “…It stopped.”

  Asuna whispered, and I nodded and agreed with her.

  “The weapon’s still embedded in me, but the continuous damage stopped, huh?”

  “How does it feel?”

  “It’s still on my body. This is probably to prevent an idiot stabbed with such a weapon to enter the area directly…”

  “You’re that kind of idiot now.”

  On hearing that cold telling-off, I could only cringe my neck back and pull the pick out. The uncomfortable feeling passed through my nerves, causing my body to tense up. There’s no sign of any wounds on the back of my left hand, but the icy metallic touch still remained on it. I couldn’t help but blow the back of my hand and said,

  “The damage did stop…in that case, why did Kains die…? Is it the unique characteristic of the weapon…or some unknown skill…TWAAHHH!?”

  The reason for the final shout at the end is—

  Asuna suddenly used both hands to grab my left hand and pulled it in front of her chest before forcefully holding onto it.

  “You…wha…what…?”

  After a few seconds, the sub-leader let go of the hand and glanced at me before saying,

  “The remaining feeling of the damage disappeared, right?”

  “——U, un. Well, thanks.”

  The reason why my heart raced is most likely because I was shocked.

  It’s definitely just like that, definitely.

  10am. Yoruko walked out from the inn. She looks like she didn’t sleep at all as she continued to blink as she bowed to Asuna and me.

  I nodded back at her and first apologized,

  “Sorry for bothering you when your friend just…”

  “No worries…”

  This girl who should be slightly older than me swayed her deep blue hair as she shook her head.

  “It’s alright. I want to hurry up and find the culprit too…”

  After that, she turned her eyes to Asuna, and immediately widened her eyes.

  “Wow, that’s amazing. Are these clothes all one-make goods from Ashley-san’s shop? This is the first time I’m seeing someone dressed up fully in that!”

  …Another name? I wondered and asked,

  “Who’s that?”

  “Don’t you know?”

  Yoruko looked at me with an expression of disbelief, and then explained,

  “Ashley-san is a super tailor who’s the first one in Aincrad to master the sewing skill to level 1000! If you don’t get the rarest and highest quality materials, she won’t make them for you!”

  “I see!”

  I’m thoroughly impressed. Even someone like me who’s been fighting like an idiot only managed to improve the mastery skill of one-handed swords to level 1000.

  I can’t help but turn my gaze to Asuna and look at her from top to bottom, and the rapier user’s face immediately tensed up, screaming before walking forward.

  “It…it’s not like that!”

  ——I have no idea what that was about at all.

  Just like that, Asuna lead Yoruko, who seemed to realize something, and I, who don’t understand what’s going on at all, to that restaurant where our meal was interrupted.

  It’s still early, so there aren’t any signs of other players inside. We sat on the inner most table and measured the distance from here to the door. The distance is so far away, if we didn’t shout out, it was impossible for people outside the shop to hear us. I always thought in the past that we just needed to hide in an inn room and lock it up before saying our secrets, but recently, I learnt that it’s even easier to let those with great eavesdropping abilities to hear all our conversations.

  As Yoruko had already taken breakfast, the three of us only ordered drinks before getting into the topic at hand.

  “First our report…last night, we went to check the «Monument of Life» at the Black Iron Palace. Kains-san definitely died there.”

  On hearing my words, Yoruko gasped for a short while, closed her eyes, nodded and said,

  “I see…thank you for deliberately going over to such a far place to check…”

  “No worries. Besides, we want to know about another name.”

  Asuna immediately shook her head, and then raised the first important question.

  “Erm, Yoruko-san. I’m going to ask you some names you may not have heard of before…one of them should be a blacksmith called «Grimlock». The other one is a long spear user called…«Schmitt».”

  Yoruko’s lowered head suddenly jerked.

  Soon after, she did an ambiguous but definite action.

  “Yes, I know them. Kains and I were members of the same guild in the past.”

  This tiny voice caused Asuna and I to look at each other.

  Is that so? In that case, we have to come up with another hypothesis—did «some incident» happen in that guild in the past to cause this incident?

  This time, I’m the one who raised the second question.

  “Well, Yoruko-san. I know this may be tough for you to answer, but I hope you can tell the truth so that we can solve this case. We feel that this incident has something to do with some form of «revenge» or «judgment». Did Kains-san get killed because of what happened in that guild and was hated by the criminal as revenge…? I’ve asked this yesterday as well, but I hope that you can think through this again. Are there any clues or anything suspicious…?”

  This time, she didn’t answer immediately.

  Yoruko still kept her head down. After a long moment of silence, she used her trembling hands to pick up the cup to take a sip of tea before nodding.

  “…Yes…there really is something. I’m really sorry for not saying it…that’s because I really want to forget it…and I don’t want to remember it. Also, I thought that there’s no relationship between these two things, so I didn’t say it out immediately…but I’m willing to do so now. It’s because of «that incident» that caused our guild to be wiped out.

  ——The guild’s name was «Golden Apple». This guild was a weak guild that had only 8 players, and their aim wasn’t to clear, but to hunt safely to earn money for lodging a
nd food.

  But, half a year ago…autumn last year.

  We, who entered an ordinary dungeon in the middle floors, suddenly met a monster we had never seen before. It was a completely black cricket, fast and hard to identify…we immediately knew that it was a rare monster. Everyone excitedly chased after it…and someone threw out a knife. Coincidentally, it hit that monster by luck and defeated it.

  The drop was a ring that looked normal, but after inspection, everyone was shocked. It could increase 20 points of agility. I think this is a magic item that’s not even dropped on the front lines.

  What happened next…I guess you should be able to guess what happened.

  We split up into two groups, one where the guild members would use it, and one where we would sell it for money. After a very rough argument where we nearly started fighting, we voted. In the end, the vote count was 5 to 3 in favor of selling it. The middle floor merchants couldn’t handle such a rare item, so the guild leader took the ring to the bustling city on the frontlines and asked the others to sell it at the auction ring.

  We had to spend quite some time investigating the market price and a reliable merchant to auction it, so the leader intended to stay a night on the frontlines. I was excitedly waiting for the leader to bring the money back once the auction is over. Even if we had to divide it into eight, the sum would be pretty large, so I’ve been looking at the records to see what weapons I would buy from which shops or what personal branded clothing I could buy…at this point, I never expect…things ended up like this…

  …The leader didn’t come back.

  It had been past an hour since the following night when we promised to meet up, and the leader didn’t bring any news. There wasn’t any response even after we tracked where she was, and the leader never responded to all the messages we sent over.

  It was impossible for the leader to take the treasure and run away, so we had a bad feeling about it. Some people went to the «Monument of Life» in Black Iron Palace to check on the situation.

  And in the end…

  Yoruko bit her lips and shook her head sideways.

  Asuna and I don’t know what to say to console her.

  Luckily —— or we can say, Yoruko soon wiped away the tears and looked up, and then said with a trembling yet rather clear voice,

  “The time of death was the night the leader took the ring to the higher levels, past 1am at midnight. The cause of death was…continuous pierce damage DOT.”

  “…She probably wouldn’t take it out of the area if it’s such a rare item. In that case…it’s a «Sleeping PK»?”

  I murmured, and Asuna seemed to agree with me.

  “Half a year ago, not a lot of people knew about such a killing method, and a lot of people stayed overnight in public places to save lodging fees.”

  “The inns near the frontlines are rather expensive too…but this shouldn’t be a coincidence. The one who killed the leader…should be a player who knew about this ring…which means…”

  With her eyes closed, Yoruko nodded her head slightly.

  “The «Golden Apple» guild had only 7 people left…so it was one of us. Of course, we thought about that, but…we couldn’t track where everyone was…so we started to suspect each other, and the guild soon collapsed.”

  The bitter silence covered the top of the table.

  ——It’s really an uncomfortable story to hear.

  ——However, this really is something that can possibly happen.

  It’s not rare to see a harmonious guild collapse without signs of disharmony because of a rare once in ten thousands drop they got. The reason why we often don’t hear about such gossip is because the people involved mostly want to forget about these things.

  However, there’s still a question I had to ask Yoruko.

  I faced this older girl, who’s lowering her head in a depressed manner, summoned my courage and asked,

  “I would like you to tell me something. The names of the three people who were against selling the ring are…?”

  Yoruko was silent for several seconds, and then seemed to decide on things as she lifted her head up and answered clearly,

  “Kains, Schmitt…and me.”

  ——This answer more or less surprised me. Yoruko wordlessly watched me blink and continued on with some self-deprecating tone,

  “It’s just that the reason I opposed it is different. Kains and Schmitt were frontlines warriors and wanted to use it for themselves, and for me…it’s because I was starting to go out with Kains. I was putting my feelings for my boyfriend as a priority rather than the benefit of the guild. It’s stupid, right?”

  Yoruko then closed her mouth and looked at the table. At this moment, Asuna, who had been keeping quiet, suddenly asked with a gentle tone,

  “Yoruko-san. Did you…still keep in contact with Kains-san after the guild was disbanded…?”

  Yoruko still looks down as she shook her head slightly.

  “…As the guild disbanded, we naturally split up. We occasionally meet up to chat, that’s all…if we stayed with each other for too long, we’ll just think about that ring incident. It was the same yesterday. We only agreed to have a meal…yet such a thing happened before we had it…”

  “I see…I suppose you’ve been hit badly. Sorry for asking so many things you don’t want to mention about.”

  Yoruko shakes simply her head.

  “It’s alright. And…about Grimlock…”

  I inadvertently sit up after hearing her name.

  “…He was the sub-leader of the «Golden Apple», and the «husband» of the guild leader. Of course, we’re talking about SAO itself.”

  “Eh…the leader was a girl?”

  “Un. The leader’s really strong…but I’m talking about the middle areas…she’s an outstanding one-handed swordsman, beautiful and smart…I really admired her. So…even till now, I still can’t believe that the leader would actually be killed by such an underhanded method like the «Sleeping PK»…”

  “…Grimlock must be really shocked then. The lover he’s married to was…”

  After hearing Asuna mutter, Yoruko’s body jerked.

  “Yes. He was a very gentle swordsmith before this…but after that incident happened, it feels like he became really violent…he never contacted anyone after the guild disbanded, and his whereabouts are unknown.”

  “I see…sorry for asking you such troubling questions, but can you please tell me one last thing? About yesterday…do you think the one who killed Kains-san may be Grimlock? actually, the black short spear stabbed into Kains-san’s chest…we inspected it and found it to be made by Grimlock.”

  This question is actually asking her whether Kains may be the real murderer of the «ring incident» half a year ago.

  Yoruko pondered for a while and then nods her head with a slight action.

  “…It’s true…there is such a possibility. But Kains and I never killed the leader and snatched the ring. We can’t prove our innocence…but if the killer yesterday was Grimlock…he might want to kill the three people who were opposed to selling the ring, Kains, Schmitt and me…”

  Asuna and I sent Yoruko back to the inn she was at and handed her several days worth of food, telling her not to leave the room no matter what.

  We considered the difficulties of her not leaving, so we moved her to the executive suite that’s composed of 3 rooms linked to each other and paid a week’s deposit first. However, we can’t depend on playing computer games to kill time in Aincrad, and there’s a limit to being in a room when we’re bored, so we promised her that we’ll solve this case as soon as possible and left the inn.

  “…Actually, I’ll feel more secure if we can move her to the KoB headquarters…”

  If we move Yoruko over to the KoB headquarters and ask them for protection, we’ll have to tell the entire guild exactly what happened. In other words, the details of the «Golden Apple» disbanding will be revealed. I guess Yoruko refused us so as to protect Kains�
� honor.

  As we arrived back at the transfer gate plaza, the bell indicating 11am rang.

  The rain finally stopped, but there’s a thick layer of mist starting to form. I looked at Asuna, who’s dressed in black and dark pink through the mist, and said,

  “Then, let’s…”

  “…?”

  Asuna felt a little bewildered after seeing that I stopped midway through my sentence.

  It’s too late —— but I conclude that we should say something, so I deliberately coughed a few times before indicating,

  “Ahem, nothing. Un—well…that get-up really suits you.”

  Ohh, I said it now. Now I’m a first-class gentleman.

  The moment I said that, Asuna immediately gave a horrified look. She quickly pointed her right index finger out at me and poked it into my chest, angrily growling,

  “Ugh—! YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO SAY THAT WHEN WE FIRST MET!”

  After saying that, Asuna declares, I’M GOING TO CHANGE! and quickly turned back at a very fast speed. The side of her face was already red, but this must be because she’s angry.

  I don’t understand. I really don’t understand the so-called woman’s heart.

  Asuna used the empty house nearby to change into her knightly attire, swung her long hair back and quickly headed for me before saying,

  “Then, what are we going to do next?”

  “Ah, okay. There are several options…the first is to head to the middle levels to hear about this Grimlock guy and find where he is. The second is to interview the other members of the Golden Apple and verify Yoruko-san’s words. The third…is to investigate how Kains-san was killed. That’s likely to be all.”

  “Un…”

  Asuna folded her arms in front of her chest and started to ponder.

  “The first option is too inefficient with just the two of us. Based on our current hypotheses, if the criminal is really Grimlock, he would be hiding somewhere already. The second option…the other members are also involved, so we can’t verify Yoruko-san’s words…”

  “Eh? Why?”

  “What’ll happen if we get conflicting information from what Yoruko-san said just now? We can’t tell which side is telling the truth, and it’ll be more chaotic for us. We need objective views to help us make our decision…”