7

Out in the yard dusted with snow, the embrace of the chill morning air was biting, but even that did not drive all of the fogginess from my head.

I shook my head a few times and headed resolutely for the wash station in the corner of the open space. I twisted the old-fashioned silver faucet and held out my hands to catch the falling water.

It was so cold, it seemed like the pipes should be frozen. But I splashed water on my face nonetheless, an attempt to force all of my nerves into activity. They screamed in protest, but were splashed a few more times before I tilted my head down and drank directly from the spigot.

As I was drying my face with the towel around my neck, the glass door to the house opened, and Suguha stepped out in her tracksuit. She was normally an excellent morning person, but today she looked as miserably half-asleep as I felt.

“Morning, Sugu,” I said. She tottered over to mumble a greeting, blinking heavily.

“Morning, Big Brother.”

“You look sleepy. When did you get to bed last night?”

“Umm…around four, I think.”

I shook my head in disappointment. “C’mon, kids shouldn’t be staying up all night. What were you doing?”

“Ummm…the Internet…and stuff…”

This took me by surprise. The old Suguha would never have stayed up until all hours on the Internet. She really must have changed in the two years I’d been gone.

“Just don’t overdo it. Not that I have room to talk…”

The second half of that came out as a quiet mumble. Remembering something from last night, I said, “Hey Sugu, turn around.”

“…?”

She did a half turn, her face confused and still half-asleep. I put my hand under the faucet to get it nice and wet, then grabbed the back collar of her suit and shoved a half-dozen freezing-cold drops down her unprotected back.

“Pyaaaaa!!”

Her screech echoed throughout the yard.

Suguha was still in a huff throughout all of our morning stretches and swinging practice, but her mood improved instantly when I promised to buy her a raspberry cream parfait drizzled with green tea and sweet-bean syrup from our local diner.

We’d both slept in a bit this morning, so once we’d finished our showers after training, the clock said it was already past nine. As usual, our mom was fast asleep, so Suguha and I cooked our own breakfast.

I was washing and cutting tomatoes into sixths, and Suguha was dicing lettuce, when she leaned over and asked, “What’s your schedule for today, Big Brother?”

“Well, I’ve got something to do in the afternoon…so I’m thinking of visiting the hospital before then.”

“I see…”

Once I’d learned of Asuna’s plight, visiting her in the hospital every other day was my most important custom.

As a sixteen-year-old in real life, there was very little I could do for Asuna—basically nothing, actually. Holding her hand and praying was the best I could manage.

The screenshot Agil had sent me flashed through my mind. Thanks to that picture, I’d made my way into the virtual world of Alfheim and, after two days, was very close to the location of the girl in the photo, but I had no proof that it was Asuna. I could be searching for her in the wrong place entirely.

But there was something to that world—that much was certain.

Sugou wanted Asuna to stay under forever. His company was involved in running ALfheim Online. The character data for Kirito and Yui the mental-care AI, both from SAO, fit right into the server…I didn’t know how all the pieces added up, but there was something there.

When the ALO server maintenance finished this afternoon, I would be challenging the World Tree in that land of fairies. Just the thought sent shudders of impatience down my back. It would be nearly unbearable to sit in my room, waiting for the maintenance to finish, wondering to myself if I was any closer to Asuna than when I started.

So before I did any of that, I wanted to touch the real Asuna, to feel her warmth. Sugou had warned me to stay away from her, citing her condition, but there was nothing he could do to stop me from visiting.

Once they were cut, we tossed the tomatoes, lettuce, and watercress in a bowl and stirred in some dressing. Suguha was quiet throughout, but she eventually gave me a serious look and asked, “Hey, Big Brother. Can I go to the hospital with you…?”

“Huh…?”

I paused, bewildered. Suguha had never actively tried to learn more about my experience in SAO before. I’d told her a bit about Asuna a while back, but nothing beyond that, not even my character’s name.

I panicked slightly when I remembered that two nights ago, shocked by the story of Asuna’s engagement, I’d broken down and cried in front of Suguha, but this time, I managed to keep my expression cool.

“Yeah…okay. I’m sure Asuna would like that.”

Suguha nodded happily, but there seemed to be a shadow behind her smile. I gave her a close look, but she only turned around, carrying the bowl to the table.

Nothing odd happened after that, and I soon forgot about Suguha’s awkward reaction.

“What’s up with your school situation now?” she asked, crunching her veggies across from me at the table.

It was a reasonable question. At age fourteen, the fall of my second year of middle school, I’d been taken prisoner by SAO and had not escaped for two years, making me sixteen now. This April, I should have been starting my second year of high school, but I hadn’t taken any entrance exams, and even if I wanted to, most of my memory was now stuffed with a vast amount of data related to SAO. It would take a long, long time just to forget all those item prices and monster attack patterns so that I could replace them with historical dates and English vocabulary words.

The fellow with glasses from the Ministry of Internal Affairs had actually mentioned something about this, but I’d been so concerned with Asuna that I didn’t take in most of that information. I strained to recall the fragments that remained.

“Let’s see…I think they said they were going to use an old school campus that was left empty after some recent consolidation to make a special temporary school for the students that came back from SAO. No entrance tests to worry about, and if you graduate, you’ll qualify to take a college entrance exam.”

“Ohh, I see. That sounds nice…right?” Suguha smiled for a moment, then scowled and mumbled, “I guess it does seem a little too convenient and unified, though…”

“Well spotted,” I said, smiling. “I think that’s exactly what the government wants. We were locked inside a game for two years with the threat of death. They’re worried about the effect that might have had on our mental health. So I’m guessing it’s easier for them to manage the situation by putting us all together like that.”

“Aw, I dunno,” Suguha mumbled, scrunching her face up.

I hastily added, “Well, regardless of any overmanagement, at least they’re offering a safety net. If I tried to get into a regular old high school now, I’d have to spend the whole year studying all over again at a cram school. Of course, they’re not going to force us to attend this temporary school, so I have the option of trying on my own, if I want…”

“I’m sure you could do it. You have very good grades.”

“Had, past tense. I haven’t done any schoolwork in two years.”

“I know! I could be your tutor!”

“Oh? Maybe I should have you teach me math and information processing.”

“Umm…”

I grinned at her look of awkward hesitation and popped the slice of buttered toast into my mouth.

In truth, I hadn’t been in any state to think about school recently. With everything that had happened and Asuna’s current plight, it was hard to think of myself as an ordinary student.

Even now, two months back into the real world, I sometimes felt lonely and vulnerable without my beloved swords at my back. There were no more monsters lurking, waiting to pounce, but I still felt that sense of anxiety. It would take a while to get rid of the sensation that I was actually Kirito the swordsman, while Kazuto Kirigaya—who attended school, took tests, and grew older—was only a persona.

Or perhaps it was because inside my head, I still hadn’t seen the ending of SAO. I couldn’t hang up my swords until I’d seen Asuna returned to this world. I had to get her back. Nothing could start until then.

I paid for two tickets at the terminal and we stepped off the bus, into the street. Normally I rode my bike to the hospital, but today I decided to give the workout a rest and take the bus instead.

Suguha blinked as she stared up at the hospital.

“Wow, it’s so big!”

“You should see the interior. It’s like a hotel.”

I waved at the guard as we passed through the gate. The walk up the tree-lined hill to the hospital itself was surprisingly long, and it took several minutes for us to finally make our way into the dark brown building. Suguha, the very picture of good health, looked around curiously at the unfamiliar setting, so I had to drag her over to the desk for our visitor passes before making my way to the elevator. We got off on the top floor and walked down the empty hallway to the last room.

“This is it…?”

“Yeah,” I nodded, sticking the passcard into the lock on the door. Suguha stared at the metal nameplate next to the door.

“Asuna…Yuuki…So her character name was her real name? Most people don’t bother to use their own name.”

“I’m surprised you know that. As far as I can tell, Asuna was the only one using her real name…”

I slid the card back out, and with a quiet beep, the orange LED turned green and the door opened. Instantly, the thick scent of flowers flooded out. I stifled the sound of my breath and walked into the chamber of the serene, sleeping princess. I could feel the tension in Suguha’s body as she stayed right next to me.

I put a hand on the white curtain and said the same quick prayer I always did.

Then I slid it aside.

Suguha forgot to breathe when she saw the girl sleeping on the spacious bed.

For a moment, she thought it wasn’t a person. It must be a fairy—one of the Alfs, the true fairies that lived on the top of the World Tree. Such was the otherworldly beauty of the sleeping girl before her.

Next to her, Kazuto watched in silence, until he finally took a short breath and whispered, “Let me introduce you. This is Asuna…Asuna the Flash, vice-commander of the Knights of the Blood. Even at the very end, I could never match her speed and precision with a blade…”

He trailed off and looked down at the girl.

“Asuna, this is my sister, Suguha.”

Suguha stepped forward and said timidly, “It’s nice to meet you, Asuna.”

The sleeping girl did not respond, of course.

She looked at the navy-blue headgear stuck to the girl’s head. It was the same NerveGear that Suguha had looked at nearly every day, often with hatred. Only the three glittering lights on the front face of the apparatus gave any sign that Asuna was alive.

The deep, terrible pain that Suguha had nursed while Kazuto was locked in the game for those two years was something he was grappling with now, she realized. Suguha’s heart quavered like a leaf floating on water.

It was too cruel that this inhumanly beautiful person’s soul should still be locked away in some other, hidden world. She wanted to bring this girl back to Kazuto’s side—to bring a true smile of joy to his face.

But at the same time, she couldn’t stand to see the look on his face as he silently gazed down at Asuna on the bed. She was starting to regret having come here.

When she had asked to tag along today, Suguha had wanted to know what her true feelings were, once and for all. Ever since Midori told her the truth, an itch had developed within Suguha, underneath all of the regret and longing of the last two years. Was it the close love she felt for her brother, or the romantic love she felt for her actual cousin? What did she want from Kazuto?

I just want to be with him forever…as a close sibling.

But was that really all there was to it? Could she truthfully claim that she wanted nothing more than to train with him and eat at the table with him every day?

These were questions she had asked herself over and over since Kazuto’s return two months ago.

She’d thought that by meeting the person who owned the innermost part of his heart, she might discover the answers. But as she stood in the golden, quiet hospital room, Suguha felt herself growing scared. She was afraid to learn those answers.

She was about to say that she’d just be waiting out in the hallway, trying not to look at Kazuto’s face, when he suddenly took a step forward and she lost her opportunity to excuse herself. He circled around the bed and sat down in the chair on the other side. Now he was front and center in her field of vision.

He grabbed up Asuna’s small hand, which was poking out of the white sheets, and stared silently at her sleeping face. When Suguha saw the look on his face, a sharp pain pierced her heart.

“. . .”

That look in his eyes. It was the look of a weary traveler in search of his fated lover after many long years…perhaps a journey that had begun in his previous life and that would continue into the next. Behind the gentle, caring light in his eyes, she sensed a deep, mad longing. Even the colors of his irises seemed different.

In that moment, Suguha realized what her heart truly desired, and that it was in a place she could never reach.

She couldn’t even remember what she and Kazuto talked about on the way back home.

The next thing she knew, Suguha was lying on her bed, staring at the blue sky in the poster on her ceiling.

Her cell phone was beeping happily atop the headboard. It wasn’t an incoming call, but an alarm she’d set last night before bed. The time was three o’clock, the end of the ALO server maintenance. The gate to the other world was open again.

She didn’t want to shed any real tears. If she cried here, she knew she’d never be able to give up on this. Instead, she’d cry a bit in the fairy world. Leafa was always peppy and energetic; she’d be back to laughing in no time.

Suguha stopped the alarm and picked up the AmuSphere sitting next to it. She put it on, lay back down again, closed her eyes, and sent her soul soaring.

When the sylph girl awoke, she was in an inn room on the edge of Alne, central city of Alfheim.

Last night—actually, early this morning—Leafa had at long last escaped the underground realm of Jotunheim. When she’d climbed the stairs carved into the roots of the World Tree, she was right in Alne where she’d hoped to be. The knothole she’d climbed out of closed up behind her in seconds, and there would be no turning back.

After that, she’d checked in to the nearest inn, rubbed her fatigued eyes, and then rolled into bed. She fell asleep immediately, logging out of the game automatically. She didn’t even have the strength to bother with reserving a second room.

Leafa sat up and went over to the edge of the bed. The bustle of town, the smell in the air, and even the color of her skin were different, but that stabbing pain deep in her heart had not vanished. She stayed hunched over, waiting for the pain to turn into liquid so it could drip from her eyes.

After a few dozen seconds, a smooth tone announced the appearance of another person next to her. Leafa slowly raised her head.

The boy in black’s eyes went wide when he saw her, but he recovered quickly and asked, “What’s wrong, Leafa?”

Something about that gentle smile, like a breeze in the night, reminded her of Kazuto. As soon as she saw it, tears sprang into her eyes and fell through the air like glittering beads of light. She tried to put a smile on her face.

“Well, Kirito…I…I’ve got a broken heart.”

He stared at her with his midnight eyes. She was struck by the urge to tell this strangely old boy with the very young features everything—but she clenched her teeth and held it in.

“S-sorry, I shouldn’t be telling you this personal stuff. I know it’s against the rules to talk about real life here,” Leafa hastily added, trying to keep the smile on her face, but the trail of tears did not stop.

Kirito reached out and put his gloved hand on top of Leafa’s head, tenderly rubbing it back and forth a few times.

“You’re allowed to cry when it’s hard—there or here. There’s no rule that says you can’t express your emotions in a game.”

There was always a bit of awkwardness around moving and speaking in the virtual world. But Kirito’s soft, sympathetic voice and gentle hands were smooth as butter. They enveloped Leafa’s senses and made her comfortable.

“Kirito…”

She gently laid her head against his chest. As each of the tears silently dripped onto his clothes, they evaporated with tiny glimmers of light.

I love my brother, she told herself, as if just confirming what she already suspected. But I can’t speak this feeling aloud. I have to keep it trapped deep in the deepest part of my heart. That way I might actually forget about it one day.

Even if they really were cousins by birth, Kazuto and Suguha had been raised as brother and sister for years and years. If she revealed her feelings, Kazuto and her parents would be shocked and troubled. Not to mention that Kazuto’s heart belonged to that lovely girl…

She had to forget everything.

Suguha, in the form of Leafa, let herself sink into the chest of this mysterious Kirito, and hoped that day would come soon.

They stayed that way for quite a while, Kirito rubbing Leafa’s head without a word the entire time. Eventually, a bell began ringing in the distance, and Leafa straightened up, looking at Kirito. This time she was able to give him a proper smile. Her tears had stopped.

“…I’m fine now. Thanks, Kirito. You’re very nice.”

He scratched his head and smiled shyly. “I’ve heard just the opposite plenty of times. Gonna log off for today? I think I can manage on my own from here…”

“No, I’ve come this far. Might as well finish the job.”

She leaped up off the bed, did a spin and a half to face him, and extended her hand. “C’mon, let’s go!”

Kirito nodded and took it, that usual slight smile playing across the corner of his mouth. Then, as though remembering something, he looked up toward the ceiling. “Yui, are you there?”

Before the words had finished leaving his mouth, the familiar pixie appeared with a sparkling of light between them. She rubbed her eyes with a tiny hand, yawning majestically.

“Fwaaaa…Good morning, Papa, Leafa,” she said, plopping down on his shoulder. Leafa took a good look at Yui and greeted her with a question.

“Morning, Yui. I’ve been wondering…do Nav Pixies sleep at night like everyone else?”

“Oh, of course not. But when Papa’s gone, I shut off my input systems and organize and analyze my collected data, so I suppose you could consider that a form of sleep.”

“But the way you were just yawning…”

“Isn’t that a part of the human start-up sequence? Papa does it for an average of eight seconds every time he—”

“Enough of that nonsense.” Kirito jabbed Yui’s cheek with his finger, then opened his item window and placed the large sword over his back. “All right, let’s go!”

“Okay!” Leafa agreed, slinging her blade across her waist.

As they left the inn side by side, the sun was just reaching its apex overhead. Most of the numerous NPC businesses were open, and the nighttime bars and mysterious item shops had CLOSED signs hanging from their doors.

It was just after three o’clock on a weekday, but because monsters and items were particularly well replenished after weekly maintenance, there were plenty of players active.

Leafa had been too tired this morning to notice, but with fresh eyes now she saw a score of surprises among the crowds.

The variety of races and players strolling around and chatting happily was stunning anew—she saw short, squat gnomes covered in metal armors and lugging huge battle-axes; tiny, harp-carrying pookas that barely reached her waist; and even mysterious Imps with purple skin under black-enameled leather. At one of the stone benches throughout the city, she found a red-haired salamander girl and a young, blue-haired undine man staring deeply into each other’s eyes as a cait sith with a massive wolf meandered past.

The sight was much wilder and more chaotic than the uniform green theme of Swilvane, but that liveliness was full of a buoyant cheer. Even Leafa momentarily forget the throbbing in her heart and let a smile steal across her face.

She noticed that part of her was hoping the two of them would look like a natural couple here, then hurriedly squashed that feeling. Looking ahead down the street, she was greeted with a sight that beggared the imagination.

“Wow…”

Alne was a many-layered city, jutting up out of the ground in a conical shape. Leafa was only in the outermost ring, far from the center, but she was still able to see virtually all of the city in its many-ringed wonder.

Looming over the exterior of Alne, and made of something obviously different from the light gray rock of the city, were numerous incredibly thick, moss-green cylinders. Each one was nearly as wide around as a two-story building was tall.

These giant cylinders snaking all over the center of Alne were actually tree roots. Headed downward, they pierced all the way through the thick surface layer of earth to the underground world of Jotunheim. But as seen upward from Jotunheim, they wriggled into fatter and fatter lines until, at last, breaking free of the surface, they all met at a single point hanging above the center of Alne. In other words, the city of Alne aboveground and the giant ice crystal jutting from the ceiling of Jotunheim were in symmetrical locations, with similar designs.

Leafa looked farther up, her back shivering with electricity as she did.

The roots met to make up the base of a tree so large and thick that any attempts to capture its essence with mere words would fail. From that confluence, the trunk shot straight upward, its bark gleaming a golden green from colonization by moss and other flora. And yet, the entire tree seemed to grow more and more bluish as it stretched deeper into the sky. Even higher than the sky’s blue, the branches were shrouded in a white haze—not mist, but clouds. Said clouds were a visual representation of the flight altitude limit, but the branches shot straight through them and far above.

Just before they turned invisible against the blue and white of the sky, the limbs could be faintly seen sprouting into a wide radial pattern. Each branch grew thinner and thinner until lace seemed to cover the sky, all the way over to the outer edge of the city where Leafa now stood. Based on the width of the lower limbs, the canopy of the tree had to extend through the atmosphere and into space—if such a thing even existed here.

“So that’s…the World Tree,” Kirito said beside her, his voice faint with awe.

“Yeah…It’s amazing…”

“And there’s another city on top of the tree? Which is where…”

“We’ll find the fairy king Oberon and the alfs, spirits of light. Supposedly, the first race to have an audience with him can be reborn as them.”

“. . .”

Kirito stared silently up at the tree, then turned to her with a hard look on his face.

“Can you climb the exterior of the tree?”

“The area around the tree is off-limits, so apparently not. Plus, if you tried to fly, your wing power would run out long before you got up there.”

“I thought you mentioned some people who stood on each other’s shoulders in an attempt to reach the branches…”

“Oh, that,” Leafa chuckled. “Apparently they got pretty close, but the GMs panicked and put in a fix to prevent it from working. Now there’s a hard-coded barrier just above the cloudline.”

“Oh…Well, let’s go see the roots.”

“Roger!”

They nodded in agreement and headed down the main thoroughfare.

After several minutes of weaving through the mixed parties on the road, a large stone staircase leading up to a gate came into view. Through it lay the center of Alne, which made it, in turn, the very center of the world itself. From here, the view of the World Tree towering above was nothing but a giant wall.

They were climbing the steps with awe, about to walk through the gate, when suddenly Yui’s face appeared from the top of Kirito’s pocket. She was gazing upward with an unusually intense expression.

“H-hey…what’s the matter?” Kirito muttered, trying not to tip off anyone around them. Leafa watched the little pixie curiously. But Yui simply stared silently toward the top of the tree, her eyes wide. After several seconds, her tiny lips parted and croaked.

“It’s Mama…Mama’s there.”

“Wha…?” Now it was Kirito’s turn to stare. “Really?!”

“I’m sure of it! That’s Mama’s player ID…Her coordinates are directly overhead!”

Kirito turned a burning stare up to the sky. His face was pale, and his teeth were clenched so hard, Leafa could practically hear them grinding.

Suddenly, his wings spread. The clear gray surface flashed white for an instant, and with an explosive bang! he disappeared from the spot he was standing.

“Hey—wait, Kirito!” Leafa called out hastily, but the boy in black was rocketing upward and accelerating. Leafa hurriedly spread her wings and took flight after him, completely bewildered.

Vertical zooming and diving were Leafa’s forte, but even she couldn’t catch up to Kirito, who seemed to be equipped with rocket boosters. The black shape grew smaller and smaller before her eyes.

It took only seconds to thread through the countless spires that towered over the center of Alne and into the sky above the city. Players lounging on the high terraces followed the sight with curiosity, but Kirito merely darted past their noses on his way ever higher.

Eventually there were no more buildings in sight, only the greenish-gold cliff that was the trunk of the tree. Kirito raced parallel to the surface like a black bullet. The white clouds enshrouding the trunk were growing closer and closer. Leafa chased desperately, bracing herself against the wind pressure on her face.

“Be careful, Kirito! The wall’s coming up!”

But Kirito didn’t seem to hear. He was like an arrow attempting to split the sky, flying with enough force to tear a hole in the fabric of this virtual world.

What drove him to do this? Was the person atop the World Tree really this important to him? Yui had mentioned a “Mama.” Was it a woman, then? Was the person Kirito sought so desperately actually his—?

Suddenly, Leafa’s chest twinged. It was a similar but distinct pain to the one Kazuto made her feel.

She lost her concentration, and her ascending speed dipped. Leafa shook her head to clear her thoughts, and put all of her mind into her wings.

A few seconds behind Kirito, she reached the thick cloud layer. Her vision went white. If the story she’d heard was correct, the unbreachable altitude was set just above the clouds. She raced through them, slowing only a little.

Suddenly, the world went blue. There was endless sky above in a perfect cobalt-blue shade that just wasn’t visible from the ground. Overhead, the World Tree stretched its branches as though supporting the heavens. Kirito was going even faster than before, heading straight for a branch.

An explosion of rainbow color erupted around him.

Just a few moments later, a shock wave ripped through the air like a peal of thunder. Kirito had slammed into the invisible wall and now plunged lifelessly through the air like a black swan hit by a hunter’s shot.

“Kirito!” she screamed, rushing in his direction. If he fell all the way from this height, not only would he lose all his HP, the ill effects would plague him in the real world for quite a while after logging out.

But before she reached him, Kirito seemed to have snapped out of it. He shook his head a few times and began rising again. Another collision with the barrier, and another impotent burst of light.

Finally at his level, Leafa grabbed Kirito’s arm and shouted, “Stop, Kirito! It’s impossible! You can’t get any higher than this!”

But his eyes were filled with a mad light, and he attempted to charge yet again.

“I have to do it…I have to go!!”

A thick branch of the World Tree split the sky in the direction he was looking. It was certainly in much clearer view than it would be from the surface, but the system’s level of detail made it clear the object was still quite far away.

Yui darted out of Kirito’s pocket. She sped upward on her own, leaving a trail of sparkling light behind.

Of course! A Nav Pixie’s part of the system, Leafa thought momentarily, but the invisible barrier repelled even her tiny body. The spectrum of light rippled outward like the surface of water, pushing Yui away.

But with a sense of desperation that seemed totally unlike a programmed object, Yui pushed against the surface and shouted, “I might be able to reach her with a warning mode alert…Mama! It’s me! Mama!!”

“…!!”

A faint shout reached Asuna’s ears, and she lifted her head from the table.

She looked around frantically, but there was no one else in the golden cage. The sky-blue birds that came to frolic at times were nowhere to be seen. There was only sunlight shining through the bars of the cage, casting shadows.

She put her hands back on the table, certain it was a figment of her imagination.

“…Mama…!”

That time it was clear. Asuna leaped to her feet, kicking the chair backward.

It was the voice of a young girl, as delicate as the plucking of a fine harp. The sound struck Asuna’s distant memories and reverberated throughout her mind.

“Y…Yui, is that you?” she whispered, then raced to the wall of the cage, clutching the golden bars and frantically searching the vicinity.

“Mama…I’m right here…!”

The voice seemed to echo directly inside of Asuna’s head, so she couldn’t tell which direction it was coming from. But, instinctively, she could sense that it was coming from below. No matter how hard she stared, she could see nothing through the white cloud layer surrounding the tree below, but that was the source of the voice.

“I…I’m up here!” Asuna shouted with all of her lungs. “I’m up here, Yui!!”

If Yui, her “daughter” from SAO, was here, then he must be, too…

“…Kirito!!”

She had no idea if she was loud enough to reach them. Asuna looked around the cage, desperate to find something aside from her voice that would signal her presence.

But she already knew that every object in the birdcage was positionally locked into place and couldn’t be thrown out of the cage. Long ago she’d attempted to send a message to the players below about her presence using teacups or cushions, but it hadn’t worked. She clutched the bars in frustration and desperation.

No…

There was one thing—one object that hadn’t existed here before. An irregularity in the otherwise pristine prison.

Asuna ran back to the bed and reached under the pillows, pulling out the small silver keycard. She returned to the edge of the cage and hesitantly reached out, clutching it in her hand. Previously, she’d been rebuffed by an invisible wall that refused to let anything through.

“…!!”

Miraculously, her right hand felt no resistance as it passed out of the cage. The clear silver card glittered as it caught the sunlight.

Kirito…please notice me!!

She opened her hand without hesitation. The card dropped through the air silently, glinting as it fell straight toward the clouds.

I slammed my fist against the invisible wall, writhing in frustration. My hand shot back as though rebuffed by a powerful magnetic field, and a rainbow ripple extended through the air from that spot.

“Damn…What the hell is this!” I rasped through gritted teeth.

I’d come so far—I was so close. The cage that held Asuna’s soul prisoner was just beyond my reach. And now my way was blocked by the unfeeling, unassailable wall that was the system’s programming.

A terrible, destructive urge pierced straight through my entire being, and then burst forth like white-hot fireworks. Two days of logging in to ALfheim Online, religiously following its rules in my quest to reach Asuna…It was as though all the frustration and panic I’d built up exploded at once. I bared my teeth and reached over my back, intent on the handle of my sword.

That was when it happened.

Through the rage burning up my vision, I saw a small light, flickering above.

“…What’s that…?”

I stared at the light, anger momentarily forgotten. The glittering object was slowly, slowly falling toward me. It was like a lone snowflake fluttering in midsummer sky, or a wafting feather of dandelion fuzz settling down after a long journey.

Still hovering in midair, I let go of the sword hilt and reached out toward the light with both hands. After several endless seconds, the silver object fluttered down into my grasp. I clutched it to my chest and carefully opened my grip, sensing a somehow familiar warmth.

Yui looked over from the left, Leafa from the right. Like them, I could only gaze silently at what I held.

“…A card…?” Leafa murmured. It did indeed appear to be a flat, rectangular card. The translucent silver surface bore no words or markings to identify it. I glanced at Leafa.

“Do you know what this is, Leafa?”

“No…I’ve never seen anything like it in the game. Try clicking it.”

I followed her suggestion, tapping the surface of the card with my fingertip. But unlike any other object that appeared within the game, there was no popup menu.

Yui leaned forward to get a closer look and gripped the edge of the card.

“This looks like…a system administrator’s access card!”

“…?!”

I held my breath, squinting at the card. “So…I can exercise GM privileges with this?”

“No…In order to access the system from within the game, you’ll need the console this corresponds to. Even I can’t call up the system menu on my own…”

“I see. But there’s no way something like this would fall down without a reason. I have a feeling…”

“Yes. Mama must have sensed us and dropped it down to us.”

“. . .”

I clutched the card. Just moments earlier, Asuna had been holding it. It was almost as though I could feel her will within it.

Asuna’s fighting, too. She’s doing her best to resist, to escape this world. There must be more that I can do.

I fixed Leafa with a stare. “Where’s the gate that’s supposed to lead to the interior of the World Tree? Show me.”

“Um…that’s in the dome beneath the roots of the tree,” she said, looking concerned. “B-but you can’t go. It’s protected by guardians, and even full-size raid parties haven’t been able to get past them.”

“I still have to go.”

I slipped the card into my chest pocket and took Leafa’s hand.

The sylph girl had saved my behind on many occasions. I came to this world full of panic, not knowing left from right, and I’d never have come so far, so fast, without her knowledge and her energetic smile. I knew that someday, I ought to tell her the truth in real life and thank her properly. It was with this thought in mind that I said what came next.

“Thank you for everything, Leafa. I’ll tackle what comes next alone.”

“…Kirito…”

She looked ready to cry. I squeezed her hand and let go, backing away with Yui on my shoulder.

With one last look at Leafa, her long ponytail swaying in the air, I bowed deeply and turned around.

By folding my wings, I put acceleration into my drop and headed for the very bottom of the World Tree. After a few dozen seconds of almost-blinding descent, the complex shape of Alne came into view at the foot of the tree. Spotting a particularly large terrace between two roots in the city’s top section, I prepared to land.

I spread my wings wide to catch the air and slow my descent as I gauged where to land. Despite my best efforts to cushion the impact, my outstretched feet hit the stone hard enough to cause a small blast. The other players lounging on the terrace turned to look at me with startled faces.

When they had all turned back to what they’d been doing before, I inclined my head toward my shoulder. “Yui, can you tell how to get to this dome?”

“Yes, it should be just up the stairs ahead. Are you sure you want to do this, Papa? Based on all the information, it should be nearly impossible to break through the gate.”

“I’ve got no choice but to try. Besides, it’s not like failing will be fatal.”

“That’s true, but…”

I rubbed her lightly on the head. “Besides, if I have to waste another second not trying, I’m going to go crazy. Don’t you want to see Mama?”

“…Yes,” she responded meekly. I poked her cheek and started heading for the large staircase ahead.

The area at the top of the wide stone steps seemed to be the very top level of Alne. The roots of the World Tree, which snaked up and over the massive conical bulk of Alne, all converged directly ahead, into one titanic trunk. But the diameter of it was so vast that from here, it merely looked like a curved wall.

But a stretch of that wall was decorated with two massive statues of fairy knights, ten times taller than any player. Between them was a stone door adorned with fine carvings. For being the starting point of the game’s final story quest, it was remarkably absent of any players. By this point, the supposed impossibility of the quest must have been common knowledge throughout the population.

But I had to get past this door and its guardians to the gate.

Hang on, Asuna. I’ll be there soon, I told myself, etching the words into my heart.

A few hundred feet later, I was standing in front of the massive door when the stone statue on the right began to rumble with movement. I quickly turned around, taken aback, and saw that the eyes beneath the helmet were glowing palely. The statue opened its mouth and a voice like rolling boulders emerged.

“O warrior ignorant of the celestial heights, dost thou seek entry to the castle of the king?”

At the same time, a yes/no prompt appeared, asking if I wished to initiate the final quest. I pressed YES without hesitation.

This time, it was the statue on the left that boomed, “Then prove thy wings can encompass the very sky above.”

As the distant thunderfall of its voice died away, the large door split down the center. Its two halves slowly rumbled open. The ominous sound made me think of the terrible memories of fighting floor bosses in Aincrad. The unbearable tension of those battles came back to me, stealing my breath and sending a chill down my back.

I had to tell myself that dying here was not permanent. Now that Asuna’s freedom hung on the outcome of this battle, it was truly the most important task I’d yet tackled.

“Here we go, Yui. Be sure to keep your head low.”

“Good luck, Papa,” she squeaked from my pocket. I gave her one last rub and drew my sword.

The rumbling finally stopped when the thick stone door was open all the way. Only darkness lay beyond it. I took a step inside, wondering if I should use my night-vision spell, but before I could raise my hand, a brilliant beam of light shone down from above, causing me to squint.

It was an unbelievably enormous round dome. The shape reminded me of the boss chamber on the seventy-fifth floor of Aincrad, where I’d fought Heathcliff, but this was several times larger across than even that.

I was apparently inside the tree now, as the floor seemed to be made of a lattice of tightly woven roots. At the outer edge of the space, the vines grew over the walls and stretched upward to form the ceiling. They grew more sparse the farther overhead they went, forming stained-glass patterns that allowed in light from above.

And at the very apex of that dome was a circular door. The ring-shaped gate was carved with delicate reliefs and composed of four wedge-shaped wings of stone that met at its center to make a cross. The route up into the tree was clearly through there.

I hefted my sword with both hands. Took a deep breath. Tensed my legs. Spread my wings.

“Go!!” I shouted to brace myself, and leaped with all my strength.

Not even a second into my flight, the luminescent spots in the ceiling began to morph. One of the shining windows bubbled forth as though giving birth: before my eyes, the light seemed to drip downward into the form of a human being, complete with arms, legs, four wings, and a roar in its lungs.

It was a gargantuan knight clad in silver armor. Its face was hidden behind a mask like a mirror. And in its hand was a sword even larger than mine. This was clearly one of the guardians Leafa had warned me about.

The guardian knight’s mirror face turned to look at me as I raced upward, and with another gutteral roar, it dove.

“Outta my waaaay!!” I screamed in response and swung. As the distance between us closed to nothing, I felt the cold sparks in my head return—that familiar feeling of all my senses accelerating that I’d tasted so many times in SAO’s death matches. At the reflection of myself in the guardian’s mask, I swung the broadsword with all my strength.

When our blades collided, a brilliant light ripped through the open space like lightning. My foe attempted to recover his balance and brandish the sword for another overhead slash, but I followed my blade’s momentum and plunged it into his chest. I grabbed the neck of the massive knight twice my height and pulled in close.

When fighting CPU-controlled monsters, the common strategy was to keep an eye on the damage-causing reach of the enemy’s weapon and maintain a distance at least that wide, but against such a large enemy, even a so-called safe distance would leave me with blind spots. Staying in my current location was dangerous, but I could at least buy enough time to regain my footing.

I pulled back the sword with my right hand and put the tip against the guardian knight’s throat.

“Raaah!!”

Thrusting my wings at full force, I shoved the sword with all of my might. There was the heavy chunk! of a hard object being split, and the blade thrust deep into the knight’s neck.

“Grgaaah!!”

For the guardian’s divine appearance, the scream that erupted from its throat was positively bestial. Its entire body froze, wreathed in pure white End Flames, and shattered.

I can do this! I screamed to myself. Statistically, this guardian was far from a proper floor boss in SAO. In a one-on-one fight, I had the advantage.

I brushed the white flames away and looked up to the gate—then felt my face grimace. Nearly every one of the countless stained-glass windows scattered throughout the still-distant dome was producing its own white knight. There were dozens of them—hundreds.

“Aaaaah!!” I bellowed, more to whip my frightened wits back into shape than anything. I would cut them all down, no matter how many there were. I beat my wings and raced upward.

Several of the new guardians descended to block my path. I set my sights on the closest one and swung again.

This time I focused on the point of the enemy’s sword as it slashed diagonally down at me. I stretched to evade its path, trying to avoid a collision of our blades, which would knock me motionless for precious moments. The maneuver wasn’t perfect, and I felt the sensation of damage suffered as it clipped my shoulder, but I ignored it and trained my every nerve on counterattacking.

My giant blade struck the guardian’s silver mask directly, splitting it in two. But the next foe was already descending through the white flames that erupted from its disintegrating body.

I gritted my teeth when I saw that this one’s sword was already in an attack trajectory. Judging that I didn’t have the time to evade, I held up the back of my left fist to deflect the swing. The resulting shock seemed to reverberate to the bone, and I saw my HP bar lose a full tenth of its value. But the deflection was successful at keeping the enemy’s blow from my body, and the momentum left the knight unbalanced. I brought my sword down on its neck.

Because my attack speed had been sapped by the force of the enemy’s blow, this swing was not a one-hit kill. Meanwhile, a new guardian swooped in from the right. I twisted around to meet the fresh threat and used the spin to kick the wounded knight’s mask with a booted heel.

Thankfully, my avatar had inherited the Martial Arts skill data of SAO Kirito—a skill that was nearly useless in ALO—and the resulting blow was strong enough to finish the job. The guardian burst into flame, the death effect distorting its bellow of pain.

In just the nick of time, I was able to stop the third knight’s swing with my sword.

“Seyaaa!!”

I walloped the knight’s mirror mask with my left fist. It splintered with a sharp crack, and the creature roared in agony.

“Fall! Fall!!” I screamed. I was possessed with a burning desire for destruction that hadn’t been present during the pitched battle against the undine warriors in Jotunheim early this morning. I thrust my sword against the knight’s neck and punched with my left hand, over and over.

This was the world I’d once lived in. Wandering alone in the depths of a dungeon, my soul battered by a constant stream of deadly battles, swinging my sword as though to build my own gravestone out of the corpses of monsters.

My fist finally broke through the mask, and a shining, sticky liquid sprayed outward. I followed the voice inside me that demanded murder, plunging my hand farther into the light. When my entire arm burst through the back of the guardian’s head, its body crumbled away into the familiar white flames.

My heart had been as hard and dry as stone back then. Beating the game and freeing all of the players was the furthest thing from my mind. I shut out all other souls, seeking only the next battleground.

Another four or five knights swooped down on me, brandishing shining blades and screeching like monstrous birds. A fierce grin stretched across my lips as I snapped my wings and plunged into their midst. My nerves trembled at the feel of the ferocious acceleration, and electric-blue sparks danced across my vision—the pulse connecting my brain to my false body.

“Raaaahhhhh!!”

With a war cry, I swung the massive sword in a straight, two-handed swipe. Their weapons deflected backward, and I cartwheeled through the air, using the acceleration to strike at their necks. Two dull thuds later, a pair of mirrored heads flew free. The flames of their deaths were like white thorns raking my nerves, and they only built up the blaze within me.

It was only in the arena of death that I could know I was alive. Only by throwing myself into hopeless battles, pushing myself to the absolute limit until I finally collapsed, could I live up to what I owed those who had died before my eyes.

I redirected myself without stopping the rotation’s momentum, striking at the chest of another guardian, my right foot like a drill. The resulting crunch had an unpleasant, damp softness to it, but I shot straight through the guardian’s body as it burst into flames. Two blades came from left and right as I finally came to a stop. I used my sword to block the right and my other forearm to block the left, ignoring the HP cost.

Wasting no time, I grabbed the right guardian’s wrist.

“Grrruaahh!!” Howling, I swung the creature high overhead and into the one on the left. A heavy thrust through both bodies, and they were dead.

No matter how many of them came for me, I would keep fighting. Just as I had been once before, I would be cleansed by the flames of slaughter, my heart growing harder and sharper…

No—that’s not it…

There were people out there who had done their best to give water to my parched soul. Klein, Agil, Silica, Lisbeth…and Asuna.

I…I’m here to save Asuna, and finally bring an end to that awful world…

I raised my head and looked at the dome. The stone gate was surprisingly close. But when I tried to fly higher toward it, something whirred over and pierced my right leg.

It was an arrow of light, gleaming coldly. A rain of them poured down, as though waiting for the moment I held still enough to target. Two, three, they continued to land, rapidly draining my remaining HP.

I scanned the area quickly and saw that some of the guardians had fanned out at long range, left hands raised, chanting spells in those unpleasant, distorted voices. Another wave of glowing arrows whistled down upon me.

“Gaaahh!”

I swung my greatsword to deflect the arrows, but several more struck true, sending my HP into the yellow zone. I spared another hard look at the gate.

It would be very difficult to defeat all of those long-range attackers alone, so I charged straight for the gate, hoping to power my way through. The hail of shining arrows pierced my body, but the goal was just ahead. I gritted my teeth against the blows and stretched out my left hand for the stone door…

But just seconds away, my back was jolted by a powerful shock. I turned back to see a guardian at point-blank range, mirror mask twisted in a triumphant grin, its massive sword stuck into my back. I lost my balance and all slowed down.

Like white vultures, a dozen knights swooped in for the kill from every direction. A hail of dull thuds rocked my body as their swords struck true over and over. I didn’t even have time to check my HP.

A vortex of black fire, tinged with blue, swirled around me. It took me a few moments to realize that I was seeing my End Flames. Small purple words floated up against the backdrop of fire: You are dead.

In the next instant, my corpse shot apart.

Like switches being flipped off, I quickly lost all physical sensation. I had a moment of uncontrollable panic as my memory flashed back to the final battle on the seventy-fifth floor of Aincrad, and the moment Heathcliff and I killed each other.

But, of course, this time I did not lose consciousness. I was only experiencing the proper “in-game death” I hadn’t tasted since the beta test of SAO.

It was a strange feeling. All the color drained from my vision, leaving only a purplish monotone. Directly ahead there was a timer marked RESURRECTION COUNTDOWN in the same purple system font. Beyond that, I could see the silver guardians roaring happily at their victory and returning to the stained-glass windows on the ceiling of the dome.

There was no bodily sensation. I couldn’t move, because the only thing left of me was the same tiny Remain Light that I’d seen from all the players I’d defeated so far. I felt lonely, small, pathetic.

That’s right—it was miserable. But that was what I deserved for thinking, somewhere in the deepest parts of my brain, that this world was still only just a game. My strength was only in the numbers assigned to my character, but I’d acted like I could transcend the game, surpass its limits and do anything.

I wanted to see Asuna. I wanted to be held in her warm, healing embrace, and to set all of my thoughts and emotions free. But I couldn’t reach her anymore.

The seconds ticked down. I couldn’t remember what exactly would happen when the timer reached zero.

Whatever the case, there was only one thing I could do: crawl back to this place and challenge the guardians again. No matter how many times I lost, no matter if it was even possible or not, I’d keep doing it until the moment my very existence was permanently scraped out of this world for good…

It was then that a shadow glinted across my vision, which was pointed straight downward.

Someone had come through the still-open entrance and was racing upward at astonishing speed. I tried to shout at them not to come, but of course, there was no sound. I looked upward to see the guardian knights dripping out of those windows again.

The white giants passed right by me, screeching in that skin-crawling way, bearing down on the intruder. I’d just learned from experience that they were too much to tackle alone. I prayed the person would run away, but my would-be rescuer was making a beeline straight for me.

Several of the frontmost guardians swung their enormous blades downward. The intruder nimbly darted away, but one of the delayed swings found purchase. Even that mere graze sent the fragile challenger tumbling away.

But the intruder used that momentum to speed even faster around the line of knights and onward. As the figure grew closer, the number of guardians protecting the dome grew and grew, thick in the air, their screeches echoing.

The attacker swung a long katana but used it only for defense, guiding the enemy into clumps and using them as a barrier to avoid attack from afar. The valiant flight of the mystery invader was touching, and more than a little painful to watch.

Once within range, I heard a passionate, teary-eyed scream.

“Kirito!!”

It was Leafa. The sylph reached out with both hands and enveloped me.

We were already close to the gate, and the knights crowded the space above to block us out, a multilayered wall of flesh. But once Leafa had me safe and sound, she turned and sped back downward toward the exit.

The chanting of a spell echoed forth from behind us, and promptly a hailstorm of bright arrows roared past. Leafa spun right and left, trying to evade the projectiles, but they were as thick as monsoon rain, and I felt the vibration of each one that landed.

“Hrg!!”

Leafa held her breath but did not slow her descent. The arrows thudded heavily into her, and I could see her HP bar fall below half. But the follow-up was not just arrows of light: Two guardian knights closed in from either side, their swords crossed at right angles.

She took evasive maneuvers via a right-hand tailspin, and successfully avoided one of the blades. But the other massive metal bludgeon caught her square on the back.

“Ah…”

Leafa was tossed as easily as a ball and slammed into the approaching ground. After several bracing bounces, she slid across the floor and came to a hard stop. Several of the guardians descended to the ground to finish her off.

She propped herself up with a hand and beat her wings once. That was enough to roll her across the ground—and suddenly my vision was full of bright sunlight. We were outside the dome.

Leafa threw her body against the cobblestones and panted heavily, chilled with fear. Somehow, despite the desperate odds, they’d made it out. She looked back to see the giant stone doors beginning to close and the white giants leaping back up to their dome. The event’s timer must have run out.

There was a small, rippling black flame in her arms. She wanted to cradle Kirito, to whisper reassurances, but now was not the time for indulging in emotion. She sat up and crawled over to the stone statue nearby, resting her back against its feet as she waved a hand and opened her menu.

Leafa hadn’t mastered water and holy magic yet, so she couldn’t cast the high-level resurrection spell. Her only option was to extract a small blue bottle called “Dew of the World Tree.”

She closed the window and popped the cap on the bottle, pouring the sparkling liquid onto Kirito’s Remain Light. A three-dimensional magic sigil very similar to that of a resurrection spell formed, and a few seconds later, the familiar shape of the spriggan reappeared.

“…Kirito,” she called out tearfully, still sitting down. Kirito returned a sad smile of his own, knelt on the stones, and put his hand on top of Leafa’s.

“Thank you, Leafa. But please don’t push yourself like that for my sake. I’ll be fine…I don’t want to put you through any more trouble.”

“Trouble? No…”

She wanted to explain to him that it wasn’t like that, but he was on his feet already. He spun around—and headed right back toward the door into the World Tree.

“K-Kirito!” Leafa called out, shocked. Somehow, she got her trembling legs upright. “W-wait…You can’t go alone!”

“You might be right…But I have to do it anyway…” he murmured, his back turned. Leafa felt like a glass statue bearing its absolute weight limit. She desperately sought the right words, but her throat felt burned; no voice would emerge. She reached out at the last moment and grabbed him tight.

She could tell that she was drawn to him. Perhaps this was just an escape, a different route for her feelings for Kazuto, but at the same time, she didn’t mind that. She knew this feeling was true.

“Please…don’t…Come back to the old Kirito…I…I want to tell you something…”

Kirito enveloped the hand that was holding him. His soft but firm voice flowed into her ears.

“I’m sorry, Leafa…If I don’t go there, nothing is over, and nothing can begin. I have to see her one more time…”

“I have…to see Asuna again.”

For a moment, she didn’t understand what she’d heard. The echo of his words rattled around in the blank space they’d created in her mind.

“…What…what did…you say…?”

He repeated himself, looking a bit curious.

“Oh…Asuna? That’s the name of the person I’m looking for.”

“But…but she’s—”

Leafa faltered a step, her hands on her mouth.

Images were blotting their way into her frozen brain.

Kazuto in the dojo after their sparring a few days ago.

Kirito’s defeat of the salamanders in the Ancient Forest—their first meeting.

Both boys would swipe their swords to the right at the end of their fights and put them over their backs. The images aligned perfectly.

The two silhouettes melted into a spray of light. Leafa opened her eyes wide, the words barely escaping her trembling lips.

“…Big…Brother…?”

“Huh…?”

Kirito’s brows suddenly knotted in suspicion. His jet-black eyes stared straight into Leafa’s. The light in his pupils rippled, quavered, like a reflection of the moon in water.

“Sugu…? Suguha?”

The spriggan’s voice was barely a whisper.

Leafa took several more faltering steps backward. The cobblestones, the town, the World Tree, the very universe around her—all seemed to be collapsing.

Over the last few days of adventuring with her new friend, Leafa had felt color and life return to this virtual world. Just flying next to him sent her heart leaping.

She’d be lying if she claimed that loving Kazuto as Suguha and being attracted to Kirito as Leafa didn’t fill her with guilt. But it was Kirito who had taught her that the world of Alfheim didn’t have to be just an extension of a virtual flight simulator, but another true reality. Because of that, Leafa had realized that the feelings she felt here were true, not just digital data.

She thought that maybe she could freeze the heart that beat for Kazuto, bury it deeply, and eventually forget that pain by being with Kirito. But now the human being who gave the fairy character life, the one who helped make this world its own reality, had come into a very sharp and unexpected clarity.

“…This can’t be happening…This is so wrong,” Leafa wailed to herself, shaking her head. She couldn’t stand to be here for a second longer. She had to turn away and open her menu.

There was no need to even look at the button in the bottom-left corner of her window, or the confirmation prompt it created. Eyes closed, she passed through the ring of rainbow light and was soon plunged into darkness.

When she woke up in her own bed, the first thing she saw was the deep blue of Alfheim’s sky. The color that had always filled her with longing and nostalgia now caused her nothing but pain.

Suguha slowly pulled off the AmuSphere and held it in front of her.

“Hih…huu…”

The sobs came pouring from her throat. Her hands impulsively clenched the fragile device, no more than two thin circles of plastic. It began to bend, creaking faintly with the pressure.

She almost wanted to break the AmuSphere, to permanently sever her pathway to that other world—but she couldn’t. She felt too sorry for Leafa, the girl living on the other side of the ring.

Suguha put the device on top of the bed and sat up. She put her feet on the floor, closed her eyes, and hung her head. She just didn’t want to think about anything.

A quiet knock on the door broke the silence. It was followed by a voice with the same inflection, though different from Kirito’s.

“Can I come in, Sugu?”

“No! Don’t open the door!” she shouted abruptly. “Just…let me be alone…”

“What’s wrong, Sugu? I mean, I was sure surprised, too…” he continued, clearly confused. “If you’re mad that I was using the NerveGear again, I apologize. But I had to do it.”

“No, it’s not that.”

She couldn’t stop the current of emotion from tearing through her. Suguha leaped to her feet and strode to the door. She turned the knob and pulled, and there was Kazuto. He looked at her with obvious concern.

“I…I…” Her feelings turned into tears and tears into words before she could stop them. “I-I betrayed my own heart. I betrayed my love for you.”

At last she had spoken the word love to his face, but it slashed her chest, her throat, her lips, like a knife. The pain seared at her, but she kept going.

“I was going to forget, to give up, to fall in love with Kirito. In fact, I already had. And yet…and yet…”

“Huh…?”

For several seconds he gaped at her silently. Then he whispered, “You love…? But…we’re…”

“I know.”

“…Huh…?”

“I already know.”

Oh no, she thought. But she couldn’t stop. She put all of her raging emotions into her stare and pushed on, lips trembling.

“We aren’t real siblings. I’ve known that for over two years!!”

No. Suguha hadn’t asked her mother to hold back on revealing that she knew the truth to Kazuto just so that she could hurl her feelings at him like this. She wanted time to properly consider what it meant, and what she could do about it.

“When you quit practicing kendo and started avoiding me years ago, it was because you learned the truth, wasn’t it? You were keeping your distance because you knew I wasn’t your real sister. So why have you decided to be nice to me now?!”

No matter how much she knew she ought to stop, she couldn’t. As Suguha’s words echoed through the cold hallway, Kazuto’s black eyes gradually lost their expression.

“I…I was so happy when you came back from SAO. I was so happy when you started treating me the way you used to. I thought you finally saw me for who I was.”

At last, two teardrops hit her cheeks. She rubbed at them fiercely and strained to push the voice from her lungs.

“But…after this, I’d rather you kept being cold to me. Then I wouldn’t have realized that I love you…I wouldn’t have been sad to learn about Asuna…and I wouldn’t have fallen in love with Kirito to replace you!!”

Kazuto’s eyes grew just a bit wider, and then his expression froze. After several seconds in which everything seemed to have stopped, his eyes wavered, then looked down. A single word came from his mouth.

“…Sorry…”

In the two months since he’d awakened, Kazuto’s eyes had always been full of a tender, gentle light when he looked at Suguha. Now that light was gone, and a deep darkness had taken its place. Suguha felt sharp regret pierce her chest as painfully as any blade.

“…Just leave me alone.”

She couldn’t stand to look at him any longer. Suguha slammed the door to escape the guilt and self-loathing that threatened to crush her. She stumbled back several steps until her heel hit the bed, and she fell over onto it.

Suguha curled up into a ball on top of the sheets, her shoulders shaking with the force of her sobs. The tears poured forth, leaving small blots on the white sheets as they soaked into the fabric.

I stood for a long moment in front of the shut door. Eventually I turned around, leaned back against it, and slid down to a sitting position.

Suguha’s suspicion that I’d been keeping my distance because she wasn’t my real sister was basically correct. But I was only ten when I’d noticed the blank field in the census data and asked my parents what it meant. But there hadn’t been a direct intention behind my estrangement with her.

That was the point when I’d lost my perspective of personal distance with everyone, not just Suguha.

I had no memories of my actual parents, and Minetake and Midori Kirigaya had loved me exactly the same both before and after I knew the truth, so it wasn’t an external shock to my system. Instead, the event planted the seed of a very odd sensation deep inside of me, where it took root.

It was a kind of suspicion, a constant question in every interaction: Who is this person, really? No matter how long I’d known them, no matter how well I knew them—even my own family members—I couldn’t prevent that thought from running through my brain: Who is this person, exactly? Do I really know them?

Perhaps that was one thing that drove me to the world of online games. On the Net, it was natural for every character to have a secret inner side. No one really knew anyone. Interacting in this world of falsehood where that was taken for granted just seemed comfortable to me. I plunged headfirst into Net gaming around fifth or sixth grade, and never looked back. It would eventually take me into a world that I wouldn’t escape for an entire two years.

If it weren’t for the whole “game of death” thing, Sword Art Online could have been my paradise. A world of false dreams from which I’d never wake. An unending virtual realm.

I tried to play the role of Kirito, just an unfamiliar nobody.

But being trapped in that full-dive experience and unable to escape eventually led me to one pure truth:

The real world and the false world were ultimately the same thing.

Human beings only recognized the world based on the information their brains received. The only thing that made an online game a “false” world was that it could be left behind with the simple flip of a switch.

SAO was a world that my brain recognized with electronic pulses, and a world that couldn’t be escaped.

And that description matched the real world perfectly.

Once I had that epiphany, I understood how empty the doubts that had plagued me since the age of ten really were. There was no meaning to wondering who anyone really was. All you could do was trust and accept them. The people you knew really were the people you knew.

I could hear the faint sound of Suguha sobbing through the door.

When I first saw her face after returning alive from SAO, I was openly and honestly happy to see her again. I knew that in order to make up for the years of distance that my pointless issue had caused, I’d need to close the gap by treating her the way I truly wanted.

But it seemed that over those two years, Suguha had discovered her own truth about me. She’d learned that I was her cousin, not her brother, and the shift in the distance she felt was surely alarming and strange to her, a challenge to accept. And, assuming that she didn’t know the truth, I’d been totally unaware of what was happening to her.

I’d revealed my feelings toward Asuna on multiple occasions in Suguha’s presence. I’d even cried over Asuna in front of her. I could never have imagined that it was hurting her so much to hear that.

And that wasn’t all.

Suguha had never been one for computers and video games. It must have been because of me that she’d started on a VRMMO of her own. Suguha had spent countless hours diving into that virtual world, trying to know more about me, creating another version of herself. Leafa, the girl who’d helped me time and time again in Alfheim…was Suguha.

Yui had said the reason I ran into her first thing after logging in was possibly due to another person in the vicinity being logged in to ALO. It wasn’t just the local vicinity, it was from the same damn house; our global IP was the same. Leafa and I had been fated to meet this way, but even as Kirito, I couldn’t think of anyone but Asuna, and I hurt Leafa just like I hurt Suguha.

I squeezed my eyes shut and opened them so hard it was practically audible, then jumped vigorously to my feet.

Now was the time to do something for Suguha. If there was one thing the people of SAO had taught me, it was to reach out when words weren’t enough.

The loud knock jolted Suguha out of her detached haze, and she hunched tighter in response.

She wanted to shout out not to open the door, but the only thing that left her throat was ragged breath. But Kazuto didn’t turn the knob—he spoke through the door.

“Sugu…I’ll be waiting on the northern terrace of Alne.”

His voice was calm and gentle. She could sense him leaving her door. Farther down the hallway, the door to his room opened and shut, and silence descended.

Suguha shut her eyes tight and hunched up again. The tears that squeezed out made little plips as they hit the floor.

There was no shock or agitation in Kazuto’s voice. After all the hurtful things she’d said to him, he must have internalized it.

He’s so strong. I can’t be like him…

She thought of that painful night several days ago. Like Suguha now, Kazuto had been curled up on his bed. Just like her, he’d been crying for the sake of someone he couldn’t reach. He’d been like a helpless child with no solution to his problem.

The next day, she’d met Kirito. That meant that Kazuto had somehow found information that his sleeping beloved was in ALfheim Online—on the top of the World Tree—and thrown himself into that quest. He’d wiped his tears aside and grabbed his sword.

And I told him to hang in there. Not to give up. And yet here I am, still crying…

Suguha slowly opened her eyes. There was a shining crown ahead of her.

She reached out, lifted it, and set it on her head.

The pale sunlight falling through the wispy clouds seemed to soften the ancient stone architecture of Alne.

Kirito was not at the log-in location. She checked the map to see that the entrance to the dome was on the south end of the World Tree, while the north side featured a large terrace for events. He would be waiting for her there.

Now that she’d come this far, she was afraid to see him. She didn’t know what she ought to say, and had no idea what he might tell her. Leafa took a few dejected steps forward and sat on a bench to the side of the square.

How many minutes did she spend looking at the ground? There was a sensation of someone landing nearby, and Leafa froze, shutting her eyes.

But the person who called her name was not who she expected.

“Arrrgh, I was looking all over for you, Leafa!”

Despite the whiny tinge to the voice, it was energetic and familiar. She looked up with a start to see a sylph with greenish-blond hair.

“R-Recon?!”

The emergence of this surprising face made her forget the pain for a moment. When asked why he was there, Recon put his hands on his hips and bent over confidently.

“Well, I noticed that Sigurd had left the sewer, so when my paralysis wore off, I took my shot and poisoned both of the salamanders dead. Then I went off to find him and make him taste some poison, but he was no longer in sylph territory, so I decided to just head for Alne myself, and the only way to get through the mountains was to keep drawing aggro from all the monsters and foist the trains off on other people until I made it here this morning. It took all night!”

“So you’re saying…you PKed people with monsters…?”

“Look, don’t sweat the fine details!”

Recon excitedly plopped down next to Leafa, totally unconcerned with her observation. Then he must have realized that she was alone, and looked around curiously.

“Where’s that spriggan? Did you split up already?”

“Well…”

Leafa chose her words carefully, inching away to put more space between them. Despite the diversion, there was still a lump of pain in her chest, and no convenient excuse came to mind. The next thing she knew, she was baring it all.

“I…I said some awful things to him…I love him, but I said such hurtful things. I’m an idiot…”

The tears nearly came flooding out again, but Leafa kept them in. Shinichi Nagata was her classmate in real life, and this was only a virtual world, so she didn’t want to burden him with a flood of raw emotion. She turned away and spoke quickly.

“I’m sorry for being weird. Forget about it. I’m not going to see him anymore…so let’s just go back to Swilvane…”

No matter how hard she tried to run, in reality they were only a matter of feet away from each other. But Leafa was still afraid to see Kirito. She decided she’d ignore his summons, go back to Swilvane, greet the few people she liked there, then let Leafa go into a long hibernation. At least until her pain had faded.

Her mind made up, Leafa looked over at Recon, then abruptly flinched backward.

“Wh…what?!”

Recon’s face was as red and puffy as if it had been boiled. His eyes bulged and his mouth worked soundlessly. For a moment she forgot they were safe in town, and thought he might have been hit with a suffocation spell. Recon suddenly darted forward to grab her hands and held them to his chest.

“Wh-wh-what’s happening?!”

“Leafa!” he shouted, so loudly that other players were turning to look. He leaned over Leafa and stared into her eyes, despite her best efforts to pull back as far as possible.

“Y-you shouldn’t cry! You’re not Leafa if you’re not smiling all the time! I…I’ll always be with you, in real life or in the game…L-L-Leafa—I mean, Suguha…I l-love you!”

The words poured out of him as though he were a broken faucet. Rather than wait for her answer, he shoved his face even closer. There was a mad gleam in his normally weak eyes, and his nostrils were flared wide as his lips closed in on her.

“U-um, hang on…”

Ambushes were Recon’s specialty in battle, but this was beyond even that. Leafa couldn’t move for the shock that possessed her body. Recon must have taken that for assent, and loomed even closer, his body practically covering hers.

“W-wait…stop…”

When he was close enough that she could feel the warmth breath of his nostrils, Leafa’s stun effect finally wore off, and she clenched a fist.

“I told you…to stop it!!” She tensed and delivered a short but powerful blow to his solar plexus.

“Gwufh!!”

There was no damaging other players in the safe zone of town, but there was still a knock-back effect. Recon flew several feet into the air and crashed down onto a bench. He held his stomach, writhing in agony.

“Hrrrgh…Th-that was messed up, Leafa…”

“Which part?! Learn to control yourself, you dingus!” she ranted, finally feeling her face flush. The rage and shame of almost having been kissed roared within her like dragon breath. She grabbed Recon by the collar and gave him a few more good punches with her other hand.

“Geh! Agh! O-okay, okay, I’m sorry!!”

He fell off the bench and propped himself up on the paving stones with his right hand, shaking his head frantically. When Leafa relaxed her attacking stance, he sat up, cross-legged, and hung his head.

“Dang it…It doesn’t make sense…I thought it was just a matter of me having the guts to go ahead and tell you…”

“You…” she sighed, “are an idiot.”

“Aww…”

He looked like a scolded puppy dog. It was such a ridiculous expression that Leafa passed straight over exasperation into laughter. She let out a deep breath, half sigh and half giggle. Her heart felt as though some of the weight had left it.

Leafa suddenly wondered if she’d been internalizing everything a bit too much. She’d been gritting her teeth the entire time, afraid of being hurt. Because of that constant backward pressure, when the dam broke all those feelings poured out in a flood. She’d hurt someone very important to her.

It might be too late—but she at least wanted to be honest to herself. Once she realized this, the tension went out of her shoulders. She looked up and murmured, “But that’s the part about you that I don’t mind.”

“Huh? R-really?!”

Recon hopped up on the bench again and grabbed Leafa’s hand—no lesson learned.

“Don’t get cocky, buster!” She slipped out of his grasp and floated up into the air.

“I’m going to follow your example from time to time. I need you to wait here, though. And if you actually trail me, you’ll get worse than this!” She brandished her fist menacingly under Recon’s shocked face, then spun around, beat her wings, and flew up toward the trunk of the World Tree.

After several minutes of flying around the frighteningly massive tree, a wide terrace came into view below. The space was apparently used for flea markets and guild events, but it was empty today. There was little else on the north side of Alne, so there weren’t even any tourists wandering by.

A small black figure waited at the center of the wide-open space. It had sharply angled gray wings, and a massive sword slung diagonally between them.

Leafa took a deep breath, collecting her nerves, and descended to him.

“…Hey.”

Kirito gave her an easy grin, though there was some tension behind it.

“Thanks for waiting,” she replied. Silence followed. The only sound between them was the whistling of the wind blowing past.

“Sugu,” Kirito eventually said. His eyes were shining with serious intent, but Leafa cut him off with the wave of a hand. She beat her wings and took a step back.

“Let’s have a duel, Big Brother. To finish the one we started the other day.”

She put a hand on her katana and his eyes went wide. He opened his mouth briefly, then shut it.

Kirito’s dark eyes stared at her, the deep glimmer the only feature he shared with his real-life counterpart, and he eventually nodded. He flapped his wings and stepped back.

“All right. No handicaps this time,” he said, still grinning, and put his hand on his sword hilt.

They drew at the same time, the clear, crips sounds overlapping. Leafa held her familiar blade dead still at medium height, staring at Kirito. He lowered his stance, just barely keeping the giant sword off the ground. Just as he had the other day.

“You don’t have to hold back at the last second. Here goes!!”

They leaped forward as one.

In the instant they closed the gap, Leafa had an epiphany. That stance of his she’d thought so preposterous during their duel must have been perfected in this virtual world. After all, he’d spent every day of those two years fighting for his life.

For the first time, she wanted to know. Wanted to know what he’d seen, what he’d felt, and how he’d lived in that other world, that death game that had never been anything but the target of her hatred.

Leafa brought her katana straight down from overhead. In Swilvane they’d said her slashes were unavoidable, but Kirito evaded it with just the slightest of motions. His greatsword came howling up at her. She brought the katana forward to deflect it, but the heavy shock left her hands numb.

They each used the backward momentum of the deflection to leap. Beating their wings, they became two opposing spirals, traveling upward to strike again in midair. There was an explosion of light and sound, and the earth shook.

As both a fairy warrior and a kendo athlete, Leafa had to admire Kirito’s ability. He was equally adept at both offense and defense, as smooth and beautiful as a dance. The longer she matched his rhythm of strikes and sways, the more Leafa felt that she was ascending to new heights she’d never experienced before. None of the duels she’d ever taken part in here had ever truly satisfied her. She’d lost before, but it was always due to some special quality of the opponent’s weapon, or a spell. No one had bested Leafa through sword skill alone.

Now that she’d finally found someone who was even better, and he was her beloved, Leafa was filled with something like joy. Even if they never shared their hearts again, this special moment was enough for her. In time, she noticed that there were tears pooling in her eyes.

After several bracing clashes, Leafa let the momentum push her into a backward leap for some distance. She spread her wings wide to come to a halt, and raised her katana high, high over her head.

Kirito seemed to understand that this would be her final attack. He twisted, notching his sword even farther back.

For a moment, all was as still as the surface of a pond on a windless day.

The tears fell down Leafa’s cheeks without a sound, dripping off her chin and sending ripples through the silence. They moved together.

She raced downward, as if to set the air on fire. Her long katana traced an arc of pure light. Kirito was dashing up to meet her head-on. His sword also burned white, cutting the air in two.

Just as her beloved’s blade passed by her head, Leafa let go.

The masterless sword flew forward, an arrow of light. But she did not follow it with her eyes. She spread her arms wide, ready to embrace Kirito’s blade.

She knew this would not satisfy him. But she didn’t have the right words to apologize for the foolishness of her hurtful statement.

So this was her means of making amends: She’d offer this other version of herself to his sword.

Arms wide and eyes half-closed, Leafa waited for the moment to come.

But as her vision melted into white, Kirito flew toward her, his hands—empty.

“…?!”

She went wide-eyed. In the corner of her vision, she noticed that, like hers, his sword was spinning off through open air. He’d discarded his own weapon at the same moment she’d thrown hers.

Before she had time to ask herself why, they crossed in midair. Kirito collided with her, his arms also open wide. The impact knocked the breath from her lungs, and all she could do was cling to him.

Unable to cancel out the momentum, their bodies spun off through the air. The world turned into a blurry smear of blue sky and brown tree.

“Why would—” It was all she could manage get out, somehow.

At the same time, staring into her face from just inches away, he said, “Why did—”

They both fell silent and let inertia carry them through the Alfheim sky, staring deeply into each other’s eyes. After a while, Kirito spread his wings to catch the air and slow their rotation.

“I-I wanted to apologize, Sugu. But…I didn’t have the right words…so I was going to let you hit me instead…”

She suddenly felt Kirito’s arms tighten around her back.

“I’m so sorry, Sugu. After all that time away…I haven’t been seeing you for who you are. I’ve been so wrapped up in my own affairs that I didn’t try to hear what you were really saying. I’m sorry…”

The tears poured out of Leafa’s eyes as she in took his words.

“No…I’m the one who…”

But she couldn’t continue. Leafa sobbed audibly, burying her face in his chest.

She was still thinking she wanted the moment to continue forever when the two of them came to a soft landing on the grass. Kirito continued stroking her head as she sobbed and hiccupped, but a few minutes later, he began to speak in hushed tones.

“To tell you the truth…I still haven’t really come back from there. It’s not over yet. My real life won’t start again until she wakes up…so I still don’t know what to think about you, Sugu…”

“…Okay,” she murmured, nodding. “I’ll be waiting. Waiting for the moment you truly do come back to our home. I’m here to help. Tell me…about her. And how it was you came to this game…”