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IF THIS QUEST, THE “JADE KEY,” HAD DEVELOPED AS IT happened in the beta, the following should have occurred.
Whether we allied with the forest elf or the dark elf, ultimately both would end up dead. The elf we sided with would remain alive for a few seconds extra, long enough to say, “Deliver this key to such and such,” before perishing. The such and such being either the forest elf base on the north end of the woods or the dark elf base to the south. Once the bodies had vanished, a small bag of sewn leaves would be left behind, containing a large and beautiful key carved of green stone.
At that point, of course, the player was to take the key to the northern or southern camp; they could sell it at an NPC shop if they wished, but that would permanently prevent them from finishing the quest. If properly delivered without falling into temptation, the commander at the elf base would part with a special reward and the initiation of the next quest.
But I had no idea there was a different branching pathway in the quest, one in which the elf ally survived the battle. If I didn’t know it, no one else did—even Argo. We had to expect a totally new and unfamiliar story ahead.
A short distance away from me, Asuna, and the still-silent dark elf Kizmel, the forest elf’s body disappeared with a brief crackle. We received considerable amounts of experience and col, along with a couple rare items, but I didn’t have time to check that now.
A familiar bag of leaves was lying on the ground where the forest elf’s body had been. Abandoned items had to be claimed soon, before they disappeared into thin air, but I wasn’t even sure if I was supposed to pick this one up. What if I touched it, and that was the trigger that turned Kizmel hostile?
“Umm…gee, what’s this?” I said unconvincingly. Asuna bent down to pick up the key as though nothing was out of the ordinary, so I hastily grabbed the hood of her cape, which earned me a furious glare. Finally, Kizmel reacted.
She bent over and cradled the bag carefully in her black leather gloves. An exhalation of relief left her lips as she held it to her chest.
“…At least we can protect the sanctuary now,” she murmured to herself, put the bag in her waistpouch, and stood up to face us. The subtle way the ferocity returned to her eyes despite her wavering hesitation didn’t seem possible for a mere simple system-controlled object.
“I must thank you,” she said, her armor clanking as she bowed in salute. “The first secret key has been protected. Your assistance is appreciated. Come with me to our base, and the commander will wish to reward you for your help.”
Again, a ? appeared over her head to indicate quest progress. I was inwardly relieved, though I did my best not to show it. It seemed that the quest would proceed as normal, even after we beat the forest elf ourselves.
However, my original plan was to butt into their fight, let both elves perish, get the key, and return to the main town. We hadn’t taken a break to refresh and resupply since beating the second-floor boss. The elation at reaching a new floor was masking my fatigue, but exhaustion here was mental rather than physical and hit the player like a ton of bricks out of nowhere. My current partner Asuna had passed out from extreme exhaustion right after our first meeting down in the first-floor labyrinth. While it was rare to get that far, lapses of concentration led to mistakes, and controlling that fatigue safely was a vital tool for any solo player.
I peered sidelong at the fencer. She took a step forward without a glance at me and spoke to Kizmel herself.
“In that case, we’d be honored.”
“…”
I wasn’t the only one who held my tongue. Kizmel stared at Asuna in silence. NPCs in Aincrad—technically, the dark elf Kizmel was classified as a mob—did not respond to player comments unless they came in a clear yes or no form.
I coughed awkwardly, ready to give a simpler answer, but before I could get the words out of my mouth, the knight nodded and spun around.
“Very well. The base camp is through the south end of the woods.”
My quest log updated, and the ? over her head vanished. At the same time, a message appeared to the upper left indicating that a third party member had joined, and a fresh new HP bar was added to the list.
Kizmel strode off coolly, and Asuna sprang after her. I stood rooted to the spot for three seconds before hurrying off to catch up.
The elf must have picked up an affirmative nuance from Asuna’s reply. But as far as I knew, the NPCs in the beta test had nowhere near that kind of conversation ability.
Perhaps it was as simple as the NPCs’ response database being expanded between the end of the beta and the start of the retail game. But something about Kizmel’s speech and expressions felt too natural for that to explain it. She was just like any other player.
I walked at the rear of the three-man team, examining her color cursor just to be sure. It was the yellow of an NPC—technically, an event mob—and her name was listed as KIZMEL: DARK ELVEN ROYAL GUARD. Players weren’t allowed to replicate monster titles within their names, so this was proof that Kizmel was indeed nothing more than a moving object controlled by the system. If SAO was a normally functioning game, there might be a faint chance that she was actually being played by a member of the game staff, but that couldn’t be true now that it was deadly.
…It must be my imagination.
I sped up to draw even with the two women.
Being an overpowered beater might have created a dangerously unpredictable set of circumstances in this case, but there was one way in which it was a definite improvement.
Reaching the dark elf base required venturing off the path and through the woods, increasing the chances of enemy encounters. And given the thick, obscuring mists that gave the forest its name, it was all too easy to lose sight of one’s location.
But Kizmel served us valuably in more ways than one: Her saber made quick work of any foes who happened across our path, and as an elf, she seemed to know exactly which way to go through the heavy mist. As an admirer of efficiency, I considered taking this opportunity to wander around and fight more mobs with Kizmel, but I thought better of it. I didn’t want to give the proud, elite elf warrior a reason to be angry with me.
So it only took fifteen minutes of hiking through the misty forest to reach the sight of many black flags rippling in the breeze.
“That didn’t take very long,” Asuna said next to me, and I had to reluctantly agree. Kizmel stopped marching and turned around to face us. She spoke with what I thought was a note of pride in her voice.
“A Forest-Sinking charm has been cast on the camp. You would not have found it so easily without me.”
“Ooh, a charm? Is that like magic? I thought there wasn’t any magic in this world,” Asuna boldly remarked. I felt a chill run down my back. Aside from her overly informal tone, I wasn’t sure if what Asuna said was even understandable to the NPC and her preset array of responses. It felt like Kizmel might not be able to answer it, even if she understood the meaning.
The reason magic didn’t exist in SAO was to allow the player to experience melee combat firsthand in the VRMMO environment—they didn’t want to turn it into a long-distance shooter.
“Listen, Asuna, that’s not…” I started, trying to help Kizmel out by explaining the concept. But once again, my consideration was totally unnecessary.
“…Our charms are not up to the level of magic,” the dark elf said, her long eyelashes low. “If anything, they are just a faint afterglow of the great magic of old. When we were cut free from the earth, the people of Lyusula lost all magic…”
The shock of what she’d said hit me five seconds later—that was as long as it took to actually process what she’d said.
We lost all magic because we were cut free from the earth.
I had a feeling that she wasn’t just giving an explanation of why magic skills didn’t exist in Sword Art Online. This might be something that corresponded directly to the existence of the floating castle, Aincrad.
Now that I thought about it, I’d never had any exposure to the background story of SAO. I tore through countless articles and interviews after the game was first announced, but nothing more was said about the setting other than that it was a floating castle in the sky made of a hundred floors with their own little world maps. This was strange, because whether single player or multiplayer, the background story of an RPG, of how the world came to be, was usually just as important as the concrete game system itself.
Even in the beta test, the background of the world was opaque. I completed this campaign quest back then, but I recalled the story being rather simple and unconnected to the origins of Aincrad—the forest elves and dark elves were fighting over some holy “sanctuary,” whatever that actually was.
When the retail game launched and promptly trapped all of its guests inside, I felt like I understood why the background of SAO was such a blank slate.
The lack of story, of any kind of descriptive background, was a challenge from the developer himself. Kayaba was telling us, The stage is set; it’s up to you to create the story now.
That was just my imagination talking, of course, but it didn’t seem very farfetched at this point. In that case, the words of Kizmel the elf knight—as an extension of the SAO system—surpassed even Kayaba’s intentions.
I was possessed by an urge to overwhelm the elven knight with questions as we walked. Whether this “Lyusula” was a continent, a kingdom, or a city. Why the dark elves were torn from their home. Why they were trapped here in this floating castle. What this castle really was, and why it had been built.
Most likely, none of that information had any bearing on our primary goal: beating the game and returning to reality. The only reason I had started this campaign quest was for the plentiful experience points and high-level rewards. There was no emotional attachment to the dark elf forces. If Asuna had insisted, I would have sided with the forest elf man against Kizmel earlier.
I stifled my sudden burst of curiosity with a deep breath and continued my silent march behind the knight.
As we approached the swirling black flags, the mists suddenly cleared away as though they’d never been there, and my field of vision returned.
We were very close to the southern end of the forest; sharp-cut rock walls extended left and right. A narrow passage barely fifteen feet wide proceeded through the rock, slim pillars on either side. Atop the poles flew the landmark black flags, adorned with crests of horns and blades.
Standing before the two poles were dark elf soldiers, proudly bearing glaives and wearing heavier armor than Kizmel’s—though still light compared to the variety available to players. Our companion strode up to the guards.
When I did this quest in the beta, Kizmel had perished against the forest elf, and our party of four had to approach these guards without a go-between. But it was this situation that had me more nervous. Asuna leaned over and whispered, “I might as well ask…We’re not going to have to fight in this base camp, are we?”
“We won’t…We shouldn’t. As long as we don’t attack any of them, at least. Or maybe they just cancel your progress and kick you out…”
“You’d better not attempt to find out.” She glared at me, then summoned her courage and picked up the pace.
Fortunately, the guards did nothing worse than glare suspiciously as we passed them. After a short walk through the narrow passage, it opened wide into a round space a good fifty yards across. About twenty tents of black and purple in various sizes filled the space as glamorous dark elves strode about the grounds—all in all, an impressive sight.
“Wow…the camp’s a lot bigger than it was in the beta,” I murmured, quiet enough so Kizmel couldn’t hear. Asuna looked at me doubtfully.
“Was it in a different place before?”
“Yeah, but that’s not a strange thing. Most of these locations related to the campaign are temporary instances.”
“Inse…tanse?”
Asuna had brushed up furiously on her gaming lingo in the last month, but this term was unfamiliar. I explained as we walked toward the largest tent in the back of the canyon.
“It’s a location that’s created temporarily for each party taking on the quest, I guess you could say. See, we’re going to talk to the dark elf leader to advance the quest, but if another party comes along, that makes it complicated, doesn’t it? Some quests are like the ‘Herbs of the Forest’ quest on the first floor, and they just shut off the area from general access if someone’s talking to the NPC.”
“So…you’re saying that you and I have temporarily vanished from the third-floor map to move to this base?”
“That’s right,” I said, impressed by the speed of her understanding.
She narrowed her eyes and gave me a searing look.
“We can leave anytime, right?”
The proceedings had been rather irregular, but the meeting with the commander of the dark elf advance forces went smoothly. Of course, being presumably stronger than Kizmel, the commander could have slaughtered us in seconds if anything went wrong.
He was delighted at the safe return of Kizmel and the Jade Key, granting us considerable rewards and equipment. Even better, we had our choice of several items. The saber decorated like Kizmel’s sword drew my eye, but my Anneal Blade +6 was stronger, so I settled on a ring that added a point to strength. Asuna made a similar decision, choosing an earring with +1 to agility.
The commander finished by initiating a new quest, the second leg of the campaign, and Asuna and I left the tent.
Back in the grassy canyon, the ceiling formed by the floor above that acted as our sky was turning the color of sunset. It had to be close to five o’clock. Now that my nerves had eased, fatigue was thudding down. It was time to rest for the day.
Kizmel stretched in a realistically natural way and turned to us, a hint of a smile on her lips.
“Warriors of humankind, allow me to thank you again for your help. I hope that you will assist in our next operation.”
“W-we’d be happy to help.”
“Now that I think on it, I have not heard your names yet. What are they?”
My eyes nearly bugged out of their sockets again. I’d never been asked my name by a mob before—no, I couldn’t keep treating her like a monster. She was an NPC.
“Um…my name is Kirito.”
“Ah, your human names are difficult to pronounce. Is it…Kirito?” Her intonation was slightly off, so I repeated myself.
“Kirito.”
“Kirito.”
“That’s perfect.”
That must have been the system sequence to fine-tune name pronunciation. Somewhat relieved that she was finally doing something recognizably NPC-like, I watched Kizmel repeat the process with Asuna.
Once she was satisfied she’d learned the way our names were said, the lady knight continued, “Kirito, Asuna, please call me Kizmel. I will leave the timing of our departure up to you. If you wish to return to your human town, I can send you nearby with another charm, or you can spend the night in one of our tents.”
Finally, something going exactly as I remembered, I thought.
Back in the beta, I took a fair number of naps in the tents to save time on the travel back to town. The beds were nice, the food was good, and most importantly, both were free. It only lasted while the quest was active, but it would be a waste not to take advantage of that value.
Asuna read my mind like a book. With an exasperated shrug of her shoulders, she answered, “In that case, we will gratefully accept your hospitality.”
“Perhaps you should save your thanks. After all…”
That’s right, this is how it…wait, that’s not right.
At this point, we’d been granted the use of an empty tent, as its owner had died at the start of the quest. In other words, it was originally Kizmel’s sleeping chamber that me and my three party members (all men) had borrowed. But now the lady knight was alive. Which meant…
“…without a spare tent, you will need to share mine. It will be a tight fit for all three of us, but you are welcome.”
“No, we’d be happy to—three of us?”
Asuna stopped still. Kizmel seemed to be waiting for a more definitive statement, so I picked up the slack.
“Thank you. We’d be happy to use it.”
“Good. I will be here within the grounds, so call upon me if you should need anything. So long for now.”
The proud dark elf bowed again and strode off toward the dining tent. Asuna was frozen in place for three whole seconds, then turned toward me, her face shifting through about three different expressions.
“Is it possible to back out and have her charm us over to the town?”
Sadly, I knew the answer already. One of our party in the beta had tried that very thing. As a beater, it was my duty to pass on the information in my pocket.
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