4Author's Note
You guys are gonna be so pissed at me. A month of going on about the fifth fic in the pentalogy, and the first release of it is this? Well, in my defense, the original prologue was twice this length and still gaining words. I decided it'd be better to split it up, so here we are with this two-thousand word piece of worthlessness that most of you have probably read before. Chapter one is already complete, though, so you'll see that in a couple days.
The first chapter, which I will release on Saturday, will have original content. After all, Kiriko (female Kirito, see warnings below) obviously has no idea who Kikuoka Seijirou is due to the amnesia preventing him from getting use out of her. So there's already a major divergence from canon.
Anyway, here's the standard warnings:
This is the sequel to an unfinished fanfic (which is also the sequel to another unfinished fanfic), and as such, will contain spoilers for the fics that come before it chronologically. Most of them are very minor, but others can be major. It just depends on what it is. In the case of this story, it plays off of the "true ending" of ALO: Path to Recollection. There are three planned endings to that fic, two of which are pairing routes and one of which is the true end.
Female Kirito. At this point in the series, changing Kiriko back to a male would be even weirder than keeping her as is.
Yuri, as if it weren't obvious by my track record. Seriously, nothing on this account has ever been straight romance.
If you're still reading, good for you! You'll probably enjoy this fic once it gets past the necessary evil of using a novel as a baseline (in other words, from chapter one onward).
Sword Art Online: The Strongest Warrior
Prologue: True Power
"I'm telling you, the theory that «AGI» is the best stat is total nonsense," screeched a high-pitched male voice, echoing off the walls of the spacious tavern. "Sure, Agility is an important stat. Having a high attack speed and dodging ability were enough to make you one of the best… until now."
The owner of the cocky voice was a player in a four-sided holographic panel, floating high in the air in the middle of the dimly-lit establishment. The panel played a popular program called «This Week's Winners» on the net channel MMO Stream. You could watch their video on real TVs or computers, but given that they also streamed into the inns and pubs of countless VRMMO worlds, most players preferred to watch it in-game.
Especially when the segment's guest happened to be from their world.
"But that's all in the past now," he followed up his earlier cocky remark with another. "I've got one simple message for all my buddies who wasted their lives raising AGI for the past eight months: rest in pieces."
His obnoxious taunt got met with boos and jeers from the large pub, and a few glass bottles and beer mugs flew across the room, smashing against the wall into little polygonal shards.
However, one man did not join in the shouting. He waited on the sofa in the back, his body curled up into a ball. His red eyes watched the rest of the tavern with a cold stare from under the low hood of his black cloak and through the eye holes of his skeleton mask.
The gloating man in the program was bad enough, but the slack-faced idiots gazing at the holo-TV were even worse. They all booed and shouted, but it was almost more of a game to them than a serious protest.
He couldn't understand why they acted to empty-headed. The man on the program had seized the mantle of the game's best player through pure luck, and had since become its greatest exploiter as well. He was taking a share of the subscription fee that every player in the game paid, reveling in his pro gamer status.
Everyone must have felt some jealousy and hatred of the gloating champion. If those dark emotions were ugly, then hiding them and pretending to laugh it off was both ugly and farcical.
The man felt his entire body tense beneath the cloak he wore. A breath hissed between his clenched teeth, sounding slightly distorted as it escaped his skeleton mask. It wasn't time yet. He'd draw his weapon a little later.
Back on the holo-panel, the camera zoomed out to show the program's host sitting to the right of the champion, as well as another person on his left. The host, a girl aptly dressed in techno-pop fashion, bubbled out a high-pitched response.
"Those are some pretty powerful words, but I guess I should expect that from the top player of «Sword Art Online», the most hardcore of all the VRMMOs."
"Well, I figured I'd only get one chance to be on MMO Stream, so I had to say my piece while I could," he explained himself while still maintaining his confident look.
"Oh, but you'll be competing in the next «Ballad of Blades», won't you?" the host asked immediately following his elaboration.
"Of course," he replied directly at the camera, brushing back his long, bluish silver hair. "And I'm in it to win it."
The tavern erupted into boos again. MMO stream wasn't produced specifically for Sword Art Online (SAO for short), but the guests and host were all in avatar form. This Week's Winners was an interview program that hosted the best players from various virtual reality massive multiplayer games, and the current guests were the champion and runner up of the Ballad of Blades, the tournament held the month before in SAO.
"The thing is, Zexceed," the runner-up interrupted, clearly tired of hearing the silver-haired man gloat. "The BoB's quarterfinals are all about random solo encounters. There's no guarantee that you'll get the same matchups and results a second time, so it's rather silly to act like this victory was guaranteed by your player build, if you ask me."
"No way. This result was the manifestation of a general trend in SAO. I realize you don't want to admit this, Yamikaze, as you're running an Agility build," the champion retorted. "It's true that until now, pumping up your AGI so you could activate «sword skills» much faster was the prevailing style. The bonus to movement speed also helped with dodging the opponent's attacks as well, which helps make up for the paper-thin defenses. But unlike a single-player game, the balance of an MMO changes over time. When you're dealing with level-based systems, you can't rearrange your stats freely, so you have to allocate those points with an eye toward the future."
As he continued to talk, Yamikaze only grimaced. "The best style in one level zone might not be the best in the next. You understand that, right? The blades we'll see next will have higher and higher Strength requirements to equip, and the same goes for armor with VIT. The idea that you can just dodge your way out of every encounter is going the way of the dodo. The final battle between myself and Yamikaze was a classic example of that process. Most of your sword skill damage was neutralized by my heavy armor, and yet almost every attack I made landed for serious damage. I'll say it right now: we're entering the age of the STR-VIT build.
The man named Yamikaze grimaced with displeasure. "But… that's only because you succeeded in getting a rare sword with a strength requirement just within your grasp, right before the tournament started. How much did you pay for that?"
"Nuh-uh, that was a drop, fair and square. But if you want to put it like that, the greatest stat of all is your real life luck, ha-ha-ha!"
The man on the sofa moved his right hand as he stared at the laughing, silver-haired Zexceed on the holo-panel with complete animosity. He found the grip sticking out of a slot on the belt surrounding his waist and squeezed the strip-leather handle. Very soon. It would happen very soon. He checked the time readout in the corner of his vision. One minute and eighteen seconds left.
At the table nearest to him, two players nursed their mugs and muttered to themselves.
"That bastard. Listen to him prattle on. Who do you think started the whole AGI build movement in the first place? It was Zexceed!" the closer one complained about the irony of the situation.
"Now it looks like it was all a trap to draw the player-base in the wrong direction. And boy did we all fall for it good," the other one assessed grimly.
"You think his new strength and vitality build is a bluff, too?" came the obvious question.
"Makes you wonder what'll come next. Boosting luck?"
"You should try it, man."
"No way in hell."
They both began to cackle. The sound only made the man's anger hotter. How could they laugh like that, knowing they'd been fooled? It made absolutely no sense.
But that dumb laughing will cease soon enough. Once they see true power – who the real champion is.
The time had arrived.
He stood without a sound, striding between the tables toward the holo-panel one step at a time. No one paid him any mind, but they'd all be focused on him very soon.
"Fools… you will know true terror as it shakes to your core," he spoke aloud right as he came to a stop just a foot from the holo-panel. He pulled a black, circular weapon from the large slot on his belt – a chakram.
It had a darkness that seemed to cast a shadow on darkness itself, with black skull engravings on the flat of its circular blade. By all standards, it looked like just a regular, albeit scarily-designed, chakram, nothing special.
But this weapon – all of his weapons – had true power.
He gripped it tighter, bringing it back over his shoulder. It began to glow bright yellow, signaling the startup of a sword skill's charging animation. The way he had begun to charge it, it would end up flying right at the cockily laughing Zexceed's forehead.
He continued to charge up his skill, while a bit of murmuring broke out around him. Although PKing could be done with little penalty in SAO, the exception was in town, where attacking others was impossible without starting a duel. He could launch his sword skill at the holo-panel, but not only would it not harm Zexceed or any of the players in the bar, it wouldn't even do anything to the environment.
His pointless display caused a few stifled giggles to bubble up around him, but her continued to charge up his skill, undeterred by the ridicule he received. In the holo-panel, Zexceed continued to taunt Yamikaze and the rest of the player base.
Somewhere in the real world, Zexceed's real body was lying down, wearing an «AmuSphere» on his head, while his consciousness was logged into the MMO Stream virtual studio. He would, of course, have no way of knowing that there was a player aiming a sword skill at his image on a holographic screen in a certain pub in the business area of the «Starting City», the capital of floor one of Sword Art Online.
Despite knowing this full well, the man opened his mouth and shouted for everyone in the bar to hear. "Zexceed! False victor! Taste the judgment of true power!"
With the shocked stares of everyone in the room placed on him, he raised his left arm, tracing a cross with his fingertips from forehead to waist, then left shoulder to right. Then, as he lowered his left hand, he released the chakram in his right, and it flew through the silver-haired champion's image in a matter of seconds, creating a brief shimmering effect where it passed through Zexceed's forehead.
That was it. The winner of the Ballad of Blades still continued to chatter as if nothing had happened – and for him, it was true.
Actual laughter broke out at that point. Some of the crowd groaned and muttered to themselves about how embarrassing it was to see a newb do that. Meanwhile, Zexceed continued to speak in a voice that rose above the murmuring.
"Don't you see, even if you include stat distribution and skill selection, the ultimate factor is the player's ski—"
He stopped his taunt midsentence. The pub began to focus on the strange occurrence on the holo-panel.
The champion froze in place, his eyes wide and mouth hanging open. Then slowly, ever so slowly, his hand rose to clutch at his chest. Then, in the next moment, he disappeared, leaving only a 3d-modeled chair in his wake. The host quickly spoke up about this strange happening.
"Uh-oh, looks like he lost connection. Don't change that channel folks, I'm sure he'll be right back with us…"
But no one in the pub heard her. In dead silence, they all stared at the man again – this time, however, in shock instead of amusement.
He caught the chakram as it flew back to him with the completion of his skill, then lowered his hand to his side. He then slowly turned around, his eyes lingering upon the various occupants of the room. Once he had completed a full rotation, he held the chakram high and drew a short sword from the scabbard at his waist, pulling it out from under his cloak and holding it level with his other weapon.
"This is the true power, the true strength! Carve this name and the terror it commands into your hearts, you fools!"
He took a deep breath, then expelled it as he continued. "My name, and the name of my weapons, is… «Death Blade»!"
After returning his weapons to their slots, he swiped open the menu with his left hand. As he hit the logout button, he felt a tremendous sense of triumph, but even that came second to the burning hunger for more.
Author's Note
Okay, to be fair, this part was kinda necessary to set the scene. By the way, for those of you who remember the true identity of canon Death Gun, and who have read how I introduced that character in Transcendent Bonds… well, you obviously know something's weird here.
Also, did anyone notice that I changed my frequency of using the «» marks? In this story, I'm only going to use them in-game, and only when something is first mentioned. Hopefully that will lessen the constant view of those marks that I noticed in other fics of mine.
So anyway, new chapter in two days! It'll be a thousand words longer than this one without the author notes, so hopefully it'll be a bit more… satisfying.
Anyway, I decided I was tired of waiting on my cover artist to finish the cover for this. I'll just edit it in when it's done, I guess. If you're reading this, ForteDragon, I haven't given up on you, but I can only wait so long before I have to take action myself.
That's enough out of me. I've got a long day visiting with family (by choice for once) ahead of me tomorrow, so I gotta get to bed.
See you Saturday!
