The demon roared with rage and attempted another downward strike. This time, I crossed my two swords and blocked it completely. As its stance became unbalanced, I decided to break free from my defending streak and launched a combo attack.

My right sword slashed horizontally towards the demon's midsection. My left sword followed immediately to cut vertically into its body. Right, left, then right again. I swung my swords as if the nerves in my brain were going into overdrive. The sounds of metal clashing resounded loudly one after another as white lights flared through the air.

This was the extra skill that I had been hiding, "Dual Blades", and the technique I was using was its high-cla.s.s sword skill "Starburst Stream", a sixteen-hit combo attack.

"Ahhhhh!!"

Paying no attention to the few hits that the demon's sword managed to block, I kept on screaming as I hacked away relentlessly with my swords. My eyes heated up, and my vision saw only the demon. Although the demon's sword still struck my body every so often, its impact felt like it was happening in some faraway world. Meanwhile, adrenaline continued to rush through my body, and my brain waves spiked every time my swords. .h.i.t their mark.

Faster, faster. The rhythm of my swings already exceeded twice the normal speed, but it still felt slow to my heightened senses. I continued my attack at a pace that seemed to overtake even the system's a.s.sistance.

"...ahhhhhhhhh!!"

With this shout I launched the last of my sixteen strikes, which penetrated The Gleameyes' chest.

"Kkaaaaaaahh!!"

When my senses returned, I realized that I wasn't the only one screaming. The huge demon was roaring towards the ceiling as ma.s.sive breaths streamed out of its mouth and nose.

Then its body froze, and as soon as I noticed that- The Gleameyes shattered into countless blue shards. Fragments of blue light rained down across the room.

It's...finished...?

Feeling dizzy from the aftereffects of the battle, I habitually swung both of my swords once more before simultaneously sheathing them into the scabbards that lay crossed on my back. I immediately checked my HP. There was a red line with only a few dots left. As I stared at my HP without care, I suddenly felt strength leave my body and collapsed onto the floor without a sound.

My vision faded out into blackness.

Chapter 12.

"...-kun! Kirito-kun!!"

Asuna's calls, which were almost like screams, forced me awake. As I sat up, pain spiked through my head and caused my face to distort.

"Owww..."

I looked around and saw that we were still in the boss room. Blue light fragments were still floating around the room. It seemed like I had only lost consciousness for a few seconds.

Asuna was kneeling on the ground, her face right before my eyes. Her eyebrows were tightened, and she was biting her lip. It looked like she was going to cry.

"You idiot...! Why...!?"

She shouted and then jumped into my arms and hugged me. It shocked me enough to make me forget my pain for a moment. I could only blink in surprise.

"...Don't hug me so tightly. You're going to make my HP disappear."

I said in a joking tone, but Asuna responded with a really angry expression. She shoved a small bottle into my mouth. The liquid which flowed in was a high-quality potion that tasted like a combination of lemon juice and green tea. It should fully heal my HP within five minutes, but my fatigue was going to last a while.

Asuna checked to confirm that I had drunk all of it. Then, as her face began to scrunch up, she put her forehead on my shoulder to hide it.

I raised my head at the sound of footsteps and saw Klein approach. He seemed a little apologetic for disturbing us, but started speaking nevertheless.

"We've finished healing all the remaining Army members, but Cobert and two of his men had already died..."

"...yeah. It's the first time since the sixty-seventh floor that someone died during a boss fight..."

"That wasn't even a fight. That idiot Cobert... You can't do anything if you're dead..."

Klein spat out. Then he took a deep breath, shook his head, and asked me in an attempt to change the mood.

"But back to the topic, what the h.e.l.l was that just then!?"

"...I really have to explain it to you ?"

"Of course! I've never seen something like that before!"

I suddenly noticed that aside from Asuna, everyone in the room was looking at me, waiting for my reply.

"...it's an extra skill: "Dual Blades"."

Expressions of amazement rose throughout Klein's party and the survivors from the Army.

All weapon skills had to be learned in a certain order depending on their type. Take swords for an example; you had to train the one-handed straight sword skill quite a bit before "Rapier" and "Two-Handed Sword" appeared on the list.

Naturally, Klein was interested, and he urged me to tell the rest.

"The conditions that have to be met are?"

"I'd have told everyone if I knew that."

As I shook my head, Klein sighed and muttered.

"You're right..."

Weapon skills that didn't have clear conditions for appearing are called extra skills. They were sometimes even called random conditions. An example would be Klein's "Katana". But "Katana" wasn't all that rare and appeared quite often as long as you kept training the Curved Sword skill.

Most of the ten-plus extra skills that had been found up until now, "Katana" included, had at least ten people who used each of them. The only exceptions were my "Dual Blades" and one other man's extra skill.

These two were most likely limited to only one person, so they should be called "Unique Skill". I had hidden the existence of my unique skill up until now. But from today, the news that I was the second unique skill user would spread throughout the world. There was no way I could hide it after using it in front of so many people.

"I'm disappointed Kirito. You didn't even tell me that you had such an awesome skill."

"I would have told you if I knew the conditions for its appearance. But I really couldn't figure out how it happened."

I answered Klein's complaint with a shrug.

There wasn't a shred of lie in what I said. About a year ago, I opened my skills window one day and found the name "Dual Blades" just sitting there. I really had no clue on what conditions made it appear.

Since then, I only trained it when there was n.o.body around. Even after I nearly mastered it, I rarely used it against monsters unless it was an emergency. Aside from using it to protect myself in a crisis, I simply didn't like this kind of skill due to the attention it draws.

I even thought that it would be better if another Dual Blades user appeared- I scratched the area around my ear and muttered.

"...if it became known that I had such a rare skill, not only would people pester me for information...it might attract other kinds of problems too..."

Klein nodded.

"Online gamers get jealous easily. I wouldn't since I'm an understanding guy, but there sure are plenty of envious people. Not to mention..."

Klein suddenly stopped talking and looked at Asuna, who was still tightly hugging me, and smiled meaningfully.

"...well, just consider suffering as another way of training yourself, young Kirito."

"So, to you it's just someone else's problem...?"

Klein bent over and thumped me on the shoulder, then turned around and walked towards the survivors of "The Army".

"Hey, you guys, do you think you'll be able to make it back to HQ by yourselves?"

One of them nodded at Klein's question. He was a boy who looked like he was in his teens.

"OK. Tell your superiors what happened here today and that they shouldn't do something this stupid again."

"Yes. ...and, err...thank you."

"Thank him over there."

Klein pointed my way with his thumb. The players from the army stood up shakily, turned towards Asuna and I, who were still on the floor, and bowed deeply before walking out of the room. Once they reached the pa.s.sageway, they used their crystals to teleport out one after another.

After the blue lights faded, Klein put his hands on his hips and started speaking.

"Well, let's see... We're going to continue onto the seventy-fifth floor and open the gate there. How 'bout you? You're the man of the day, so do you want to do it?"

"No, I'll leave it to you. I'm totally wiped."

"If that's the case... be careful on your way back."

Klein nodded and then signaled to his teammates. The six walked over to the huge door in the corner of the room. Behind it should be the stairs to the next floor. The katana-wielder stopped in front of the door and turned around.

"Hey... Kirito. Y'know when you jumped in to save those Army members..."

"...what about it?"

"I was...well, really glad. That's all I have to say. See ya around sometime."

I don't get what he was trying to say. As I c.o.c.ked my head, Klein gave me a thumbs-up, then opened the door and disappeared through it with his party.

Only Asuna and I were left in the huge boss room. The blue flames that had been flaring up from the floor had disappeared some time ago, and the sinister atmosphere that once filled the room had vanished without a trace. The soft light that filled the pa.s.sageway now flooded this room as well. Not a single sign of the battle remained.

I said something to Asuna, who still had her head against my shoulder.

"Hey...Asuna..."

"...I was so scared... I didn't know what I'd do... If you had died."

Her shaking voice was weaker than I had ever heard it.

"...what are you talking about? You were the one who charged in first."

I said this as I softly placed my hand on Asuna's shoulder. A manner infraction flag would come up if I grabbed her too blatantly, but this really wasn't a situation where I should worry about that.

As I gently pulled her towards me, my ears had almost missed her small voice.

"I'm going to take a short break from the guild."

"T-Take a break... Why?"

"...I said that I was going to party with you for a while... Did you forget already?"

As soon as I heard that...

Somewhere deep within my heart, a feeling that could only be described as a strong longing reached out. It surprised even me.

I-solo player Kirito-was a person who had abandoned every other player in order to keep myself alive in this world. I was the coward who had turned his back on his only friend and ran away two years ago, on the day that all of this had started.

A person like me, who didn't even have any right to wish for a comrade-let alone something more than that.

I had already realized this in a painful and unforgettable way. I had sworn never to wish again, never to yearn for the care of others.

But- My left hand, which had turned rigid, didn't want to let go of Asuna's shoulder. I just couldn't pull myself away from the virtual warmth of her body.

I buried this huge contradicting conflict inside me with an inexplicable emotion, and then answered with a short reply.

"...okay."

After hearing my response, Asuna's head nodded slightly on my shoulder.

The next day.

I had been hiding on the second floor of Agil's shop since this morning. I was sitting on a rocking chair with my legs crossed and was drinking a strangely flavored tea, which I figured was probably a defective product. I was also in a rather foul mood.

All of Algade-no, most probably all of Aincrad was busy discussing the events of yesterday.