"Final stretch! Dragon Cavalry, full assault! Target the spellcasting Guardian Knights around us. Everyone still left, break through in one push. Once you cross that line, the raid is clear!"
Souji Yae's text in the raid channel seemed to carry an actual voice, like the beat of war drums at the last stand. Behind the countless fallen Salamanders, the Red Dragon Cavalry, silent until now, finally hauled hard on their reins. Their ferocious dragon heads rose as one, jaws spreading wide.
A searing wave of fire roared upward with enough force to scorch the ceiling of the sky. The spellcasting White Knights spawning from the walls around the final sprint were swallowed in an instant. Within the crimson tide, they melted one after another into white liquid, only to be vaporized a heartbeat later.
The Dragon Cavalry attacked in two rotating waves: one firing, one charging, then swapping places, maintaining a seamless barrage. Amid the furious roar of dragon cries, their flames cleanly sealed off the White Knights' spawn points and created the perfect opening for the team charging ahead.
That was their role in this battle. A ranged unit would pin down the ranged enemies.
All that mattered was breaking through the top of the World Tree. Casualties did not need to be counted. Survival did not matter. As long as someone reached the end, that was enough. They would spend the lives of seventy or eighty avatars to send those two across the finish line.
Souji Yae hovered ahead of the Dragon Cavalry, firelight blazing behind him and above him. When he looked up, through the falling ash of his comrades and the wreckage of the White Knights, he could just make out the trajectory of two people charging without fear.
"We've done everything we can. So show me the view beyond the World Tree... Satoru."
He let out a long breath.
Strange. At a time like this, he found himself remembering the days when they used to fight together. Though calling it fighting was generous. Each of them had sat in front of a computer screen somewhere far away, relying on headsets to speak to one another. The fierce clashes, the timing of their strategies, all of it had taken place inside that small screen.
Everything they had treated as their whole world had been virtual, something that would vanish if someone simply pulled the plug.
They were not friends. They were not brothers-in-arms. They were just passersby who happened to share the same interest, and after enough time spent talking, they had somehow become acquaintances.
In the hot wind and the roar of flames, he lit a cigarette.
Congratulations on making it back alive from the death game. And from here on, may your life go smoothly.
There was no bond of life and death between Souji Yae and Satoru.
Those words were from Shadow Song to Yurnero.
He raised a thumb toward the distant battlefield at the top of the sky.
...
The relentless fire breath from behind temporarily erased the threat of the final-stage spellcasting Guardian Knights. The White Knights surging from the ceiling, now closer and closer, were also being forced back. They might be endless, but the space they could fight in was shrinking by the second.
Satoru and Kirito beat their wings again and again, driving straight toward the finish line. Both of them swung their weapons at blinding speed, destroying everything their blades touched and carving open a path through the enemy ranks in a single breath.
The surviving Salamander players had already fallen behind. The two of them could not afford to wait, and the Salamanders could no longer keep up. In the end, after seeing the gap between them, those players made their own decision. Even if they could no longer help clear the road ahead, they could at least wipe out the enemies behind them.
It was the right call for the situation, and Satoru felt grateful to them for it.
Practically stepping over the "corpses" of those allies, the two finally broke through in a frenzy of blades and closed in on the last stretch.
"I'll send you up, Kirito!"
Satoru's voice reached Kirito through the vibration of clashing blades. Kirito did not answer. He simply moved directly beneath him.
The gold in Satoru's eyes suddenly deepened, sharper and darker than before. His avatar had begun to tremble strangely. The wings on his back seemed almost frozen. Then, in the next second, his entire body accelerated beyond anything he had shown so far, beyond any reasonable limit, and Demonic Sword Gram in his hand blurred until its shape could no longer be seen.
Gram could pass through an opponent's weapon as if it were empty space, ensuring that every thrust reached the White Knights' bodies.
Black-violet slash-lines exploded from in front of him like a net cast across the sky, destroying everything above. The slashes were so fast the system could not fully render them. The White Knights shattered like sheets of paper, bursting apart into white trails.
Infinite Sword: Azure-Rising Abyss!
That maddening miracle had never been limited to a self-destructive move like One Blade, Heart Eater.
Even if that unique skill no longer existed, the Sword Skills he had practiced night after night, over and over, had carved themselves deep into his brain: the opening motion, the arc, the point of impact. He did not need to think. His muscles already knew how to move. True, all he was doing now was swinging according to those Sword Skills.
No system assistance. No Sword Skill damage bonus.
But that made it even more real. It was proof, carved deep, that that world had once existed.
Whenever he sank into this state, where a single movement of his hand became violence, he could not help wanting to laugh with pure exhilaration. A human being could be this free. Thought could stretch to the farthest end of anything, without a single shackle left.
At last, he released the battle fury filling his chest, roaring with everything he had as he accelerated again. Around him, terrifying black-violet cutting lines filled the air.
Kirito gritted his teeth and kept close, struggling to follow the wide road Satoru had opened for him.
And now, he could still see the figure ahead. On the 75th Floor, it had been almost impossible for him to follow the battle between Satoru and Kayaba. But now, he felt as if he could see some of it. Perhaps it was what they called neural acceleration. Everything was reflecting directly into his mind, where he could understand it fully.
That sword path, so difficult for others to grasp, carried the style of Aincrad. Kirito could feel it.
Above his nerves, electronic pulse signals with blue-white tails carried information. Little by little, he began to understand Satoru's movements.
- Resonance.
A person already touching the limit, watching the sword dance of someone beyond that limit. If he kept matching him like this, perhaps he could cross that line right now.
But right now, there was still a responsibility on his shoulders.
"Go!"
Satoru's roar came down from above. As if they were handing the moment off, Kirito accelerated past him. Satoru, seemingly drained of strength, slowed almost to a stop. The top of the sky was now within reach.
The thirty-odd White Knights still waiting before it screamed as if in hatred and rushed Kirito all at once.
"Ngh... ooooohhh!"
Kirito shouted at the top of his lungs and crossed the weapons in both hands into a ready stance. His shining twin swords traced a pure white circle as their angles shifted, like the corona erupting from the edge of the sun during a total eclipse. The knights caught in the dozens of ultra-fast consecutive slashes were ground to pieces.
This time, he could finally see clearly where the White Knights had been coming from. At the center of the canopy, where branches interlaced like a mesh, stood a cross-divided circular gate. That was the final boundary piercing through the World Tree's trunk, the way leading straight to the city at the tree's summit. Kirito drew a thin trail through the air and flew toward it.
Satoru hovered in midair, breathing lightly. Watching Kirito break through the defenses, he smiled a little.
"Beautiful."
Then, in the next instant, endless White Knights filled the gap the two of them had forced open. Satoru gave a low grunt and raised Demonic Sword Gram again, his emotionless golden eyes sweeping over them.
"I finally retrieved the Impact Program through your contact. That gate leading to the top of the World Tree isn't locked by the quest program. It requires administrator privileges."
In another world, Rinko's voice echoed faintly in his ears beside his sleeping body.
"I see... So this final Grand Quest, reaching the city atop the World Tree, reincarnating as a true fairy, all of it was made up. The difficulty here has been raised to an absurd level, and the gate doesn't leave any chance at all. But that is exactly why there has to be something hidden in it." His voice dropped. "Is there a way through, Rinko-san?"
"I need time."
"Kirito is over there. I'm sure he's noticed the problem too. Even so... these endless things don't understand fear."
He watched the White Knights gradually closing in again, and the desire to cut them down rose in him once more.
"You've been in a Fluctlight state for ten straight minutes. From the brainwave monitor on my end, it looks like someone keeps dropping huge stones into a calm pond. If you weren't still talking to me, I would honestly think your brain had already collapsed from overuse." Rinko's voice came through, grave.
"But I think I can hold out a little longer. During that time, Rinko-san, find a way through the gate."
Satoru drew a long breath.
"No human being can truly control something like that... Right now, you're only drunk on the numbing arrogance of hyper-accelerated thought. You're like a frog in water being heated slowly, never realizing how close death is."
"If I back out now, these things will kill me instantly. Then they'll all go after Kirito, and this whole raid will end in failure."
Satoru's voice was low. There was one thing he had not said aloud.
This thing might not be something he could turn off.
Rinko fell silent for two seconds.
Then, as if she had made up her mind, she said,
"Give up... Satoru-kun."
"Wh...?"
His eyes widened slightly.
"Rinko-san?!"
"I don't specialize in electronic intrusion or defense. I don't know how long it will take me to find a way through. And the whole time, you would have to keep burning through your own nerves. That's the same as burning your life away. Let's give up for now. There are other ways."
"But it's right there! Rinko-san... the trace of Kayaba you've been searching for is right there!" he said sharply.
"That doesn't matter. The relics of a dead man have no reason to outweigh a living person."
Her voice was firm.
Satoru clenched his teeth.
"But what I want is right there too. Even if it kills me, I won't let go here!"
He was almost mad with it. As if answering his state of mind, his eyes were on the verge of becoming pure gold.
A burning heat seared through his head. In front of him, the White Knights' movements slowed even further. Even his sense of color had been stripped away for the moment. All he had to do was kill the code in front of him. He no longer needed to pay attention to color. Trust his brain to kindly pour that discarded attention into focus instead.
In a black-and-white world, dozens, hundreds of White Knights moved as slowly as ridiculous marionettes. So feeble. So full of openings.
"Satoru-kun!"
He ignored Rinko's voice and charged straight ahead. This time there were no companions beside him. Alone, blade in hand, he drove into the White Knights' endless respawn point and began the slaughter.
He understood that this was coercion. Faced with his stubborn recklessness, Rinko would have no choice but to start working on the breakthrough. Otherwise, by her own words, he would die here for nothing. And yet he did not feel as if he were drawing closer to death. On the contrary... it felt like the ecstasy of transformation.
In a world and a time slowed without end, at the boundary between black and white, only he flew.
He reveled in the pleasure of looking down on the entire field like a god. If this truly was poison, then it had to be the finest, most luxurious drug imaginable, one that let a human touch a consciousness beyond humanity.
Sheeta. Soon. Just a little more, and I'll find your trace.
It has to exist somewhere.
Nerves burning with pain. A breathless rush.
He could not help laughing, loud and wild.
The figure dancing with a sword was both deranged and relentless.
...
Rinko stared helplessly at the suddenly intensifying numbers and fluctuations. Fortunately, she was only a researcher, not a doctor. Otherwise, seeing something that overturned everything she had learned might have overwhelmed her completely. What she could see in those readings was simply a madman constantly developing his own brain.
If this were surgery, Satoru's head would already be covered in blood, and his own hands would be holding the scalpel and forceps. And still, his face would be blank.
A brain active to that degree could no longer be called an organ... Perhaps it had not collapsed yet because the overload was not physical in nature.
But where was it, exactly...? Kayaba's report had only mentioned it in a line or two.
Uncharacteristically rattled, she forced herself to stop thinking about the state Satoru had thrown himself into. She had always been the type to plan everything out and proceed step by step. For now, she cut off that line of thought and threw herself completely into searching for a vulnerability in the electronic gate. This really was not her specialty... A thin sheen of sweat appeared on her forehead.
How was she supposed to find it? How was she supposed to break through?
Anxiety slowly crawled into her chest. The pressure kept multiplying.
Especially this person beside her. He left her at a complete loss. From the moment they met, he had always been just as orderly as she was. When they discussed these matters, his thinking had always been clear. So why... at a moment like this, just like that man, was he ignoring everything around him and letting the obsession in his heart drive him forward?
Were men all such maddening creatures?
The sound of her striking the keyboard grew louder and louder.
"!"
She suddenly stopped. The typing stopped with her.
"It's open?"
She murmured to herself.
The gate had opened. Not from her side, but from inside the game. The code had been rewritten.
There was no time to think through the process any further. She spoke in a rush.
"The gate is open, Satoru-kun!"
...
"Then... let's go up."
Satoru lowered the sword in his hand and walked through the countless pieces of debris around him, all of them seemingly frozen in place.
He slowly closed his eyes.
The flow of time before him gradually returned to normal.
The debris hanging still in every direction began to fall. At last, as if the spell that had frozen time had vanished, the countless corpses of the White Knights dropped from the sky at their normal speed.