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Chapter 101 - Ch 101 : Dragon

The clearing group's party went on until after 2 a.m.—even though they were supposed to set off at 6 a.m., a third of the players still partied hard all the way until after 2.

Akimi and Kirito could only remain silent in the face of their behavior.

As expected, those who partied the hardest the night before stumbled to the meeting point groggy and half-awake right before departure.

Amid the curses and grumbling of Kibaou and Lind, they wobbled into their respective teams.

Shortly after setting off, several of the revelers started complaining of exhaustion, suggesting a break.

But Kibaou and Lind refused harshly, insisting that they must finish the boss raid before noon.

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Akimi expressionlessly sliced down another monster that had popped out of the forest.

He glanced at the loot drop with disinterest and then shifted his gaze toward the front of the clearing group—only about five or six minutes remained before they'd reach the Labyrinth Tower.

As usual, the raid group was divided into eight sub-teams, A through H.

Teams A and B were from ALS, C and D from DDA (Divine Dragon Alliance), and E and F from KoB.

The remaining G and H teams were composed of Akimi, Agil, and other solo players.

(Note: SAO originally had a party limit of six players—something previously overlooked in the second-floor content.)

Kibaou was in charge of the overall strategy this time, but just one look at his pompous, arrogant demeanor was enough for Akimi to decide he'd ignore any orders he didn't like.

At 8:12 a.m., the clearing group, slightly behind schedule, arrived at the door of the floor boss room.

As per custom, the commander was supposed to give a motivational speech while everyone rested and prepared.

"Ahem! Everyone, listen up!" said Kibaou, clad in black chest armor, standing in front of nearly 50 players with his back to the boss room door.

He cleared his throat and began:

"Thanks to everyone's efforts, we've completed one-fourth of Aincrad's conquest. I believe we'll defeat this floor's boss just like we have before—and not just this one, but all the future bosses as well!"

"Now, let's push open this door, defeat the boss, and spread the good news to everyone!"

Kibaou's rousing speech didn't quite have the effect he had hoped.

The players weren't cold or unresponsive, per se—it's just that they'd drunk too much of this kind of motivational soup by now, and had become somewhat immune to it.

Still, Kibaou didn't seem the least bit embarrassed.

He kept up his enthusiastic demeanor, but as he turned to push open the boss room door, a flicker of darkness passed across his face—revealing that his mood wasn't nearly as cheerful as he let on.

The 25th Floor Boss Room was a standard circular arena-style space.

In the center of the room's floor was a strange design composed of four dragon heads pointing in different directions, and the ceiling depicted an image of "Nine Dragons Hidden in the Clouds."

Around the central pattern were 18 irregular lines that twisted and curved toward the edges of the room.

Though the curves were uneven, the spacing between where each line touched the wall was perfectly consistent.

The gaps between the lines were filled with countless swirling cloud motifs, outlined in red ink.

Directly above where each line met the wall were 18 bronze beast-head statues—not of common beasts, but of the legendary Nine Sons of the Dragon: Qiuniu, Yazi, Chaofeng, Pulao, Suanni, Bixi, Bi'an, Fuxi, and Chiwen.

Each dragon son's head appeared twice, positioned opposite each other across the 40-meter-radius circular room.

These bronze heads were crafted so vividly that the fierce expressions in their eyes gave off a bone-chilling sense of menace.

The moment Akimi saw those bronze dragon heads, his expression darkened instantly.

A deep sense of foreboding welled up in his chest.

In truth, quite a few strange things had already started happening on the twenty-fifth floor.

The veteran information broker Argo hadn't been able to uncover any boss-related quests, and the monsters inside the Labyrinth Tower were all just strengthened versions of ones that had appeared before.

So up to this point, the clearing group hadn't obtained any real information about the floor boss.

What led them to recklessly charge into the boss room was nothing more than the confidence they had built up over time.

But judging by the details within the boss room, Akimi had already started to get a vague idea of what the boss was—a true dragon, one from Chinese mythology.

After the clearing group entered the room, beams of light suddenly shot out from the mouths of the 18 bronze statues of the Nine Dragon Sons, illuminating the ceiling's painting of the Nine Dragons Among the Clouds.

Then, the pearls in the mouths of the nine dragons began to emit a brilliant glow, lighting up the entire room.

Next came music composed of the five tones from traditional Chinese music—gong, shang, jue, zhi, yu.

The painting of the Nine Dragons Among the Clouds began to move.

Accompanied by music that sounded almost divine, the swirling cloud patterns on the floor slowly floated into the air.

Then, the nine differently colored dragons from the ceiling mural flew out of the painting, weaving and merging mid-air to form a single five-clawed golden dragon.

The golden dragon hovered for a moment, then began to descend slowly.

Along with it came the cloud patterns, which clung to the dragon's body, making it appear even more divine and majestic.

Snake-like body, ox ears, deer antlers, goat whiskers, eagle claws, fish scales—the features and elegance of a Eastern divine dragon were fully realized in its form.

Below its name tag, written in traditional Chinese characters, was a glowing marker so red it was almost black: 「龍」—Dragon.

Next to it were six long HP bars.

The dragon landed on the ground, but did not immediately attack.

It simply stared at the clearing group in silence.

The players, in turn, swallowed nervously, too afraid to make a move.

After taking a deep breath for what felt like forever, Kibaou finally steeled himself and shouted:

"Boss sighted—begin the assault!"

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