"So you're staying in ALO a while longer? I don't mind. I've already finished exploring the Ruins District, and there aren't any urgent quests I want to clear. Every game reaches this point eventually. The farther you progress, the fewer ways there are to make your character stronger, and every improvement takes longer."
Satoru held his Banana X Plus to his ear. On the other end was GGO's ice-blue sniper.
"You've already won the BoB, the biggest tournament GGO has to offer. I suppose you're running out of goals over there, Shino."
"Thanks to that tournament, players still stop me everywhere I go. They want to say hello, send friend requests, or invite me to their party. I turn down at least a dozen invitations every day."
Shino sighed.
"Really? No one's been that enthusiastic with me."
"They probably think you're too intimidating to approach. Everyone saw that close-range death match between you and Death Gun. You looked like you genuinely intended to kill him. Ordinary players are bound to keep their distance after seeing something like that."
"So we're complete opposites. We both won, but you've become GGO's beloved celebrity. I even remember a feature about you in one of those popular in-game magazines. What was the headline again?"
Satoru deliberately slipped into an obnoxiously theatrical voice.
"Beauty and Skill in One Deadly Package! The Delicate Yet Merciless Sniper Who Might Pierce Your Heart! Sparkle, sparkle!"
"What was that disgusting voice at the end?! Forget you ever read that!"
Judging by the flustered shout on the other end, his teasing had landed perfectly.
Attention was usually supposed to be flattering. Unfortunately, Shino had never enjoyed being the center of it. Every encounter felt more like another public execution.
"I thought you would be used to it by now. You were already fairly well known before the tournament, and you've always been good at handling male players who can't take a hint."
"I'm not good at it. I glare at them until they go away. The problem is that some of them only get more excited."
"At least I understood that you didn't like being approached. When we first met, I made sure not to crowd you."
"If only everyone were like you... No, forget it. If every man were like you, women everywhere would die of frustration."
Her mutter barely reached him.
"What was that?"
"Nothing. Anyway... is ALO fun?"
The hesitation in her voice was hard to miss.
"GGO is tighter and more technical, but ALO appeals to a much wider audience. Why? Are you thinking of transferring your account? I probably won't have much time to show you around, though."
"No! I was only asking. Do you think playing with you is some kind of luxury? You're always calm, never nervous, and completely impossible to surprise. Being in your party takes all the challenge out of the game."
"I see."
Satoru rubbed his chin.
"I'll be in ALO for a while longer, but you could party with other players. You'd probably have more fun with them than with someone like me."
"Wait... are you angry?"
"No. I mean it."
His voice was perfectly serious.
"I've been treating games too much like studio work. All I care about is efficiency and profit, not the experience. You've spent a lot of time adapting to the way I play, and I feel bad about that. Besides, you've already achieved what you wanted in GGO. You don't need to keep chasing goals in virtual worlds."
"You're still in high school, Shino. You should be enjoying your youth. Meanwhile, I kept taking up your free time because having ranged support made everything easier. I should reflect on that."
Shino had stopped answering.
Satoru continued anyway.
"Plan your time properly. Don't you have that upperclassman you're interested in? Have you mastered mapo tofu yet? If there's another dish you want to learn, I'm happy to help."
His right hand kept moving the mouse as windows shifted across his computer screen.
Then he found something.
"I have to go. Something came up."
Shino remained speechless for three full seconds before the call ended.
Sitting cross-legged on her bed, she stared at the phone with wide eyes and her mouth hanging open.
"You idiot!!"
She screamed into the cramped, empty room, unsure whether she meant Satoru or herself. Then she slammed both hands into her pillow and rolled across the bed in furious embarrassment. Her loose shirt shifted messily as she thrashed around, but there was no one there to see it.
...
Satoru placed his phone on the desk and stared at the information on his monitor, his brow furrowed.
Yuuki, the Absolute Sword, had vanished from ALO after that day. The rest of the Sleeping Knights had disappeared with her, as though they had all agreed never to log in again.
Real-life obligations alone could not explain it. Every member of the guild played with the skill and dedication of someone deeply immersed in FullDive worlds.
The others did not matter.
Yuuki did.
She was a Fluctlight bearer. There could be no mistake.
When their eyes met, Satoru had felt a sensation he had almost forgotten, and the pale gold in his own eyes had awakened in response. For one brief instant, he had touched the emotions inside her. The exchange of information between them must have intensified beyond anything the system was designed to carry.
What reached him was sorrow as cold as ice and hostility honed like a blade.
It made no sense. He had never met Yuuki before, never touched her Fluctlight, yet those eyes felt disturbingly familiar.
Makoto Kaizuka.
She reminded him of that man.
Had everything led him back to the same place?
Satoru's eyelid tightened. He could still feel the crushing weight of Kaizuka's Azure Gap Halberd and the sheer dominance behind every swing. His nerves remembered how powerful that opponent had been, how completely their battle had consumed both mind and soul.
Kaizuka's parting words still applied.
Satoru remaining alive was not necessarily a good thing.
He released a quiet breath, took a cigarette from the pack on his desk, and lit it.
"Does that resemblance mean we're destined to settle this with swords too?"
He had asked Souji Yae to use the studio's resources to track the Sleeping Knights across every game within their reach. The search produced plenty of information, but all of it came from before the guild vanished from ALO. After that final logout, none of them appeared to have entered another VRMMO.
Something else was happening.
The anonymous message Satoru had received after meeting Yuuki had shown him the detail he had overlooked.
Now his gaze settled on a new page.
ALO Swordsmanship Championship: Who Will Be Crowned Sword Saint?
The announcement had been posted on ALO's official website. It was a major tournament open to the entire player base, ALO's answer to GGO's BoB.
This was not the first competition of its kind. Two swordsmanship tournaments had already been held since ALO introduced its Sword Skill system. This year's event, however, had been moved far earlier than the previous one.
Another line stood out beneath the headline.
Who Will Claim the Title of Absolute Sword?
The intent could hardly have been clearer.
Even before the tournament began, the forums were filling with support threads for the likely winners. Someone had gone out of their way to build an entire thread around Yuuki, using her recent winning streak in open duels to generate attention.
She had not appeared in days.
She was not a famous veteran.
Yet the thread treated her like one of ALO's biggest stars.
The manipulation was blatant.
It felt as though the entire spectacle had been prepared for Satoru alone. The moment he began searching for Yuuki, a lead appeared. The moment he needed a path forward, someone built him a stage.
They were not worried that he would miss the message or refuse the invitation. Whoever arranged this understood his position perfectly.
The references to Sword Saint and Absolute Sword made the bait almost insulting in its simplicity.
"I can't ignore it. This is the only chance I have to cross swords with you properly."
Satoru spoke to the image of Yuuki on the screen.
"So she is the first provocation. What are you planning?"
His expression did not change.
"It doesn't matter. Once I break through her, everyone behind this will have to come into the open."
He did not believe the girl could truly rival him. Everything he had seen suggested that she was still too compassionate.
A clash between Fluctlights was not an ordinary duel. It meant tearing into each other's souls, bite by bite.
The phone on his desk vibrated.
Satoru glanced at the screen and answered.
"Sorry, I don't remember ordering anything like that. You have the wrong number."
He took another drag from his cigarette while the delivery driver explained.
"That address isn't even close to my home."
A few seconds passed.
"Fine, fine. I'll accept it. But I'm telling you, it was sent to the wrong person. If someone comes looking for it later, that's your problem."
Satoru ended the call, thought for a moment, then dialed another number.
"Souji, it's me. I need a full set of equipment. Get me the best you can find. And buy another Universal Name Change Card. I've already used this account's free rename."
"What name do you want?"
The answer was obvious.
"Yurnero, of course."