[F-01] [SP] Ruined Temple, Ruined Blade <<Katana Acquisition>>

[Tsurei 0]

“That’s not really the point,” Yuta rolled his eyes, “Anyway, come on, let’s get going,”

“Can’t we just stay here for a bit?” Rei groaned,

“Hey, this is your quest we’re going on you know,” Yuta looked over with a slight frown,

“Yeah, yeah. Fine…” Rei sighed deeply, standing up.

The four of them walked down the slight incline from the grasslands downward towards the lake, from a distance, it really looked like numerous pockets of small puddles, right now it was frozen over, but they could swear that the arrangement of the lakes were almost like a dog’s paw, it had that kind of icon, but it could have been their minds just playing tricks on them.

As they walked over, the forest to their left and a expansive grassland still on their right, it was hard to remember that they were on a flat disk of earth, though there would be little doubt that falling off the edge would kill you. It was a terrifying thought to fall through the sky like that, Rei trembled momentarily,

“I really don’t like heights…” he sighed to himself,

“We’re going to climb a mountain though, right?” Yuta raised a brow, “Are you and Takumi going to be fine?”

“It’s just a temple up in the mountains, so there’s bound to be a path, it’s not like we’re climbing up to the summit or anything,” Takumi explained,

 

ID# 133901

LD: 17 = Treasure chest Found

Edited January 7, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

“I guess you’re right,” Yuta shrugged, “… it’s exciting though, right?” he suddenly spoke up,

“What is?” Takumi raised a brow at him, shooting a questioning look,

“You know… us… going out for a camping trip,” Yuta forced the words out bashfully, “I kept trying to get you guys to come with me but you were always too lazy to go,” he pouted at the end,

“I wasn’t particularly against it,” Kenji held his hands up, feeling somewhat accused,

“I mean, there wasn’t any point to it, it just seemed like a lot of effort to just go sleep in a forest somewhere, there was no motivation,” Takumi shrugged, shaking his head,

“Ah,” Rei looked straight up at the sky, making a surprised sound casually,

“What?” the three of them sent a look over at him,

“Something’s… falling…” Rei frowned, shading his eyes and squinting, some kind of black object seemed to be getting larger from the sky.

 

ID# 133902

LD = 8 = 75 Col, 3x T1 materials, 2 x rare consumables Found

Edited January 7, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

They all looked up together, indeed, the mysterious object was like a box or something, it was like an airdrop as the box rushed down to meet them much faster than they expected, as it got closer, the reason was clear. It was a metal treasure chest.

Immediately there was a cry of alarm from all sides as they began to run away, looking up at the sky trying to judge where it would land, and making sure it wasn’t going to be on top of them. Lucky, they were clear of the zone, if they had stood still, the chest wouldn’t have hit them, in fact, since they moved, there was a higher chance of it hitting Kenji, but luckily it slammed a few meters behind him as he kept moving, allowing him to breathe sharply with cold sweat on his back.

“That was too close!” he cried out,

“A treasure chest?” Rei frowned,

[Tsurei 0]

“From the sky?” Takumi scrutinised it, but as far as he could see, it really was just a treasure chest, they’ve only encountered on after the escapade in the caves that he was so desperate to forget, but seeing the chest reminded him, causing him to grimace.

“… That’s not supposed to happen, right?” Kenji looked over uncertainly, he’s rarely played games like this before so he had no idea, but he could assume something was off.

“Yeah, that’s not normal, you should find them in dungeons or in enemy drops or something,” Yuta replied, shaking his head,

“Did something get killed on the floor above?” Rei wondered,

“If it was a setting like that, we’d see the underside of the next floor,” Takumi tried to use logic here, indeed, even on the first floor, the bottom of Aincrad, a structure made of 100 disks of earth pulled from the planet below to stack atop each other to create it, logically speaking, they would look up and not see the sky or much light for that matter.

[Tsurei 0]

“It can’t be that that’s how they’re spawned, right?” Yuta frowned, desperately grasping at straws now,

“What about the interior dungeons?” Rei pointed out,

“Right, so this isn’t normal,” Yuta nodded, thankful that he wasn’t just being crazy,

“Well of course,” Rei shrugged, “Maybe something got killed up there, wait, is there aerial combat in this game?”

“There’s dragons and monsters with wings, right? So why now?” Takumi questioned,

“Well, I mean… you’re not wrong but…” Rei struggled, he was right, but he was fairly sure anything winged would have to get down to their level to fight since they only had melee weapons, and as far as he knew, there was not a single ranged option in this world.

“Should we open it?” Kenji was moving on, looking at the chest dubiously,

“Well, nothing for it,” Rei shrugged, crouching by the chest and popping it open,

“Wait, what if it’s a trap!?” Yuta cried out, but he was too late, the chest was already open.

[Tsurei 0]

“Ah,” Rei realised his mistake as the chest opened up before him, stunned into inaction, he simple watched as the chest dematerialised normally and several items popped into his inventory along with a text box, letting him breathe easily,

“It’s just some consumables,” he sighed,

“Oh,”

“Well, it’s great that it wasn’t a trap,” Kenji breathed out,

“Yeah, a mysterious chest falls from the sky and the first thing you do is open it,” Takumi sighed, shaking his head disapprovingly,

“Hey, it’s game,” Rei retorted,

“Yeah, a game where you can die,” Takumi shot down seriously,

“Point taken,” Rei sighed deeply, quickly giving up.

“What kind of traps are there anyway?” Kenji asked, looking over at Yuta,

“Hm? Well… a mimic? Poisoned arrows, explosions and monsters spawns? Stuff like that,” Yuta threw a number of ideas out there, and they were all within reasonable conjectures.

“Anyway, we’re done here, right? Let’s get moving, It’s nearly the afternoon and we haven’t made much progress,” Takumi sighed, pulling them along,

“Whose fault do you think that is!?” Rei cried out,

[Tsurei 0]

“Obviously, not mine,” Takumi shrugged half-jokingly, shooting a steady expression with a raised brow,

“Yeah, right,” Rei rolled his eyes and sighed, slapping him lightly on the head as they continued on their journey onward, obviously the simple wolves weren’t their only problem, it didn’t take long before a large white furred wolf, perhaps a dire wolf would be the best thing to call these things.

Anyway, it burst out of the forest and charged towards them, they could see it eyeing them up from tens of meters away and they knew it was only a matter of time before it ran to engage them.

When the dire wolves bounded to their location, Rei drew his blade from it’s scabbard with a cold steely scraping sound, raising it lightly over his back, he charged it with particles of blue coloured light before striking at the dire wolf whilst dodging it’s leap.

The blade raked across the chest and side of the wolf, leaving a large digital red gash after a powerful blue crash of energy, a critical hit, meaning Bleed was also inflicted.

ID# 133918
BD: 10 +3 = Crit +2 [Rage Blow] [Bleed Inflicted]
MD: 1 = Miss

Damage Dealt= (3 + 2) x 2 = 10

Rei: HP: 260/260 | EN: 24(-2)/26| 3 DMG | 8 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD

Dire Wolf [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 28/50| 15 DMG

Edited January 7, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

One way or another, he was off to the best start possible as the dire wolf’s health was nearly halved in one hit, Rei grinned excitedly as he lunged for the wolf, blade falling from his back after being fully charged for round 2, it was clear that he was overeager and overconfident however, as the dire wolf leapt at him, knocking him down before he could manage the full swing, the dire wolf proceeded to chomp down at his neck, proccing a crit, even so, that would do little damage to Rei thanks to his [Light Armour] Skill, even if his armour was simply a Vanity, it was still Light Armour and would thus get the benefits of the skill.

He briefly wondered if his new scarf would be finished by the time this trip was over, he really hoped so. It was winter and all, seeing that girl at the Evening Star who made his Ice Star Chain wearing a warm muffler, it made him want one as well. It was going to be a blue scarf, like the one he had in real life, same as the Snowflake key chain.

ID# 133919
BD: 6 +3 = Hit [Rage Blow]
MD: 9 = Crit +1

Damage Dealt= 3 x 2 = 6

Damage Recieved = 15 + 1 - 8 = 8

Rei: HP: 252/260 | EN: 23(-2+1)/26| 3 DMG | 8 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD

Dire Wolf: HP: 10/50| 15 DMG

Edited January 7, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

He briefly wondered as he kicked the Dire Wolf off his body to slash at it with his next Art, that if the others had items made for them that were important to them in real life as well? He doubted it, Yuta wasn’t a violent person, he didn’t have combat knives or daggers, he has very slight karate training from his mom and had a interest in fighting techniques but only to the degree that a hot blooded youngster would’ve had in their heated youth.

Takumi was an intellectual so to speak, he liked sports and cars, the typical boy stuff, he wasn’t much into games and he always got good grades at school without trying, now studying the sciences at a prestigious university, he’s been spending sleepless nights studying as hard as he could, mostly in part to his laziness, he would procrastinate even if he knew he seriously needed to put the work in.

ID# 133920
BD: 3 +3 = Hit [Rage Blow]
MD: 4 = Miss

Damage Dealt= 3 x 2 = 6

Rei: HP: 252/260 | EN: 22(-2+1)/26| 3 DMG | 8 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD

Dire Wolf: HP: 4/50| 15 DMG

Edited January 7, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

In any case, Takumi currently wielded a very typical looking infantry spear, a light metal pole with a steel spearhead, nothing fancy, his armour was likewise simple leathers, it wouldn’t be remiss to call it a puffy jacket, gambeson they called it, a type of padded defensive jacket. His accessory was a watch, it wasn’t a working one, just for show, but it pertained to how he always wore a watch in real life, rarely taking it off even when he sleeps, or rather, he forgets to. So when they went into SAO, he would constantly rub at his wrist which lacked the watch.

Kenji was even more of a mystery, he was much like Takumi, into football, not so much cars, but he had a lot to say about politics and the situation across the world, which usually procced somewhat heated arguments between him and Yuta who had his own personal view of things, one believed in the natural kindness of humanity and the other believing that humanity were selfish and greedy, so there’s that.

ID# 133921
BD: 5 +3 = Hit [Rage Blow]
MD: 10 = Crit +2

Damage Dealt= 3 x 2 = 6

Rei: HP: 252/260 | EN: 21(-2+1)/26| 3 DMG | 8 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD

Dire Wolf: HP: 4/50| 15 DMG

Edited January 7, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

He wouldn’t have anything pertaining to the real world either, he had a simple knight’s straight sword, a flair of the blacksmith’s and less of his personal taste, his shield was much the same, it was very much in the colour scheme of silvery steel and golden decorations for a heroic, knightly look. His plate armour was rather normal however. The accessory he bought was just a simple pin with a image of a dart board, since that was one of his few interests, along with pro-wrestling if you could believe, he was also into heavy metal. Certainly a juxtaposition from his meek personality, but he gets rather violent and impulsive when annoyed. Much like his delinquent younger brother.

With a inward sigh, Rei delivered one last Art towards the Dire Wolf, disintegrating it into glass shards before he moved to help the others, he finished his fight a lot quicker because of the Bleed, otherwise he and Yuta would’ve finished around the same time.

Edited January 7, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

When they finished wrapping up, there was a definite feeling that they had grown stronger quite quickly, it wasn’t all that long ago they would be running for their lives away from a Dire Wolf and being beaten up by boars to an inch of their lives.

Letting a breathe out to release their battle tension, the four of them glanced at each other, Rein shot a grin and a chuckle, the others quickly followed as though it was infectious and soon they were laughing completely.

“W-what’s so funny?” Yuta asked carefully as he wiped a tear from his eye and straightening from being doubled over,

“I mean… It’s barely been a week and look at us now?” Rei smiled, “We’re definitely rising up the ranks or something, y’know?”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” Yuta nodded, a small smile on his face,

“Don’t forget, all it is just numbers going up,” Takumi tried to downplay it,

“Y-yeah…” Kenji nodded, not feeling much stronger since he was still getting knocked around, though what little he could do now to fight back had made him proud, but what Takumi said was right…

“And that’s why we’re picking a fight with everything in our path,” Rei shrugged, “come on then, let’s get moving.”

 

ID# 133928

LD: 5 =Fail

Edited January 7, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

They walked down to the lake, soon finding Ol Pete’s cabin, today it seemed like usual that he sat all by himself in the middle of the frozen lake, seated in a temporary chair, a fishing rod propped up by a Y shaped stick feeding it’s line into a neatly cut hole in front of him.

“Huh?” Ol’ Pete lifted up his cap to peer over at them walking over, glancing at his rod and back, he stayed where he was, “You’re the lads from yesterday, what brings you around here?”

“We’re passing through, headed to the mountains,” Rei answered with a wave, “Heard there was an interesting ruined temple up there,”

“So you adventurers are headed there to get some treasure?” he raised a brow,

“Yeah, that’s the plan, rumours are, what I need is up there,”

“What could you possibly need from a temple that old?”

“A katana, it’s a rare eastern blade, it’s hard to come by, I heard there was one up there,”

 

ID# 134001

LD: 6 = Fail

Edited January 8, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

“Yeah, maybe not, but I think I can get some of the folks back in town to fix it up for me,” Rei shrugged,

“Pah! They’re not miracle workers you know, shouldn’t you just ask them to make you one?”

“Some old ritual from ages past, you have to go searching for your own Katana, it can’t be simply made like that,”

“Is that so? Well then, good luck climbing that Temple,”

“Climbing the temple?” Rei looked at him puzzled,

“What? You don’t know? Less of a temple, it’s more like a tower, and it goes pretty high up,”

“…I can’t see it,” Rei glanced over at the mountain range,

“Well, they say that the world is all strange and different, one moment it’s there and the next it’s not, you can only see it when you’re close enough,”

[Tsurei 0]

“A barrier?”

“Who knows, anyway, I hear the monsters up there in the temple are really nasty, take care now,”

“Yeah, thanks for the info,”

“When you have time, come back and help me get another good haul, you guys have good luck,”

“Yeah, yeah,” Rei smiled and waved as they headed for the forest at the mountain’s base. Despite being winter, these trees were leafy, their conical thick brush of irritating leaves created a dark shade over the woods, the trees were all quite large as you’d expect from a fantasy forest, it was pretty dense too, he wouldn’t be surprised if a Halloween event would take place here.

Speaking off, he realised that when they started out, a December event was going on, so their exp gains were increased by a small amount, that would explain their slightly quick increase in power.

On the other hand, it was done and finished by now, now that he thought about it, that strange town up on the 17^th floor was an event, he had no idea what came of that since he was teleported back into the inn once it was over without warning.

 

ID# 134002 

LD: 20 = T1 material Found (total = 3)

Edited January 9, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

It didn’t take long before they were attacked, moreover by icy wasps and bees no less, they reminded him of a rather famous monster from a monster collecting game on portable devices, but he couldn’t quite place his finger on it. In any case, the group readied for combat against a sizeable number of them, it seemed each of them would have to fight a couple each at this rate.

Lifting his cutlass over his back, he let the blue energy gather before unleashing it in a horizontal sweeping strike, lashing out in a wide arc, unfortunately it was a single target attack, even if he tried to hit them all at once, only one of them took the damage which was annoying, but that was how it was. Even so, with a loud explosive crash, he knew he landed a critical hit, as such, Bleed was inflicted and the hornet would soon die even if he didn’t do anything. So he turned his eyes to the next target, carefully jumping backwards to avoid each of their attempts to shishkebab him with their stingers.

 

ID# 134003
BD: 10 +3 = Crit +2 [Rage Blow] [Bleed Inflicted]
MD: 2 = Winter Honet #1 Missed

ID# 134004
MD: 1 = Winter Honert #2 Missed

ID# 134005
MD: 3 = Winter Honert #3 Missed

Damage Dealt= (3 + 2) x 2 = 10

Rei: HP: 260/260 | EN: 24(-2)/26| 3 DMG | 8 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD

Winter Hornet #1 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 3/25 | 7 DMG
Winter Hornet #2 : HP: 25/25 | 7 DMG
Winter Hornet #3 : HP: 25/25 | 7 DMG

Edited January 8, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

Even without looking, he could hear one of the hornets succumb to it’s wounds and fall out of the air with a dying buzzing sound, it’s lively skittering grinding to a stop then the familiar sound of shattering fragments of digital glass data, one down.

Charging his blade as he dodged the next two hornet strikes, he lashed out with a brilliant blue strike and critted the second hornet, his blade slashing across it’s torso, it would’ve neatly bisected it’s main body from it’s large abdomen. This one too would soon die, so he quickly turned his attention to the next hornet.

He was lucky with all these crits, the others were having trouble dealing with multiple enemies at once, it was like a swarm ambush or something and panic had fully settled all over the skirmish, Takumi in particular was having extreme trouble using his spear against the agile airborne enemies. Kenji was flailing around as usual and even Yuta was struggling due to their constant assault.

 

ID# 134006
BD: 10 +3 = Crit +2 [Rage Blow] [Bleed Inflicted]
MD: 8 = Winter Hornet #2 Hit

ID# 134007
MD: 2 = Winter Hornet #3 Missed

Damage Dealt= (3 + 2) x 2 = 10

Rei: HP: 260/260 | EN: 23(-2+1)/26| 3 DMG | 8 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD

Winter Hornet #1 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 3/25 | 7 DMG
Winter Hornet #2 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 3/25 | 7 DMG
Winter Hornet #3 : HP: 25/25 | 7 DMG

Edited January 8, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

One more down, one more to go, Rei looked up with a small grin as another hornet bled to death behind him, shattering into data. Rei carefully side stepped the last hornet as it lunged towards him, turning around, he raised his arm to charge the Sword Art over his back, blue light swirled like a whirlpool with his blade at the centre, once it was fully charged, his blade was sheathed in the light seemingly like a layer of ice, befitting it’s pale blue colour scheme at least.

He winced as the hornet flew into the air, only to turn around and fire a volley of stingers at him, he barely had the time to throw himself to the side to avoid it, he instinctively lowered his arms, losing the Sword Art charge,

“Tch,” with an annoyed click, he repeated the process, eyeing the hornet as it swept down to meet him, luckily enemies with ranged attacks didn’t do so for long on account of players having no ranged option, still, it felt cheap.

 

ID# 134008
BD: 9 +3 = Crit +1 [Rage Blow] [Bleed Inflicted]
MD: 4 = Winter Hornet #3 Miss

Damage Dealt= (3 + 1) x 2 = 8

Rei: HP: 260/260 | EN: 22(-2+1)/26| 3 DMG | 8 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD

Winter Hornet #1 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 3/25 | 7 DMG
Winter Hornet #2 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 3/25 | 7 DMG
Winter Hornet #3 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 5/25 | 7 DMG

Edited January 8, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

He slashed with his blade sideways across the hornet, cutting it right through the middle, another crit, looks like his luck was off the charts for this encounter, he watched as the hornet collapsed behind him, shuddering in pain as it tried to get up and attack him again, before it could even unleash one attack, it shattered and died.

Rei let out a small sigh, it was disturbing watching things die like that, the whole twitching and shuddering, seeing it in front of him instead of on a monitor or something was something he couldn’t get quite used to. Don’t get him wrong, he had no problem with killing things, but the way they quivered as they died or let out death throes, it was a bit too much, what kind of person programs this into a game?

Ah yes, the same guy who set up a death game for a good hundred thousand people most of which were teenagers, right, that one.

 

Rei: HP: 260/260 | EN: 22(-2+1)/26| 3 DMG | 8 MIT | 0 EVA| 3 ACC| 1 BLD

Winter Hornet #1 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 3/25 | 7 DMG
Winter Hornet #2 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 3/25 | 7 DMG
Winter Hornet #3 [Bleeding 1/2] : HP: 5/25 | 7 DMG

Edited January 8, 2020 by Tsurei

[Tsurei 0]

He quickly moved to help the others eliminate their hornets without too much trouble, no one received too much damage but they were tired, it was a whole bunch of swinging at the air at these buzzing huge hornets with spikes for an ass, let’s not speak of how it was basically a shotgun while it was as it.

They were in the forest now and with how dense it was, it was hard to not get lost, the only lead Rei had was that he was walking in a straight line, going right back was the edge of the forest and last he checked, he had angled himself so that walking in a straight line would bring him to a gap in the mountain range where there was the gentlest slope he could find to begin scaling the mountain.

But once they were in the forest amongst it’s dense woods, with no path and a uneven ground that constantly meant they needed to meander, it was difficult to tell if they were still on track.