There was another surprise waiting. Among the students were Raios and Humbert, those nasty upper-class nobles. They were probably back early because their mansions were close by. They were seated in the front row, leering with anticipation. The desire to see Volo cut me open was written right on their faces.
I had no regrets about boldly accepting his rules. In that situation, I couldn’t possibly have brought myself to any other choice.
Instead, a different kind of indecision now plagued me.
Should I fight Volo or not?
There was definitely a part of me that yearned to challenge the greatest swordsman at the school. In fact, the number-three reason that I’d journeyed from Rulid in the far north down to Centoria was the old-school-gaming desire to fight against mighty opponents.
But at this moment I had a different desire, much stronger than the one to cross swords with Volo.
I wanted Miss Liena to beat him in her final match. I wanted her to win and be free of all the tangles surrounding her family name and style. In the entire year that I’d been serving her, she had never once shown me a true, unburdened smile.
Volo was examining his sword at the other end of the arena while I grappled with my inner dilemma. I heard Liena call my name and snapped around to attention.
Her deep-blue eyes stared right into me. In her normal, firm voice, the second seat said, “Kirito, I believe in your strength. It is with this faith that I warn you: the Levantein family, sword instructors to the imperial knights, have a secret saying. ‘Wet your sword with the blood of the mighty, and their strength shall be your own.’”
“B-blood, huh?” I mumbled.
“That is right. Volo has no doubt been through many first-strike duels with naked blades, dating back to before his days here. It is that experience that creates his tremendous power. And he intends to turn your own skill into blood to feed his blade as well.”
It was hard to grasp precisely what she meant by that, but I was able to convert her metaphor into terms that were more familiar to me. It all came down to the power of the mental image. Liena’s skill was tied down to a mental image that said, “The Serlut style is an offshoot created because we were forbidden from using orthodox styles.” While in Volo’s case, the Levantein family message was, “The stronger a foe’s blood you feed to the sword, the stronger it becomes.”
No doubt that when he saw a bit of my combination skill and my high-priority blade in the forest clearing, he figured that he had found a suitable target. If it weren’t for the fact that he had picked me out as an easy mark, I might have even been honored by the attention.
In other words, if I took a direct blow from Volo in this duel and shed blood, it would only further strengthen his mental image. And this outcome was highly, highly probable.
I didn’t want to give the enemy a morale boost just before Liena’s final match. I was just preparing myself to take back my previous statement and beg to use the stop-short rules when her hands patted me on the shoulders.
“I know I said this before, but I believe in you. You’re better than letting him demolish you. You…you haven’t forgotten yesterday’s promise, I trust?”
“Promise…” I mumbled, then nodded. “Right. I promised to show you everything I can do.”
“Then fulfill that promise, Kirito. Show it to me here. Unleash all your strength and technique and best Volo Levantein,” she said.
Instantly, all the hesitation and fog around my head cleared.
Avoiding a straightforward battle with Volo because it might make him stronger before his fight with her was the worst possible mix of arrogance and pessimistic lack of confidence. And I was nearly about to serve my respected tutor that fatal cocktail. Once the sword was in my grasp, I had no choice but to wield it with all my life and spirit. That was how I had lived in every virtual world to this point.
I gave her a bold, confident look, then turned to my right to glance at Eugeo, who was leaning over the railing of the stands to watch. I shot him a confident grin, and despite his usual worried look, my partner raised a fist in solidarity.
I returned the gesture, then told Liena, “I will fulfill my promise.”
She replied with a tip of the head and stepped back. Right on cue, a voice from the other end of the arena asked, “Are you ready now, Trainee Kirito?”
I turned, walked right up to the black floorboard that marked the boundary of the arena, and said, “I’m ready.” Volo made a simplified knight’s gesture, striking his left breast with his right fist, the back of his hand horizontal. There was no instructor here to serve as judge, but that wouldn’t be a problem; whoever bled first, lost.
A step forward into the arena. Two, three, four. I was at the starting line indicated by a white floorboard.
We drew our swords—he from the left waist, I from over my back. Volo’s steel-gray sword with its polished golden-brown hilt drew murmurs of appreciation from the crowd. But when they saw mine, that admiration turned to hushed astonishment. None of them had ever seen a sword that was entirely black all over, I was certain.
“Well, well! I wonder if they practice spreading black ink on their blades in the uncivilized regions, Raios!” Humbert said in a stage whisper from the stands.
“Don’t be cruel, Humbert. Pages are so busy that they simply don’t have time to polish their swords,” Raios whispered back, sending up a tizzy of chuckling from the nobles around them.
But as soon as Volo began to move his sword, the crowd went still. It was a sign of respect for the first-seat disciple but also a likely consequence of the vicious presence of his intimidating blade.
To think that wooden and real swords could be so different, I marveled.
I’d seen Volo Levantein’s High-Norkian style “Mountain-Splitting Wave” stance three times at close range during the disciple testing matches that had occurred while I served as Liena’s page. But seeing Volo with a real sword, rather than a wooden one, and facing off against me personally was a different kind of pressure altogether.
With his shaved blond hair and slender frame, Volo had the appearance of a monk, but I realized in this moment that it was a mistake to judge him based on that. The look in those gray-blue eyes belonged to a demon who sought nothing but to cleave the bodies of his foes with hard steel.
Volo lifted his lengthy sword with both hands; the weapon would be classified as a bastard sword in a video game. The rippling effect around the blade wasn’t a hallucination. The sword’s high-priority level and the power of its wielder’s imagination were vibrating the very air around it.
With a heavy whoosh, the first seat lifted the sword high overhead to complete his stance. Just pulling his sword a tiny bit farther back would unleash Mountain-Splitting Wave—the alternate name for the two-handed heavy charging slash attack Avalanche.
In the recent past (which felt like distant times of yore at this point), I had faced off in many one-on-one duels in Aincrad. The most memorable of these fights involving a two-handed-sword wielder was against a man named Kuradeel, who was in charge of Asuna’s personal security when she was vice commander of the Knights of the Blood.
When we had faced off, I had correctly predicted that Avalanche would be his first move, and I’d used a different charging skill named Sonic Leap to strike the side of his sword and destroy it.
I briefly considered that stratagem again here but promptly shelved it. I couldn’t envision any success in the attempt, only my own sword breaking—or, at the very least, rebounding and leaving my shoulder wide open to his blade’s path.
Mountain-Splitting Wave was based on the Avalanche model, but I needed to consider Volo’s attack to be a different thing, thanks to its increased weight and speed. His overwhelming confidence gave his skill absolute power. In other words, if I couldn’t create a competing mental image that infused my entire body down to the tip of my sword, I had no business standing in the arena with him.
Now was the time to put aside any personal issue
s and use my combination skills.
So I started the motion for the four-part Vertical Square, the highest attack I could reliably use at the moment. It would require precision control, but if I could strike his Avalanche with the first three hits in order, it should negate his attack. Then the fourth and final swing would finish him.
In contrast to Volo’s style, I pulled back my blade in a tight, compact stance. When it came to countering a sword skill with another sword skill, timing was everything. I had to unleash my skill at the exact right moment.
The tip of the black sword slowly passed vertical and began bending backward.
“Kaaah!!” Volo screamed, the sound splitting the air.
The bastard sword glowed reddish-gold. With a ferocious rush and the appearance of burning flames, the overhead smash that had thrice beaten Miss Liena’s Cyclone barreled toward me.
But I was already moving. I’d begun Vertical Square with the minimum possible pre-movement and pushed into the first slash to provide extra power.
Gyang! A high-pitched clash erupted at the same moment that a tremendous shock ripped into my right hand—my first blow was easily deflected downward. No doubt the students and instructors in the audience assumed that I was using Lightning Slash, the Norkian version of Vertical. If that had been the case, it would be all over already—but I was just getting started.
Even in a clash of skills, the combination would continue as long as the motion itself wasn’t completely knocked off alignment. Vertical Square’s second attack was an upward slice from down below—exactly where the first hit was deflected. I wasn’t done yet.
“Zeyaa!”
I spun myself to the left, hurtling the sword upward. Another clash. The blue glow surrounding my sword and the orange around Volo’s mingled and flashed white, lighting up the dim training hall.
Again, my sword was knocked backward. But this time, the enemy’s Avalanche slowed down. I gritted my teeth, unleashing a vertical slice from top to bottom.
Grinngk! The two swords met with a duller crunch.
As I expected, the third attack didn’t deflect his blade, but it did stop the technique. If I pushed back here, it would cancel out the Avalanche and leave me with a fourth and final attack to go.
“Rrrrah!”
“Hrrng!”
We grunted in unison, trying with all our might to push back the other’s attack. At this point, the little details like sword skill attack values and system assistance meant nothing. It was mind against mind, will against will. The connecting point of the swords was white-hot, sizzling and sparking. The thick floorboards of the arena creaked with the incredible force being pushed into them.
I envisioned a person observing the main memory device that contained the entirety of the Underworld and noticing that a certain portion of the light quantum storage was turning a blinding white. The signals being created in our fluctlights were in direct competition, each trying to overwrite the other. There was no more self-assured confidence in Volo’s face now, just furrowed brows and gnashing teeth. My face had to look the same to him.
The state of equilibrium lasted for two seconds, three, four…
Then I saw something I never imagined I would see.
Arrayed around the head of Volo Levantein, first-seat elite disciple, were the similar-looking faces of at least five other swordfighters.
Their bodies were vague and transparent, and the only thing I could make out was that they were holding swords in the same pose as Volo, but that was enough to provide instinctual enlightenment. They were the generational heads of the Levantein family, traditional masters of sword teaching for the Imperial Knighthood.
It was the true vision of what Volo the student carried on his back…or was placed on his back for him. The true source of the tremendous power in his swing.
I…cannot afford to lose!! I thought I heard a voice say. The next instant, I felt the weight against my arms grow to many times its previous level.
The bastard sword, now glowing like the fires of hell, gritted and creaked against my black sword. I pushed back as hard as I could to withstand it, but I could feel my feet starting to slide backward.
Another few inches…another inch and my skill would be forced to a close. In that instant, it would throw my weapon aside and leave me vulnerable to a deep, maiming blow.
The words three hundred and eighty years echoed in my head.
Nearly four centuries of time had already passed since the creation of the Underworld. Even with the protection of its absolute law system and the absence of any true battle, the swordsmen of this world had created and passed on their swordcraft for all those years. The result far surpassed any kind of mere VRMMO attack skills.
My right foot slid, and the light infusing my black sword began to blink.
But…
I wasn’t fighting for the mere sake of experience points, either.
I fought for Eugeo, the friend who had been first to offer a warm hand of help. I fought for Liena, who had spent a year showering me with kindness, discipline, and many lessons. Most of all, I fought for Asuna, Sugu, Klein, Liz, Sinon, Agil, Silica, and all the others who waited for my return to the real world.
“I can’t…afford to lose here…either!” I screamed to no one’s ears but my own.
In seeming response, the sword in my hand pulsed.
Within the dying blue light enveloping the black blade, a golden point formed. More lights began to appear, until soon the inside of the blade was covered in bright dots. In turn with this phenomenon, the space around me grew darker, but I barely even registered it.
I was more focused on the stunning change in my sword itself.
The blade was growing with little ringing noises. With all the visual effects going on, and the fact that it was just a growth of a few inches, I doubted that anyone noticed except for Volo and me—but it definitely wasn’t an illusion.
The hilt grew as well. Automatically, my left hand reached over to squeeze the black leather handle and provide a full two-handed grip.
In the old Aincrad, my sword skill would have automatically ended due to an irregular equipment state. But when I added my left hand, the dying blue Vertical Square glow immediately regained its power, fusing with the golden light within the sword and swirling violently.
Something about the fierce change in the sword put me in mind of the black blade’s true form—the Gigas Cedar that loomed over the forest south of Rulid. The obsidian mammoth that had refused to be cut down for over three centuries, sucking up the valuable resources of earth and sun.
…The sword’s…memory.
The words barely flashed into my mind before my howl overrode them.
“Raaaahhhhh!!”
With all the muscle and willpower I could summon, I stepped—forward.
The moment my foot landed, all the energy packed into that intersection point of the two swords expanded, unable to handle its own density.
Volo and I were both blasted backward, as though by some higher flame-element sacred arts explosion. But we held firm in our forward posture, refusing to fly off our feet. The soles of my hardened boots scraped against the arena floorboards, bringing up smoke. Even with our trails of burned leather, both Volo and I managed to stop just short of the boundary lines.
Our swords were hurled backward with the force of their repulsion. Volo’s Avalanche was over, its orange light fading.
But my Vertical Square was still active, even with two hands on it now.
“Seyaa!!” I belted, and leaped. The fourth and final attack, a high slice from a pulled-back position, activated. The sword carved a brilliant blue arc through the air as it approached Volo’s defenseless chest…
It nicked his jacket and stopped just short of the floor. Vertical Square was not a charging attack. I did all I could to boost the range, but it wasn’t enough to reach to the opposite end of the dueling arena.
Volo and I stared into each other’s eyes at close range, and after
the briefest of intervals, a voice called out, “That’s enough!!”
Immediately, I leaped backward to a safe distance and lowered my sword. Up ahead, Volo had similarly disengaged his battle footing.
Once I was sure that it was over, I turned toward the voice, wondering who would step in to play referee in a duel that needed none. The fact that it turned out to be none other than Miss Azurica, the manager of the primary trainee dorm, left me speechless.
Why would a dorm manager—not even an instructor—act like a judge? And why did Volo obey her? These two questions kept me rooted to the spot.
The first seat, meanwhile, walked closer with his sword hanging at his side and murmured, “We cannot disobey her judgment.”
“Err…why is that…?”
“Because she was the Norlangarth Empire’s first sword after the Four-Empire Unification Tournament of seven years ago.”
Whaaaaaat?!
My eyes nearly bulged out of my head. Volo Levantein inclined his monk-like head, displaying none of his earlier ferocity. “Your punishment is hereby concluded. Be more careful not to throw mud onto others from this point onward.”
He put his sword back in his sheath and turned around. The white-and-blue uniform crossed the floor and vanished through the door.
Instantly, a roar of shouts and applause erupted, filling the training hall. To my surprise, there were now nearly a hundred students, and even faculty members, clapping and cheering wildly. In the front row, next to the calmly clapping Azurica, I found my partner, Eugeo, tears streaming from his eyes. I raised my left fist. Next to him was the imposing bulk of his tutor, Golgorosso.
Lastly, I glanced at the sword in my hand to make sure that it was back to its proper size, then slid it into the sheath affixed to my back.
Whap! Someone instantly smacked my shoulders from behind, causing me to jump. Pale hands turned me around, until I was facing Miss Sortiliena, her face even more tear-streaked than Eugeo’s.
“…I thought…he’d cut you apart,” she whispered, just loud enough for me to hear.
“Yeah…so did I.”