The Tower

POV Switch - Kirito (1st)

"The boss is named Illfang, a kobold," Kibaou said, scruffing his spiky brown hair as he read through the handbook. "He has Sentinels which guard him, and our group is assigned to take them on, not to challenge the boss. Is that clear? Anything to add?"

I nodded respectfully, since he was the leader of the famous Aincrad Liberation Squad, and saw Asuna follow along half-heartedly.

Since the rest of the group was silent, I spoke up, "Illfang? I remember him, as a quest boss during the beta test. We had some trouble with it, but it got easier when we memorized its pattern of attack. It's slow and sturdy, and takes a while to recoil after each attack, so it's easier to take it on then. The Sentinels are a pain, but there were only one or two back then, as long as you surround them they go down quickly."

Kibaou frowned, with a graveness that surprised me. "The beta test? So you're a beta tester?"

"Yes, he is!" Asuna fired back. "And why should it matter?"

"Well... I've personally recruited so many people to the ALS, only to see greedy beta testers kill them thoughtlessly. So many people who I get to know, killed in cold blood just because of your kind... After all, most players try to get along, but beta testers have an incentive to start violence because they're ahead of other players, right? I don't trust them."

"What do you mean you don't 'trust' them? You're reading a guidebook written by them, you oaf!"

"Oh, it is?" Kibaou flipped to the front of the guidebook, and showed that beta testers had been credited for the information in it, including Kirito himself. "Well, fine then. You win this round, Kirito. But don't you dare pick fights with my new players, or I'll have to personally fight you off."

Asuna was fuming at his tone, and I was surprised she hadn't drawn her rapier yet.

"I win this round?" I replied. "I thought we were on the same side! Anyway, we should work together for this fight, let's not fight among ourselves."

"That's true. Fighting ourselves, we always lose." He sighed.

However, as he raised his head again, resuming his briefly-interrupted confident posture, he began to laugh. "Asuna and Kirito, you two get along well, don't you?"

"Wh-what gave you that impression?" Asuna said, blushing heavily.

"Well, you showed up here together, and you were blushing the whole time that you spoke up in his defense."

"Look, we're just Guildmates, okay mister?"

"Yeah, whatever. Tell you what, why don't you guys form a separate unit? Since Kirito knows this boss, maybe you two can break off and fight it if the others are having difficulties. I think most players here are going in 'blind,' they won't know the boss' patterns."

"Alright! Great idea!" Asuna said in an instant.

I looked over at her in surprise, not expecting her to assent that quickly. "Um, I'll go along with the lady. It's safer not to say no to her. She actually kicked me awake this morning, when I didn't want to rise, because she wanted to drag me around for training."

Kibaou just laughed, and walked ahead towards the central chamber of the labyrinth.

The first floor of the Tower wasn't that difficult to navigate. We had run into a couple of boars and kobolds, but killed them in a few seconds. Most of the groups were confident now, but I guessed that Illfang's strength would quickly shake their confidence.

Soon, I saw the familiar, stout blue boss standing in the middle of the room, flanked by three of his kobold Sentinels in heavy armor. The group got into formation before entering his lair, with the tanks in front, and several groups of powerful attackers massing behind them.

The plan would be for groups to rotate periodically, giving them time to heal up. So that the Sentinels couldn't disrupt this, the group led by Kibaou, including me and Asuna, would aggro them and kill them off.

After a brief discussion with Kibaou, we decided on a plan for that. Since the Sentinels were spread out across the room, our group would fan out and aggro them, then lure them towards the left wall of the chamber so that they were safely out of the way. We could then surround them and kill them off.

As these Sentinels died, new ones would appear to replace them. As such, Kibaou said that me and Asuna should spread out once one or two Sentinels were dead, and prepare to aggro the new ones. Since they would always spawn in the same positions, we could easily prepare to aggro them as soon as they spawned, preventing them from getting involved in the battle with Illfang.

When the group was ready, with the main groups standing in formation and prepared, Kibaou told me that we should go out and get the Sentinels out of the way so that the other players could march up to Illfang.

As the tank line began advancing slowly towards Illfang, my group began to charge towards the Sentinels. Asuna and I ran up to the one standing on the right, while I saw that Kibaou was sauntering over to the one on the left.

Aggroing the Sentinel was easy, it started coming for me as soon as it saw me approaching it with sword drawn. It held up a large shield, and wobbled in a duck-like walk as it raised its own sword.

Since it was fairly slow, it was fairly easy for Yuuki and I to backstep towards the left of the room, luring the kobold on.

However, on our way, a large shadow suddenly loomed over us. Seemingly, the tanks were delayed because one of the groups had failed to aggro the central Sentinel before it charged into the tank group. Without anyone facing it directly, Illfang had turned its attention towards Asuna and I in the middle of the chamber.

I saw its axe raised high in the air, targeting me since I was closer to it than Asuna, but fortunately I knew the timing of this attack. After a 2.5-second delay, it swung its axe down firmly towards my position, but I reacted just in time to leap backwards out of the way.

Dodging too early would have been useless, because its axe would have followed me. Dodging late, well, obvious issues. The timing had to be precise. And it was.

But Illfang didn't just have an axe. As soon as I felt the tremors from the axe striking the ground, I ran sharply to the left, grabbing Asuna and dragging her roughly along with me.

She tried to keep up, cycling her legs frantically, but was surprised and slightly frightened by seeing this massive creature's axe striking so nearby in a life-or-death game. After a handful of steps, she tripped up, dragging me to the ground as we fell and rolled for a few meters.

It was enough. Illfang's massive shield slammed into the ground to our right, missing by some distance. By now, the tanks finally surged forwards, keeping Illfang's attention and meaning that we were safe for now. Asuna wiped dirt from her face as she got slowly to her feet, absent-mindedly grabbing my chest to help her climb.

A few of Kibaou's Guildmates had been sent to fight the Sentinel we had picked up, and we helped them lure it the rest of the way to the left, where the rest of the group was.

There, we easily surrounded the Sentinels, which tried clumsily to deal with being attacked from multiple directions despite their heavy armor.

In the front, the rest of the players seemed to have got Illfang under control, and there were few casualties as they chipped away at its HP. Soon, it was down to three HP bars out of four.

POV Switch - 1st (MC)

Ah yes, I can hear these little Knights of the Blood members training, and talking about how they'd like to grow and become like their strong Guildmates fighting the Tower boss.

I have a better idea.

Walking out from behind some trees, using the Hiding skill, they don't even see me. Well, I've developed it a bit, using skill points from the cave quests. It's good to know that it lives up to its billing.

Once I got close enough, however, there was no need to hide. Drawing out my spear, I circled around and stabbed through three players as the rest tried running away.

However, with my stats being much higher across the board than these level 8-15 players, they had no chance of escaping. Especially not when my spear sometimes extends to almost twice its length and catches them on the spine.

A trail of fallen players grew across the ground as I pursued everyone still standing.

A few of the players on the ground had only fainted or been severely injured by my strikes, rather than dying immediately. That was fine. I could track back and kill them properly later, and most would probably bleed out regardless.

Bravely, with only three players left, one of the players, named Akkun, turned to fight me in the hope that he could delay me until the others escaped. Unsurprisingly, he was the last male from this group, and the other two were females. What a simp.

His sword strike was rash and landed far short of me, since his short, low-level sword had less range than my spear and could barely reach me. However, he at least managed to raise it and block my spear's point as I surged forwards to end the battle.

Not willing to wait, I smashed the side of his face with the spear's iron shaft, then punched him in the face for good measure. He collapsed to the ground, unconscious.

His insolence had won him nothing.

Meanwhile, the squealing girls in front of him weren't difficult to track down and spear, and they died without any serious struggle. One of them had turned around and caught a spear through their mouth, which jostled its way to the top of their skulls before they went out cold and fell to the ground. That meant that the whole group, of about fifteen members, was now defeated in a matter of minutes.

Life isn't bad when it isn't bad.

I tracked back and killed off any surviving injured or unconscious players by poking around with my spear until it struck their heart. For Akkun, though, who had fallen face-first, I shoved my spear in through his spinal region and let him bleed out. If people throw away their lives purely to annoy me, then I must make an example of them.

Listening carefully, I heard a few more players creeping nearby, this time from some Guild named 'MMO Today,' apparently after some website or forum. What a dumb name.

These players had seemingly come to check on what was going on.

I let them get close, using Hiding again to avoid detection, then easily ran out of cover and hunted them down. This spear makes things really easily, since it often reaches over surprisingly long distances. Maybe Antony was good for something after all.

These two players had a few valuable items, as well as the usual potions, gold, low-level equipment, herbs, flowers, animal skins, and all that. This expedition has actually got me quite a lot of free resources, especially since Guilds like Knights of the Blood are quite wealthy and use their coffers to offer new members a head-start - one of the reasons why so many people join them. Killing these saplings before they can grow also weakens a lot of these Guilds in the long run, and means they'll be easier to deal with in the future.

Anyway, I can hear another group training nearby. It's three level 19 Knights of the Blood players. Well, why not take them on? They're 10 levels lower than me.

I stood behind a low tree, and hung out my spear through the thick branches to fish for one of the players. After spearing him, the others suddenly turned towards me in alarm, but found it difficult to push their way through the branches while I was angling for them. Since I was much higher-level and my spear was powerful, even a slight delay could be fatal for them. Eventually, I managed to kill another before they reached me, and the other one managed to swing her sword at me but I easily blocked it with my spear's shaft. Then I impaled her from the belly to the throat.

This is easy.

POV Switch - Kirito (1st)

The boss fight has taken a turn for the worse.

Illfang suddenly decided to change its focus, attacking the leader of one of our offensive units. Since those players are typically less beefy than the tanks, Illfang managed to kill the unit's leader, and soon cut through three more players as the unit fell into disarray and eventually fled.

Seeing these players dead alarmed the tanks, who suddenly began shuffling nervously away. This meant that Illfang suddenly began advancing forwards through the room, his axe slicing through groups of players which were trying to stand back and heal. The three or four players who bravely tried to hold him off, and prevent him from rampaging through the whole formation, were quickly killed, and even if they dodged the axe they were crushed beneath his shield.

Since our strategy was for players to rotate and stay out of the fight while recovering, this has taken a lot of players by surprise. There's a very real danger that he kills off a large part of our group right now, and throws the rest into chaos by disrupting our strategy. Further, I know that Illfang hasn't even reached his final stage, where he drops his axe and takes out a large sword to cut through players. If we reach that point with a small group of survivors, we're probably not going to win this fight.

"We can't let him do this!" Asuna shouted beside me. "Come on, Kirito, let's stop him before he ruins everything!"

"Are you sure, Asuna?" I replied. "It'll be risky."

"Yeah! Even Kibaou said we should! Please take me, I can't do this alone!"

"Alright, I'll follow you."

She nodded, and charged towards Illfang.

Worrying slightly as I saw it strike down a player with its axe, I decided to not put Asuna in the line of fire, and instead ran ahead of her to reach Illfang first.

Fortunately, it saw me before her, and again raised its axe. OK, I've got this.

It struck down, and I again managed to dodge back. However, I noticed that Asuna had taken advantage of the boss' preoccupation to launch a vicious attack cutting large gashes in its back and arms. The boss roared out in pain, delaying its shield strike by a few seconds and giving me more time to get away.

I noticed that, despite her fierce assault, Asuna was looking over towards me with mild, worried eyes.

After the boss' shield fell, I jumped forwards and started slashing at it, something I was used to from the beta test. The boss had more HP bars this time, but its attacks were still roughly the same.

Soon, it was prepared to attack me again, and I managed to dodge out of the way. The other players were keeping their distance, somewhat surprised that I hadn't been struck down yet. Fortunately, Asuna's insistent attacks were wreaking havoc on the boss, and I mostly had to just keep it busy while she attacked it. It had just slowly crept below 1 HP bar, and soon it would begin using the sword.

For a third time, it raised its axe to attack me, and I dodged. Honestly, I'm making this boss look easier than it is, but some of the other players seem more enthusiastic now because they think it's easy. Well, it isn't, but at least our morale is back.

However, when its shield came back down, I suddenly heard Asuna squeal and froze while I looked over. She had been bowled over from behind by a Sentinel that took her by surprise, and was desperately rolling around and fending off its blows.

Too late, I remembered that I had to dodge the shield, and the shield managed to break my toes. Ouch.

OUCH.

By this point, I just double up and fall to the ground, abandoning the fight for now. Fortunately, a lot of players, with new-found confidence, surge forwards to fight Illfang, meaning that it leaves me and Asuna alone. Kibaou's group have moved in to help Asuna with the Sentinel, and she's managed to get to her feet.

Speaking of feet, mine hurt like hell. I'm going to be out of action for a while.

Also, where's Heathcliff, our leader? He had guided most of our forces here, but now it's the heat of the battle and he seems to have just disappeared! What the hell? He might be strong on paper, but he's been anonymous in this fight, so much that I haven't seen him since the first minute or so. I know he isn't dead, and I never saw him run away, so is he just keeping out of the way for some reason? I don't understand why Asuna admires him so much, he practically abandoned our Guild in the middle of the first boss fight.

Anyway, in his absence, players are just running in to fight the boss and getting killed. I've inspired them, and now they think it'll be an easy fight and they can play the hero. I estimate about 5-10 players who just got mowed down by the boss on this charge, before players learned to be more cautious. I should probably feel some sense of responsibility for their actions, but what could I have done?

We only have just under 20 players left, but the sudden rush of bravery at least depleted Illfang's HP, which is now below 30% on his last HP bar.

Now comes the final challenge.

He begins drawing his sword. Wait, there's too many players clustered around him. If he starts swinging around his long nodachi it's going to do some serious damage. And who's going to help with that? Heathcliff is nowhere to be seen, and our Guild was supposed to be leading the charge. Everyone's looking a bit lost instead, and they don't seem to understand just how dangerous the sword can be.

They'll be cut down in seconds.

As much as my feet are in pain, I am not Heathcliff, and I won't abandon my Guildmates in the hour of need!

Surging to my feet, I ignored the pain and ran forwards just as the monster was withdrawing his sword.

Before he could swing it, I managed a stunning blow to the chest.

"Everyone, pour in! Kill him quick!" Asuna said, reading my intention.

The rest of the group surrounded Illfang, all attacking him at once. Soon, his HP had lowered beneath 10%. Under this string of attacks, and with no Sentinels remaining, he was finding it difficult to find space to swing his sword.

He managed to take out two players, but the attack was enough to bring him to the brink of death.

Finally, limping slightly, I managed to leap up and slash my sword down diagonally across his back, before tilting it upwards to slash his face as he turned around. This time, his face broke in two, and he dropped to the ground, dead.

The boss battle was over.

For the final blow, I had received a nice reward, some leather gloves which would increase the speed of my sword attacks. That would be especially valuable when I was using two swords, since it would help in co-ordinating them.

But how the hell am I going to walk back? Honestly, I barely know. As Asuna walks over, leaning over me, I just faint from exhaustion.