Sword Art Online Gameverse x Reader

Chapter 77: Moonlit No More

Floor Twenty Five was just cleared just a couple of hours ago.

And before we went in we planned to have another Floor Cleared Party, like we did for the First and Tenth Floors... however, with so many lives lost, nobody was really in the mood to celebrate.

We still met up in my room like we planned, but there was a severe lack of food and laughter, rather a more solemn and quiet atmosphere. And we were missing a friend, Asuna... It seems there was a rather one-sided conversation between her and Kirito, and Asuna ended up joining the Knights of the Blood guild.

I'm not sure what was said between the two of them, nor do I really want to know. That seems like something that'll be kept between themselves, but it wasn't an amicable departure from Asuna from what I saw.

And the Aincrad Liberation Squad has all but disappeared from the front lines, it seems as if the huge amount of losses they suffered weren't only hard on the guild's morale but also on Kibaou's wellbeing. His over-confidence got a lot of players killed, some that he considered good friends. 

I hope I'll never know the pain he's feeling whilst I remain within this game.

The rest of the night was just quiet conversation between the friends, and then they slowly made their way out to head to their own inn rooms.

Leaving just me and Lisbeth once again, like usual. I then make dinner for the two of us and we have a friendly yet respectful chat now that the overhanging aura had mostly dissipated with those in mourning who had departed. Then we made our way to our beds, ready to make the most out of the next day.

*TIMESKIP* 

It had been a couple of weeks since we cleared the 25th Floor, we were now on the 28th Floor... fortunately we had not suffered any further losses since the 25th Floor.

Whether that be because of Heathcliff and the KoB's assistance or just solely because every major milestone up this tower had a more powerful Boss Encounter compared to its neighbouring Floors. Every 10 Floors is a step up in difficulty whilst every 25 Floors is supposedly meant to be the real challenge... hopefully we do better on the 50th.

I saw much less of Asuna ever since she joined the KoB, she was present at the Boss Battles and sometimes I would run across training sessions of a squad of KoB members being led by her, but that was it. She quickly rose up the ranks of the KoB guild, so I guess she didn't have as much time to interact with us all like we used to.

Although she also seemed quite different too, as if she had returned to her attitude before we cleared the First Floor. Forgetting the luxuries of this world and opting only to escape it as soon as she could. She hasn't been in contact for anything cooking-related at all since the 25th Floor!

. . .

And it seemed she wasn't the only one to join a guild, Kirito actually ended up joining the Moonlit Black Cats Guild. The same one that Sachi belongs to.

That was honestly quite a surprise to see, he always seemed like a solitary player like me. But at least it'll give me some peace-of-mind knowing that he's working alongside them and will keep them from doing anything reckless. He hasn't appeared at the last couple Boss Fights so he must be spending a lot of time with them.