Sword Art Online: Another Story.

Chapter 3: Solo

January 12th, 2023

Floor 18: Land of Despair

Dodge rolling from the unexpected slash of a blade covered with spikes, Xero rolled into a field of bones. Looking up he was able to see two armored skeletons with spike helmets equipped and two spike covered swords each, standing before him. Their blades were pointed only a few inches from his head. "Crap..." He thought to himself; taking a quick look at his HP to make sure it was still fully green. 

Grinning to himself as one of the skeletons launched another attack at him, he quickly dodged rolled out of the pile of bones, causing them to scatter every as the skeletons swords slashed into them. "Luckily, I'm way stronger than these skeletons. This should be easy." Xero said to himself as he forced himself up, reaching behind him, he pulled out his sword. Getting into a fighting stance, he prepared himself, holding his sword in two hands. 

The two skeletons began to run over at him. Holding his sword outwards to the skeletons, Xero did a sudden dash towards them. He passed right in between the skeletons as they turned sideways swinging their blades to try to get a hit at him. Missing, Xero forced himself to spin around, facing the enemies he slashed his sword across them as hard as he can. He smiled to himself as he watched the HP of his enemies drain down into the yellow bar. 

"Don't mess with someone, that is way stronger than you!" He yelled out to the skeletons as he dashed towards them. His sword began to glow with a red aurora around it. "Now, die!" Running towards them, Xero focused only on the one that was already standing back up to fight. 

Stabbing his blade into the skeleton; he quickly spun around, sliding his sword out of it and slicing the other skeleton as it began to stand up. "Done.." He smirked as he put his sword back into its sheath. Watching as the skeletons health reached zero, shattering into a thousands of pixels.

"That was way to easy." Xero smiled to himself as he looked around. He was standing in a graveyard like area. It had small swamps about every 50 feet. Scattered everywhere was piles of bones from both humans and animals. Trees were cut in half, on the ground as if blocking passages. 

Opening up his inventory, he scrolled down to his friends list. Both Alicia's and Asuku's names were gone. Having deleted them off his list the day he separated from them. Closing the friends list tab, he up scrolled up to his messages, clicking on it. A label appeared in front of him that had 'No new messages' on it.

Sighing to himself, he closed the message tab, then began walking through the graveyard. "I wonder how they're doing without me..." 

January 26th, 2023

Floor 18: Land of Despair

It had been only been a few weeks and floor 18 was already cleared by the top raid guilds. Xero looked around at the deserted broken down city that was floor 18. It was empty due to the fact that every player had already moved on to floor 19. Xero refused to leave floor 18 though. He had a reason he was there. To clear the boss, and obtain the items for himself. He had never taken on a dungeon boss by himself, yet he had heard rumors of Kirito already doing it by himself. 

"If I do this, and can defeat this boss... I'll have even stronger armor; maybe a new sword." Standing up from against tree that looked like it was about to tip over, he opened his inventory, equipping the best sword he had.

Heading outside the city, he entered the graveyard area that he had entered a few weeks earlier. Walking through the graveyard for almost an hour, Xero had finally reached a massive cave, where the boss awaited. Two massive doors stood in front of him. Each door had skeletons hanging from the top of them as if someone or something was decorating the bodies.

"Lets do this..." Xero took a deep breath as he placed his hands on the doors, slowly pushing them open. Inside was a dark room with piles of bones scattered throughout it. "What.. Where is the boss?" He said to himself as he walked into the room, the doors closing behind him. Suddenly, Xero was able to see all the bones begin to pile up together, fusing together as they began to create a giant solider skeleton. This Skeleton was unlike anything Xero had seen before. It stood at over 30 feet tall. It had on a brown breastplate, and torn up matching leggings, with a black spiked helmet.

"Oh there you are.." Xero grinned to himself as the skeleton stood before him. A  gigantic barb wire covered mace appearing in the skeleton's hand. "Hope you're ready to die." Xero quickly reached behind him, pulling his sword out from his sheath. Getting into his fighting position, he prepared for the skeleton's first attack.

The skeleton roared out as if it were some kind of beast. Swinging it's mace forward towards Xero, he quickly dodge roll just in time. The mace smashing into the ground. The skeleton lifted up his mace again, this time throwing it as Xero. "Crap.. Crap.." Xero quickly dashed sideways, the spikes on the mace barely cutting his left leg. His health points slowly drained down just a bit, still managing to stay in the green.

"I see you actually want to put up a fight!" Standing straight up, his sword began to glow its red aurora around it. "You put up a good fight, but it's your time to die..." Running towards the skeleton, he kept his sword help in both hands. The skeleton grabbed its mace off the ground, swinging the mace towards Xero. Xero began to dodge back and forth as he dashed towards the skeleton. Using his sword to block, Xero stood his guard, blocking the attack of the skeleton. 

"Now, take this!" Xero jumped high up into the air, the point of his sword glowing red. He slashed his blade across the breastplate of the skeleton. The skeleton's health drained down to orange as Xero landed back down on the ground. 

Roaring out loud, flames appeared around the Skeleton's body. Making it look like it was on fire. "Oh, angry are you?" Roaring out again even louder than before. The skeleton's mace vanished from his hands. "W-what.. is this?" Xero thought to himself as the skeleton lifted it's hands. Balls of fire appearing in its hands, it began throwing them at Xero."

Covering his eyes as he kept his sword in front of him to guard the balls of fire. A circle of flames appearing around Xero. "You're getting really annoying.." Slashing his sword forward, the flames of fire faded away. 

As the skeleton began to unleash another attack of fire, Xero jumped up into the air again, stabbing and slashing his sword across the skeleton multiple times, using a combo attack.

The skeleton backed away, his health points draining completely. The breastplate of the skeleton shattered into pieces as the skeleton began to glow brightly. "Gotcha..." He smiled to himself, the skeleton roaring out as it shattered into pieces of blue and white particles.

Breathing hard, Xero smiled to himself. Putting his sword back into its sheath, a notification appeared in front of his face. The notification was labeled with "Congratulations!." Below that was a notification for two items acquired from the boss. A light brown leather coat, and a sword with a silver blade and grey handle. The sword was named 'Forsaken soul' as the coat was named 'Randivier's coat.'

"Awesome!" Xero said to himself cheerfully. "Whelp, job is all done here." He smirked, turning around, walking out of the dungeon.