When Our Blades Cross (A Sword Art Online Story)

A Unique Meeting

Ice. Ice was all Gosen could see in the dungeon, as far as his eyes could see. "Jeez... why was that kid in here anyway? It's freezing and this is the 58th floor..." he said, glancing around. "He's not very high level, so he couldn't have gotten too far in, so the item must be close by too."

As he trekked through the icy fields, Gosen kept his sword in hand just in case enemies decided to pop out. Somethings wrong here... it's way too quiet. And there's no sign of any item having been dropped out here anyways...

Could there be a trap somewhere? I see no reason he would've dropped it unless there was something of the sort... The boy continued to move, the temperature seeming to drop heavily as he went deeper.

Soon he noticed a wire on the ground, seeming to have been tripped already, followed by a heavy inhuman growl. Gosen followed the growl into a side room, where he found a chimera-like beast seemingly cradling something that had a red shine. "Oh. Now it all makes sense. A miniboss, kid must have panicked and ran away."

He drew his sword, the dark blue coloring being illuminated by the icy ground. "I'll make this quick." As soon as he entered the room, the chimera made a roar as it got up, baring its fangs in a threatening manner.

Yeesh, the intimidation factor in this game really works for the rating. The boy dashed, slicing the side of the beast before it had the chance to strike. Recoiling, the beast tried to use the snake on it's tail to bite. Grazing Gosen's shoulder, a poison status symbol popped up below his health bar.

"Tch. Damnit," Gosen quickly moves his sword, slicing off the head of the snake. "It's game over for you!" He yells, activating the four-hit sword skill Vertical Square while the beast was weakened. He hopped back and gazed as it's hp gauge disappeared and it shattered into pixelated shards.

Giving a sigh due to how little exp slaying it gave, the boy picked up the item, the label saying 'Sunshine Rapier'. "Jeez, it barely does any damage, too... seriously, what was that boy thinking?"

"Now, let's use the teleport crystal..."

~~~

Arriving back to the thirty-first floor, Gosen found a boy about his height looking stressed out. "...Michael." Gosen said, causing the boy to jump and look up.

"O-oh, you've returned, Gosen! H-how'd it go?"

"It was easy enough for me, just don't do something so reckless again. At your level, if you fought that thing instead of running, I can assure you, you WOULD have died." Gosen opened his menu, returning the sword. "How do you even forget something as important as your weapon? What if you ran into mobs on the way back?"

"Eheheh, you should know I don't think that far ahead by now," Michael said, rubbing the back of his head.

"Yeah, and that's exactly why I'm worried," Gosen says, "you're literally the only one I'm comfortable around in both worlds."

"Yeah? Well you're one to talk about being worried," Michael says, eyeing Gosen, "I didn't even know you were here too, but then bam! I see you headed to a boss raid on the front lines with one of the strongest guilds in the game!"

"Yeah, I suppose that wasn't the best way for you to find out..."

"Why'd you leave the front lines anyways? We both know you're still checking out the higher floors, just not doing the boss raids."

"I left... for personal reasons. Anyways, I gotta go, but do me a favor and stick to the lower floors for the time being, okay?" I hate to limit people, but I've heard rumors that Laughing Coffin members have been lounging from floors 50-55, so until I can put those to rest, I can't let him go up there.