Chapter Text
Floor 27 - Chapter 2 - What We Do in the Dark
After his ill-fated attempt to follow Rosalia and Joe, and the discovery of whatever the heck Quinella was, Jet had bemoaned how difficult keeping a close pursuit of someone was, especially when you had to keep a low profile.
Rain had thought he was being a little bit melodramatic, exaggerating how difficult of a task it was, or assuming that, with his low-level Hiding skill, and… less than stealthy appearance (purple and orange were not normally two colours that happened to appear regularly in nature, after all), he would naturally have more difficulty in such a task than she would.
She owed him an apology, she'd realised.
The well-dressed man was certainly thorough in keeping his back clear of would be tails, and by thorough, what she really meant was dangerous and cold blooded. A young NPC that had followed him, part of a quest to find their missing toy – for which the reward was barely anything, 1 col if she remembered correctly, and a small sense of doing a good deed – was sent away and disappeared out of her sight.
It was only when she'd gotten closer that she realised exactly where the child had gone.
Beside her, a small chamber of a cavern had an entrance. So small in fact, that had she not nearly tripped over the uneven ground nearby, she wouldn't have even known it was there…
Despite poking a light crystal in through the entrance, she failed to spot the child who'd probably only been in there for moments, and a sad realisation bought a look of anguish and sorrow to her face.
They were gone – all because of this creature masquerading as human.
She was going to get to the bottom of who this creature was, whatever she did.
/-/
Almost an hour of travelling later, and Rain had edged closer to the creature, despite every sense of self-preservation telling her to run as far away and as fast as possible; to go back, meet up with the Concord and work out who this creep was together… not to do what she'd told both Jet and Sanya off for at various times, for taking completely bonkers risks and trying to do things on their own.
She was absolutely getting chewed out for this, she realised (and no doubt Sanya had already been chewed out for letting her do this on her own…), but the risks were worth the reward. As long as she maintained a low profile, she'd be alright. They hadn't noticed her, and the path was wide enough with enough rock formations to hide behind, that she wasn't too concerned at the moment with that.
No, what she was concerned about was the sheer drop beside her. She wasn't sure exactly where she was anymore, but she had a horrible feeling this wasn't on the Twenty-Seventh Floor – that drop looked less like falling down a mineshaft, and more like falling off the side of Aincrad itself, though she knew instinctively it wasn't falling from the side of the floating castle…
The terrain around it simply didn't add up for it to be that: sheer purple stone cliffs above and below her, littered with the bones of strange creatures, the likes of which she'd never seen before in Aincrad or the real world, and sets of armour that more closely resembled something she reckoned Jet would wear, should they not contain the bones of what she believed were once humans, people who had died probably many years ago… maybe even decades ago.
"It is rather unique, this place, is it not?" The man spoke to himself, though why would he be asking himself that question, unless…
Oh no.
"Oh, don't be so surprised. I've known you to be following me since Ham's Stead." He commented, a lasseiz-faire tone to his voice, as if he was used to being followed. "I must say, I'm impressed by your tenacity, young lady. Many would've given up long before now… if I allowed them to survive that long, of course. You should be honoured that I let you follow me."
Even from the way he spoke, she was working out the situation in her head – if she ran, she died. If she stayed… she died. Damned if she did, and damned if she didn't. What she could do however, was offer her best impression of Jet – keeping the villain talking as long as she could and learn whatever their plan was. It wasn't fool proof, but it was her best option right now. "Don't flatter yourself." She responded, holding back the rising anger at the nonchalance of the man.
"Oh, I don't. I merely state facts, Rain." Without any warning or even turning to face her, he'd been able to identify her. What the hell was he?! "Such as the fact that you know you stand little chance of escaping this unfortunate situation you placed yourself in, and so, you endeavour to act like that knightly friend of yours. Seeking answers in the vain hope that it buys you time to think of an answer."
"Who are you!" She shouted, her voice echoing throughout the cliffs. "You know too much to just be some random thug, but…"
"Oh, I am far from a random thug, as you so ineloquently describe me. As for who I am, my anonymity is my defence, I'm sure you understand. Much as your friends wield their swords to create hope, I wield information. I know more about you all than perhaps you know about each other; your hopes, dreams… anxieties, fears and your deepest, darkest secrets."
"And a dictionary."
"Oh, how very droll." He commented, a sarcastic smile on his face. "I suppose I could allow my name to be revealed to you – I am Albion, at your service."
"So why go around murdering people?!"
"I am offended by that impropriety, did your parents fail to raise you correctly?" He smiled, as if he'd realised something. "Oh, of course they did. An absent father, and an alcoholic mother, all lead to that inferiority complex of yours, don't they?"
"H-how…"
Albion continued, the smile contorting to show the malice hidden behind it. "That lack of love in your life, a lack of hope especially… you latched onto the first person to show you kindness, to show you hope, to so much as smile in the right way towards you. You latched onto him like a parasite, and he is far too kind to tell you exactly what you are, Rain. Tell me, how is your sister? Still more intelligent than you? Of course she is, she wasn't foolish enough to follow a dangerous man on her own, having already seen what happened to someone who confided in me…"
"That woman… "
"Oh yes, rather my finest work, don't you think? A perfect dichotomy between life and death; the inner struggles faced by everyone, made manifest…" Albion spoke as if he were an artist describing a painting, not a butcher who'd slaughtered a young woman! "Perhaps even my magnum opus, if I do say so myself!"
"You eviscerated her!" She shouted in disgust. "You aren't an artist, you're a monster!"
"That young woman had come to me – she told me of her struggles, of how no one took her seriously and told me of her inner thoughts. I offered her an out. Hardly murder… assisted suicide, perhaps."
"And how did you do that then? Convince her to let herself be found like… that." She thought back to the murder scene; to the horror show they'd found, with bits of the young woman spread across the room… no one would willingly have that happen to them, would they?
"It's fascinating what a person will do, if the correct words are used… for example, if I told you to jump down there, you would say no. That self-preservation mechanism kicks in…" Albion explained, and she looked down into the abyss. "But if I told you that, say, your sister was down there, faintly crying for help… what would you say then?"
She paused for thought – of course she knew Seven wasn't down there, but if she paused for long enough, she wondered if she could actually hear her voice. A faint cry that sounded like it could be her, but that she would need to- just what the hell was she doing!?
That was how Albion had gotten to people, she now realised - the power of suggestion.
"Could you hear it? Just for a moment… it's marvellous, isn't it?" He grinned as he stood back from the edge. "I could convince anyone of anything with enough time."
Gaslighting as a superpower, she really had heard it all now.
"I'd say I was impressed, but I'm not. Horrified, yes, but not impressed. You're nothing but a stage magician with one good trick… a fake psychic at that."
"How dare you!" If her earlier insults had been deflected back at her, that one must have hit him squarely where it hurt. His ego. "Oh, I shall rather enjoy watching you suffer and squirm as you give into your misery…"
Before he'd had much of a chance to reach for a weapon, she watched as an angry red slash severed his right arm at the shoulder, and his arm flew away into oblivion below…
"What the-" The creature named Albion mumbled, still processing the loss of his arm as he turned to face the source of the slash – a big mistake, given there was an old saying: "never turn your back to your enemy", and that was exactly what he had just done…
With little hesitation, she rushed forward at Albion, to force him onto the defensive, a task made easier when it appeared that the mystery attacker had severed his leading arm, forcing him to fight on the back hand throughout.
"This simply isn't fair!" He cried, as if she gave a damn.
"Yeah, well… he who fights fair, loses!" She responded, switching her attacks up to ensure that at least one blade got through his defences on each pass.
"Hm, I thought perhaps you would be more like your friend – willing to handicap yourself for an antiquated justification of chivalry…" Albion grumbled, before he managed to break through her attacks for the first time, his sole arm reaching under her swords and grabbing her by the throat… "I would rather not kill in cold blood, but… no, this is self-defence." He smirked. "I hope you said all you wish to say, it does tend to be rather hard to do so from the afterlife…"
Realising that Albion was far too overconfident to realise that he hadn't quite won yet, Rain remembered a tactic that Jet had taught all of them in a duel – the "male reset button", as he had called it. She called it kicking someone in the groin instead, though both names had the same effect…
She kicked as hard as she could, and based on the high-pitched wail let out by Albion as he staggered back towards the edge of the pass, her attack had worked pretty damn well. Without a chance to really do anything, Albion had staggered back far enough that he found himself in a position resembling a coyote in a Saturday morning cartoon… meeting gravity for the first time.
She clutched at her neck as she watched him descend, before disappearing into the mists below. She wasn't one to wish death upon anyone, but considering the man's crimes, she was far from eaten up over his demise too.
The man had tried to kill her, and he'd met his maker in the form of gravity.
"Whew, got here just in time!" From a few paces away, she heard another voice, and reached for her swords once again. "Heh, sorry, I'm on your side!"
The girl stood there was probably in her late teens or very early twenties, she reckoned, with piercing red eyes, and very light brown hair, tied up with a black bow into a long ponytail along her back, with very little by the way of armour on – just a pair of black trousers and what appeared to be a well-worn grey tunic of some kind. Her sword was the most interesting thing about her appearance though, a midnight-black katana not too much shorter than she was that was still partially glowing as she sheathed it – probably the remnants of a sword skill, if she had to guess.
"I could hear voices in the valley and followed them. Got close enough to hear what he was saying, and well, you saw the rest. You're pretty good by the way, 'specially with that style of yours! What do you call it?"
"I don't really call it anything, it's just how I fight?" She admitted. She'd never given it much thought, other than when she was worried she would wind up like Kirito had for being unique amongst the frontliners.
"Ahh, too bad." The girl said, a sense of disappointment in her voice, before bouncing back. "Oh, I never got your name!"
"Rain." She answered with a small bow.
"I'm Eydis, nice to meet ya, Rain!"
/-/
With Albion gone, Rain had decided that heading back the way she had come was the best option – even if it was the option that also meant she would face the wrath of Asuna for doing something so reckless… and the disappointment of Koharu for the same thing. Honestly, she wasn't sure which was worse…
Actually, she was – Koharu's disappointment. At least Asuna calmed down after about five minutes, and all was back to normal; Koharu, by virtue of having not been angry in the first place, never had to calm down, and so it was hard to tell whether she was still disappointed or not…
"So that creep was a murderer… glad I did step in then! Not sure I needed to though, you looked like you had it under control!" At least having Eydis here helped snap her out of that worrying thought, though Eydis had far more confidence in her skills than she did.
It had only been because of Eydis taking his arm off that she had succeeded in that fight anyway, so she owed the girl big time.
"Yeah, one question though… where am I?" She thought aloud, looking around her. As she'd wondered earlier, the valley looked completely different to anything she'd seen so far in Aincrad with the purple stone walls and perpetual twilight around her…
Eydis's tone suddenly became almost as dark as the sky above them. "The Dark Territory. We, uhh, really shouldn't be here… but you know, I needed something, so…"
"What did you need? I owe you at least something for helping back there."
"I needed a Dark Knight's Armour for Mary's medicine." Eydis said quietly, a stark contrast to the usual energy she displayed. "I figured it'd more than pay for it, and I'd heard stories of a knight whose armour was still there on the pass… saves me fighting one!" She laughed, though it was clear there was no humour in it.
"Armour?" She wracked her mind, thinking of why that sounded familiar, before remembering why – she'd seen the armour whilst she was chasing after Albion! "It was back the way I came. I kind of overlooked it, as, well…"
"Wait, it's real!?" Eydis lit up as if someone had flicked a light switch behind her eyes. "Rain, I could kiss you!"
Now it was her time for a switch to flip – the switch that controlled the blood flow to her cheeks, that was… "Err…"
"Heh, just a figure of speech." The brown-haired girl grinned. Not in the same way Sanya did (which usually involved some nefarious scheme to do… something), but in a more teasing way. It wasn't like Eydis wasn't cute either, but- nope, she could have that realisation later.
When they weren't walking along a cliff edge later, she decided, though she had come to another realisation as they headed along the cliff edge – Eydis could talk.
Not in the way Jet so often meant, which was usually an insult whenever someone said something mildly hypocritical, but in the way that Eydis was talking so much she was honestly concerned the girl would go blue at any moment, for forgetting to breathe as she spoke…
"You fight with two swords, right? How does that even work, I've never actually seen anyone who can make it work before!"
"It's like, err… It's like wielding a sword and shield for me, use one blade to attack, one to defend, and alternate them, if that makes sense?"
"Ohh, so you aren't using both for attack then – that's… really clever! I don't think I'd be able to do that with my sword, it's a bit too big to have a short sword with it."
"Eydis, what actually do you need this armour for? You don't wear it, and…"
"It's for my little sister. Sort of, anyway. I'm going to sell it, get the money to head to Zakkaria with her, and get her the help she needs. I know, I know, I sound mad – risking my life for a bit of rusty old armour, but it's the kind of thing you only understand if you have a sibling…" She defended herself, even though she didn't need to at all.
"I understand you, and yeah, it's… something like that for me too." She admitted.
"You've got a sibling too?" Eydis asked, a curious look on her face.
"Yep, a little sister too. She's, well, kind of a genius, but we only reunited recently." She left out the many years of inadequacy that that separation had bought about, though she wondered if Eydis had heard what Albion said on the cliff side, because she gave her a look of sympathy. "I'm not even sure where we stand, to be quite honest."
"If I had a big sister as cool as you, I'd look up to her." Eydis smiled.
She laughed bitterly, remembering everything she'd thought about Seven – everything their mother had told her about her, and how she was none of those things. She may as well have called her a parasite; it was what she'd meant after all… "If only you knew, Eydis. If only you knew."
Sensing a change in the mood, Eydis moved the topic to something slightly more light-hearted – her love life. "Soo… you got a boyfriend? Or a girlfriend?"
And for the second time this evening, she blushed furiously enough for her cheeks to act as a signalling beacon of some kind. "N-nope! I did like someone, but it's, err… complicated." It really wasn't, she knew that – Jet and Koharu loved each other, and she knew that her feelings for him were nothing more than a schoolgirl crush, mixed in with a dose of idolisation and hero worship – but explaining all that to Eydis would take longer than they probably had before they reached the armour.
"Ah, it's like that then." Eydis winked at her, a tacit acknowledgement of what was being said. Either this girl was psychic, or she was exceptionally good at cold reading…
Or she was as unsubtle as a brick through a window, a voice inside her head countered.
Changing topic again, she swung back around to the whole "Dark Territory" thing. "So, this Dark Territory place? Why aren't we allowed here?"
"Because it's against the Taboo Index." Eydis answered as if it were the most obvious thing.
"Taboo Index?" She asked, trying not to sound like she'd asked Seven about what she had been working on before she arrived in Aincrad – her little sister was amazing… but it had taken her half an hour to explain, and involved three tangents, two lectures on advanced concepts in biology, and a drink break before she'd answered her question.
Eydis looked at her with a look usually reserved for aliens. "Umm, Rain… you don't happen to be a Lost Child of Vecta, do you?"
She had no idea what a Vecta even was, so she was sure she wasn't one. Whatever a "lost child of Vecta" was anyway, it had to be something very unusual for her to give her that look – or very dangerous, a part of her mind said. "Not that I know of, no."
"How do you not know what the Taboo Index is then? It's basically the law of the land…" She shrugged in response, trying out her best impression of Jet again, though to no avail as Eydis continued. "Wait, are you from the Dark Territory?"
"I mean, it is cold and bleak where I'm from, but no."
"Huh, you really are a mystery, aren't ya?" Eydis smiled. "A mystery wrapped in an enigma, wrapped in a pair of slightly too small trousers."
She smiled and agreed… "That's- hey! My trousers are perfectly fine, thank you!" Briefly.
Eydis burst out laughing, and she couldn't help but laugh along with her. It had been a nice reprieve from everything happening recently – from the Dream Reaper, to dealing with the fallout of that battle, training up the newer frontliners, to arriving on the Twenty-Seventh Floor and solving a murder-mystery; they hadn't taken so much as a day off to rest recently…
Jet and Asuna had taken time off to grieve, of course, but she would hardly call that resting. More of an enforced break, really…
She stopped in her tracks, looking along the ledge for the purple suit of armour. "I think it was around here somewhere." With her searching skill, this should have been really quite easy, but for some reason, her HUD and interface were badly messed up now.
"Ah hah! Found it!" Eydis sang, as she picked up the armour and placed it into a burlap sack that she tied to her back. "Hey, Rain? When we get back, you could… you know, join us?"
"Sorry, I've got friends waiting for me back in Ham's Stead. They'll already be worried about me, I think – I did kind of disappear on them, and I've been gone a few hours now."
"Ahh, no problem! I just thought I'd ask, ya know?" Even though she wasn't all that good at reading emotions, she could clearly tell that Eydis's smile hid a sense of disappointment. A thought came to her mind – perhaps she couldn't go with Eydis, but there was nothing stopping her from joining them!
"Why not come with us? We can help get you whatever your sister needs, and then you could join us?"
"You… you would do that for me? For us?" Eydis stopped walking and turned to her; the girl's face becoming almost shocked at the invitation.
"Yep!" She smiled. "Jet, Koharu, Sanya and Kizmel definitely would, and everyone else wouldn't take much convincing, I don't think."
"I…" Eydis's smile continued to mask the true extent of her feelings, but the fact the older girl had now drawn her into the tightest hug she'd ever had was a good idea as to what those feelings truly were! "Thank you! Thank you! Best friend ever!"
"Yuh-you're welcome…" She coughed out, checking her scrambled HUD to ensure that Eydis's bear hug wasn't going to cause any HP loss… wait, what was that speck in the distance? It looked almost like an aircraft at the distance it was at, but it was getting ever closer… "Eydis?"
"Yeah?" She smiled, before spotting the flying object herself and going pale. "Oh no. No no no no no…" Eydis almost panicked, before pulling her by her arm as she started running. "We need to go, now!"
"What even is it? It looks like some kind of glider?" The wingspan was certainly right for a glider, more so than anything else.
"It's an Integrity Knight, and if they've spotted us… no one knows what happens. All we know is that whoever they take is never seen from again."
"Not good then, got it!"
And with that, the pair ran back towards the direction that Eydis had arrived from, and for some reason that she put down to having spent way too much time around Jet, she decided to crack a joke. "You know if you join us, right… there's a lot of this kind of stuff!"
"What, running or being chased by an unstoppable knight!"
She made a gesture that could be summarised as "either or". "On a good day, both!" She answered in jest.
"What's a bad day then!" Eydis asked, as the speck became a larger speck, visible as a dragon! Some part of her was willing to stop, just get a better view of the dragon… the more sensible part of her told her to keep doing what she was doing, and not stop to gawk! "Never mind, I have my answer!"
Something told her Eydis would fit in brilliantly with them… when they escaped, that was.
/-/
After a few minutes, they had managed to find a crevice large enough for the pair to slip through and hide. Once they were in the cave, Rain looked around: it was dark, dingy and worse still, what little light there was, was a dead giveaway for her – not so much for Eydis, but with her Hiding skill doing very little to mask her, there was every chance she would have to fight this Integrity Knight if they came looking for them in here...
Clang. Clang.
The clattering of armour against the stones and other plates of armour told her that she was about to have to fight; to fight for her life.
If this was how it went down though, she was not going down without a fight! She would make sure that, even if she lost… then the Integrity Knight lost too.
"Reveal yourself, sinners, by the authority of the Axiom Church!" They spoke, their voice muffled by a helmet, though clearly on the feminine side – and above all else, that voice was familiar too, though she couldn't tell why…
She resisted the urge to tell them to go to hell, and moved as delicately as was possible, making every effort to minimise any possible noise as she did so.
"It's me you want, let her go." Eydis stood out in front of the knight, her weapon dropped to the floor.
"You demand anything from me, sinner? Bold of you to assume I shan't just cut you down where you stand…"
"You would've done that already if you were going to. I've heard the stories of you knights; you only talk to those you want alive to face punishment… so that means I'm more valuable to you alive. Am I right?" Eydis asked, her sword dropped to the floor alongside the pilfered armour.
The knight's silence at the question was telling, Rain thought, before she caught a glance of the knight's weapon.
It couldn't be…
The knight wielded a huge chain scythe, almost identical in design to the one Mito had once wielded, even down to the cosmetic details on the handle. "That weapon belonged to a friend of mine! How dare you steal it for your own use!" She shouted from her hiding spot, scandalised by the cruel knight and their stolen weapon…
"You would accuse an Integrity Knight of stealing? You really are wishing for your own demise…" They taunted, readying the stolen scythe.
If they were spoiling for a fight, then so were they – besides, they had the numerical advantage. "Then bring it on, thief!"
"Rain!" Eydis cried, as if to try and discourage her from this. No chance, she thought, if they were just trying to kill her, it wouldn't be so personal… but stealing a dead girl's weapon? A dead girl who, whilst they may not have been friends per se, they were certainly on talking terms!
"You think you scare everyone? I've seen monsters that you knights would run screaming from – the avatars of power mad gods, the very worst of human depravity… a creature formed of nightmares themselves!" She told the Knight exactly who they were dealing with… "And guess what? Every single time, I survived… no, I won! The Concord won, and I will not let them down here!"
"Hm, your lack of self-preservation does you no fav-" Without a single moment of hesitation, Rain launched herself into a blizzard of strikes to get the battle off to a start, and to control the tempo of the battle.
The flurry of strikes lit up the darkened cave, as her swords clattered against the armoured knight and to her surprise for a supposedly invincible enemy, she was able to do some damage to their armour, cracking the helmet they wore, and breaking off a part of their shoulder plate.
"You… just attacked an Integrity Knight." Eydis stood there in shock, before swallowing whatever she was about to say, to be replaced before something that sounded a lot less shocked. "Well then, I suppose I should stand by you… Rain of The Concord."
"Oh, how touching." The knight stood back up. Their helmet had practically broken in half from that attack, giving Rain a proper look at who she was facing – A red eye, piercing the darkness in the cave, and tied back lilac hair, with a very familiar face… no, it couldn't have been… she was dead!
She had seen her die!
"If we are doing introductions, then know who slayed you both. I am Mito Synthesis Six, Integrity Knight of the Human Empire!"
Rain's eyes went wide at the confirmation, and she readied her blades for a clash she'd never wanted.