Chapter 70: I am Civilized

"He's dangerous."

That's what Asuna first thought after seeing this man seamlessly pass through this chaotic battlefield. <<Stealth>>, the higher version of <<Hiding>>, not only hid his player cursor from others, but also provided vision and sound stealth.

If not for the player being dragged around by him, no one would've noticed him, except for Kirito whose abiity to detect gazes and killing intent is on a whole another level.

"Save me! He's trying to kill me!"

While being held on his collar, Morte shouted once again. This time is different as some players noticed his plight. Though, they didn't have the choice but to redirect their attention to their opponents after a moment.

"You... You're that person!"

Since she's been together with Kirito from the start, she knew about Morte. In the early stages of the game, he attempted to kill Kirito multiple times.

Once, he tried to do so in a duel.

Morte tried to control his damage to make Kirito's HP just slightly above 50%, so that he can trigger a critical hit and kill him without being an orange player. There's a couple more times that he attempted to finish him off, but each of his attempts ended in failure.

(A/N: They did a Half Loss mode which will end if their HP reaches 50%. Morte tried to kill him in one hit while being at 51%~55% by using a critical strike, but failed to do so.)

More than half a year later, his attempts stopped. Asuna didn't knew why, but she didn't expect to meet him here again.

"Please hand him over. We'll make sure that he'll get punished in real life."

"..."

Shiro went silent for a moment after hearing this. A light chuckle escaped out of his mouth as he replied, "Why should I? Can't I have him as a favor for clearing more than 20 floors?"

Ever since their debut, many knew about him. Thus, they could immediately recognize him even if he's wearing a black cloak on top of his light armor.

"Mister, you know that this is wrong. Instead of enforcing justice, you're doing the same thing as them."

As a proper civilian who follows the laws, Asuna has a moral compass that always points out to "good". Moreover, she's also kind to others and never killed another player before.

Shiro got baffled by these people who has a specific type of mindset, but perhaps this is a specialty of this world. The people living in it aren't so complicated.

Keita can do almost anything for his friends' safety, Eiji can do anything for Yuna as seen in the movie, and Asuna can firmly stick to her beliefs even if it's getting challenged continuously by different circumstances.

Of course, he also met some other people that has a complex mindset. Basically, their behaviors can shift based on the environment.

Lastly, there's the psychopaths who would do anything for fun. Shiro might be included in this category, though he doesn't harm anyone who doesn't possess the intent to harm him or someone close to him.

Even now, he couldn't feel any sort of killing intent from Asuna. That's considering her being in a battle stance.

Others might not feel much and even call her naive, but seeing her personally instead of a chunk of text made him interested in people such as her.

"Sigh... I can also be civilized at times." Shiro gripped the black sword in his left waist before pulling it out of its sheath. "Let's fight."

Hearing this, Asuna's face became serious. Still, she kept her composure and said, "I understand."

Shiro gestured her to attack him first, and so she did.

Clang-! Clang-!

Every time their blades met, Shiro can perfectly deflect her strikes, which surprised Asuna. After all, she trained her rapier skills for a year and fought against many powerful players and monsters.

However, she felt that Shiro is on a whole another level.

Meanwhile, Morte got his face dragged on the floor as the two fought. Sometimes, Shiro simply threw him away at a certain direction before picking him up in the back of his collar.

'He... He doesn't want to kill me?'

Right now, confusion filled his mind. If Shiro had wanted to kill him, he would've used him against Asuna as a meat shield. Her quick thrusts alone could send his HP to zero if timed well - that's something he's confident of Shiro doing.

Ding-!

"He... He blocked <<Linear>> with his sword..?"

When she unleashed <<Linear>>, a simple thrust sword skill that contained a lot of power, she thought that he'll dodge it at best. She didn't expect for him to use his sword as a shield before deflecting her rapier away like a baseball player.

Taking this opportunity, Shiro used <<Rage Spike>> and jumped at her. He slashed his black sword with an upward diagonal strike, hitting Asuna in the chest.

It immediately depleted her HP to less than 50%, making her HP bar turn yellow.

"Asuna!"

After blocking a sword and an axe at the same time, Kirito hastily threw a couple of throwing daggers with his <<Blade Throwing>> skill. Since he has the mod <<Track Target>> and <<Swift Strike>>, they arrived quickly in front of Shiro.

Swooosh-!

Swooosh-!

Half a dozen of blurry daggers flew at his face, yet he remained unfazed. Shiro avoided these daggers one by one until none was left.

While shocked at his insane reaction speed, Asuna finished the starting motion for her big move, <<Star Splash>>.

"Hup!"

Three swift thrusts arrived at Shiro's chest, throwing him off balance for a second. Then, she ducked before aiming at both of his legs.

However, she didn't expect for him to somersault in the air - his previous loss of balance is nothing but a facade!

With it, Shiro gained some distance from her, all the whilst the light on her rapier died down due to her movements being impeded.

Picking up Morte whom he had thrown away just before Asuna used <<Star Splash>>, a glint appeared on Shiro's eyes as if he saw someone.

"It's another farewell for now."

"What d-"

A set of flying daggers were thrown straight at her, in which she instinctively used her rapier to deflect them all. In the midst of this, Shiro ran away.

Seeing all of these, some players who noticed the commotion are hesitating on what to do.

"Should we help..?"

"Bro, you're also a fan of the White Hero, right? Do we even need to choose?"

"But, he's also a killer if you look at it..."

"What, do you think that a hero who doesn't kill is better than him? The ones that he killed are murderers, for gods sake!"

"Even so..."

While they are busy arguing, a loud shout gathered their attention.

"Vanguard Team, assist Asuna if you can!" Godfreed asked them.

""Understood!""

Shiro only sighed at the sight of players swarming at his place. Though, he never stopped running due to his confidence to someone.

Swooosh-! Swooosh-!

Swooosh-! Swooosh-!

Ten daggers were thrown from an unknown direction, aiming at some specific members of KoB. Some did manage to dodge them, but their charge was disrupted for a few seconds due to this.

Shiro saw this and suddenly stepped into one of KoB player's shoulders. This player is specifically paralyzed, thus he didn't have any troubles using him as a foothold.

There are several more players who got paralyzed, in which he used them as a foothold in a span of five seconds - long enough to let him escape the chaotic battlefield.

Just as he showed up in the spot where they'll rendezvous, he locked eyes to the main character of this anime, Kirigaya Kazuto.

While his eyes showed that he's scanning Shiro's battle power, the latter is also looking at him with interest.

"Inhumane level of reaction speed. I see, that's how he managed to cut down bullets."

While murmuring, he and Kuroneko headed to their final target and the cause of this chaos, PoH.

*****

A/N: Uni is about to start, so I guess this schedule would become the norm. Anyways, here's a fact of the day!

Fact #27: In Kjerag (Basically the Siberia of Arknights), there exists a real god called Goddess Kjeragandr. It is said that she warded people off the extreme cold environment, protected them against catastrophes, and helped them build a settlement. With this, she is enshrined as their guardian deity. A priestess is assigned in one of the highest mountains of Kjera, in which they'll live there whilst waiting for the oracles. Though, their goddess currently takes the form of Kjera, the attendant of the current priestess. She uses "Divine Arts" (will be explained tomorrow) while helping Rhodes Island investigate the Feranmuts, which is basically the god-like entities in Terra.

PS: This shows that gods>Originum as they can 'protect' an environment against catastrophes.