Was that really the log out option?
It felt so unreal, almost like a dream.
Could his eyes be playing tricks on him?
Unable to stop himself, he closed the game's [Main Menu Window], then tried to open it again and check.
"Why did you close it?! Why didn't you log out? What if closing it counts as giving up your chance to leave?"
Before he could reopen the game's [Main Menu Window], the words of the person beside him made his face turn deathly pale.
A violent wave of regret surged through him. He immediately tried to summon the game's [Main Menu Window] again.
But it did not appear.
"No. No way. Closing it means I gave up? I didn't say—"
"Calm down, you idiot. Your gesture to open the game's [Main Menu Window] was crooked."
Only after the person beside him reminded him again did he successfully summon the window. He immediately looked at the log out button.
It was still there.
This time, he did not hesitate for even a second and immediately confirmed the log out.
"How is it? Did you—"
The person who had reminded him stopped mid-sentence.
The figure of his friend was rapidly turning transparent, fading away until he vanished completely.
He reached out and touched the spot, but there was nothing there. Only empty air. Clearly, this was not invisibility.
In other words, he had successfully gone offline.
He had returned to reality.
The man's gaze fell back to his own game [Main Menu Window]. His finger tapped the log out option.
Confirm.
In less than five seconds, the clearing group inside the Floor 55 boss room had lost one-third of its members.
Some people who had been hugging each other and crying tears of joy stopped embracing when they saw that. In a panic, they hurried to log out as well, terrified that if they were even a step too slow, they might lose their chance.
In the end, only a few people remained, giving last-minute instructions to others.
Those who had not participated were afraid they might truly be unable to return. They asked the ones who had obtained the key to escape this world to pass messages to their family and friends in reality.
A few players even said they would log out and then log back in, just to confirm for everyone else that the log out option was real and not a trick.
However, two minutes after the player who promised to log back in vanished—
"Why hasn't he come back yet? It shouldn't take this long, right?"
"Heh. You actually believed him when he said he'd log back in?"
"Who knows? What if logging back in means you can't leave again?"
Several people spoke with mocking voices.
They were envious. They were jealous. And at the same time, they took a twisted comfort in the fact that others had been as foolish as them and had not participated in the event.
"Not a single person has logged back in. Maybe they all died. Maybe this whole thing was just a scam."
A sharp, piercing mutter rang out, drawing quite a few icy stares.
"Kibaou, if your mouth stinks that much, then shut it!"
Someone refused to indulge him and snapped back.
Kibaou was the vice commander of the Army.
"My mouth stinks? Why don't you people think for once? Why would a plot like this suddenly appear out of nowhere? Why would such a convenient prize just fall into our laps? Isn't it possible this is Akihiko Kayaba's conspiracy? Maybe he's running some kind of experiment. Maybe they didn't actually log out at all and were sent somewhere else. Maybe this whole duel was nothing but a staged act."
He began spinning conspiracies on the spot.
Hearing that, Asuna turned an icy gaze toward Kibaou.
When he said those words, he looked at her with those eyes, as if he were hinting to everyone else that she was an accomplice helping Akihiko Kayaba stage this performance. Her reward would be the right to log out.
This man had already clashed with Asuna half a year ago.
He was someone she truly disliked.
"What's that supposed to mean, you shifty-eyed creep? Are you trying to say Asuna wants to hurt everyone?"
Lisbeth, who had not logged out yet, shouted furiously.
Beside her, Silica, who also had not logged out, glared at him as well.
"I never said that."
Seeing his smug, infuriating face, Lisbeth was so angry she wanted to march up and beat it in.
"If she has also obtained the chance to log out, then why has Miss Asuna not left yet?"
He immediately threw out another sentence loaded with insinuation.
"Is there something wrong with your brain? Asuna triggered this plot. If she leaves now, what happens to the plot? What happens to everyone else?"
Lisbeth started cursing again.
"That's enough, Liz. There's no need to bother with a man as timid as a mouse."
Asuna held back Lisbeth, who was about to lose her temper again. In contrast, Asuna herself remained calm, speaking with a faint smile.
That reaction made Kibaou's face twist slightly.
"You—"
Bang!
A fist knocked Kibaou's words right back down his throat. Before he could react, several more punches slammed into him.
"Bastard! What are you doing?"
"What am I doing? Asuna was right. You really are a cowardly bastard. Stop pretending you're calm. Right now, you're just throwing a powerless tantrum because you envy and hate the people who got to go back. It's all your fault, you bastard. You kept saying we should wait and see. Otherwise, I would've signed that contract just now!"
"Go to hell, you damn bastard! This is all your fault! You're the reason we didn't sign!"
Several players began beating Kibaou savagely.
At this rate, it looked as if they might start killing one another.
"All right, stop!"
A player stepped in, cutting into the scene in a seemingly cool manner.
He was extremely famous among the players as well. It was said his level was second only to the commander of the Knights of the Blood.
His name was Kazuto Kirigaya.
According to the information Asuna had received from Black Cat, in the original plot, he was the one who defeated Akihiko Kayaba and cleared the game.
Moreover, in the original plot, Asuna had fallen in love with him.
Honestly, Asuna did not understand why she would have liked him.
She had interacted with Kazuto Kirigaya before, and he could be considered a good person. But his personality was not one Asuna liked.
He was a loner and did not fit in well with others. During the first twenty floors, he had soloed nearly one-third of the floor bosses and claimed their exclusive rewards for himself.
That was somewhat selfish.
Of course, that was also human nature. But Asuna had carefully noticed a certain arrogance in him. He seemed to want to stand apart from everyone else, to appear mysterious and impressive in other people's eyes, satisfying his own vanity.
So Asuna had never planned to invite him to join the Knights of the Blood. She simply treated him as an ordinary player to cooperate with.
In other words, the plot of Sword Art Online that Black Cat had shown her had absolutely been heavily altered by the author.
Drawing her gaze back, Asuna looked once more at the Floor 100 live-feed window.
How would things develop from here?
The reason she had obtained the log out option but had not immediately logged out was because she was afraid the same thing might happen as in Sword Art Online's story. After logging out, she might be imprisoned by Nobuyuki Sugou in another game.
She had to wait until Mr. Kain finished handling things and returned to her side before logging out.
Mr. Kain had also told her that if she ever received the option to log out, it would be best to wait until he was beside her before confirming it.
It was starting.
From the look of it, the final boss Strea was preparing to launch a second round, initiating a second "contract document."
This time, quite a lot of people would definitely sign.
"Huh?"
"What's going on?"
"I didn't even confirm anything. Why did it close?"
The contract document had just appeared for the other players to sign, only to suddenly shut down and vanish.
The reason lay in the image reflected in Asuna's grave gaze.
In the live broadcast, Strea had suddenly dropped her hands weakly, like a robot whose power source had been cut off. The system window she had originally summoned in front of her vanished as well.
The light in her eyes seemed to fade away.
At the same time, a figure appeared in the air above.
It was a figure draped in a red cloak. The cuffs, the edge of the hood, and the hem were all pitch black, and the inside seemed utterly empty.
This was the same figure that had appeared on the first day of the official launch.
In the next moment, the cloak ignited, becoming a mass of black-red flame that fell to the ground.
As the flames dispersed, the figure revealed beneath left the players frozen in shock.
Heathcliff.
Commander of the Knights of the Blood.
He swiped one hand through empty air, and an interface appeared—one that, no matter how they looked at it, did not belong to a player.
It was a GM system interface.
After tapping it a few times, a new "contract document" appeared in front of the players.
Looking at its contents, everyone's expression changed dramatically.
Damn it.
The contents had been changed.
This was different from before.
This one was far more sinister.
No, calling it utterly deranged would not be an exaggeration.
(End of Chapter)
[Get +30 Extra Chapters On — P@tr3on "Zaelum"]
[Every 300 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter Drop]
[Thanks for Reading!]