Shattered: A SAO Tale (Sword Art Online)

Soil crunched under Drifter's boots as he walked along the crest of a hill. His eyes scanned the horizon for threats, and his spear was in his hands, like it always was when he wasn't inside a safe zone.

Those who had shorter weapons could keep them safely sheathed at their hips, or, as some dagger-users preferred, across their chest. For Drifter, however, the only two options were to carry his spear in his hands, or on his back.

Both worked pretty well, to be fair. And the spearmaster needed less than a second to retrieve his weapon from his back. But at his level, even that short amount of time could spell the difference between victory and defeat, and life or death.

So, carrying it on his hands it was, even if that wasn't as comfortable. It wasn't like it mattered for him anyway. Drifter was so used to having his spear with him that he actually got uncomfortable whenever he had to unequip it.

He wasn't the only one. Ever since they got Dual Blade, you couldn't see Kirito and Yuuki without their swords - well, not that any frontliner would be caught dead without their weapon within reach, but their's was more obvious.

Anyway, his mind was going off on a tangent, as it usually did when he was bored. The mobs on this floor were all semi-peaceful. They didn't attack unless attacked first, so there was little to worry in terms of getting caught by surprise.

Of course, to the frontliners, being cautious was second-nature, so even if Drifter allowed himself some level of relaxation, it wasn't much. But it was enough to let his mind wander.

These days, he rarely thought of the outside world, or what his life was like before. SAO was real. Aincrad was real. And sometimes, it felt like his life only became real after he entered Sword Art Online.

The spearmaster let his spear sag, and dragged the tip across the ground, cutting stalks of purple grass and digging a trench. His guildmates looked at him strangely, but didn't comment.

The 38th floor was peaceful. However long that would last, Drifter didn't know. But he thought it was just a sign. A small respite provided by Kayaba before they arrived at the 40th floor.

It wouldn't be a death floor, that was the 50th. But it was a round floor. And just because they had beat the 30th without losses, didn't mean that would be guaranteed to happen again.

He looked around. It wouldn't be one of the Reavers who died. Of that, he would make sure.

Still 2 floors before that battle arrived. They hadn't even found the entrance to the labyrinth yet on the 38th. But that shouldn't take to long. Which meant another hard battle wasn't far off either.

Was it wrong that he felt excited?

...

"Six more that way. You want to take them on?"

A few days later, Drifter, Kizmel, Vallerk, Agil, Wolv, and Yuna were treading through another seemingly unending field of purple grass. Not far away from them, a pack of half a dozen Wilted Faeries was galivating around a formation of protruding blue rocks.

The Wilted Faeries were pretty in a deathly kind of way. About half the size of an adult, they had elvish features, a dress of flowers covering their bodies. Instead of being colorful like one might expect, however, the dress was in gradients of grey and black.

When in conjunction with their pale white hair and red eyes, it fit their names well. The two pairs of insect-like wings on their backs completed the picture.

The spearmaster raised his weapon in consideration. Six Wilted Faeries weren't much trouble. They had sharp teeth and could spew a spore cloud with a nasty paralysis effect, but that was all.

"We'll take them two at a time. Vallerk, you help me block the four in front, while Agil, Kizmel, and Wolv, you guys take the ones behind. Finish them off then aggro another pair, and we'll kill the last two together."

"Roger that."

Without wasting time, Drifter launched a Serpentcoil Impale. It was his usual opener for battles. Honestly, there was no reason to not use it whenever he could - it dealt a ton of damage, caught the enemies by surprise, and aggroed them in a way that he could control the flow of the battle.

One of the Wilted Faeries yelped in surprise, a surprisingly melodic sound, as a fist-sized hole appeared on its chest. As one, the pack of mobs turned to the Reavers' party and flew towards them.

Vallerk stepped in front of Drifter and smashed the first fairy in the face with a Shield Bash. When the others tried to go around him to get to Drifter, he yelled a Taunt.

Using Brace and Shield Wall, the tank firmly set himself against the retaliation from the mobs. Repating the combo, with a few Counterforces thrown in the midst for good measure, quickly put him at the top of the aggro list.

"Kizmel, Agil, Wolv, you are good to go!"

Drifter's spear flashed with a Snake Bite over Vallerk's shoulder, catching one of the Wilted Faeries in the throat. He was ignored, the mobs unwavering on their determination to kill Vallerk, so he shouted to the rest of his party.

The other 4 Reavers jumped into action immediately. Yuna played her Song of Stone to boost Vallerk's defense, while Wolv, Kizmel, and Agil circled around the mobs to quite literally stab them in the back.

The aggro system in Sword Art Online was a lot more complicated than just seeing who had the highest damage. The mobs all had advanced AIs, so they weren't going to sit around and let themselves be killed.

Being attacked in the back was a known trigger to an instant aggro switch. So when Kizmel slashed at a Wilted Fairy's wings with her Serration Wave, and Agil hit another with a Cleave, the two mobs immediately abandoned Vallerk to target the new attackers.

The pressure on Vallerk lessened, and with Drifter darting in and out of range, the duo quickly led the other 4 Wilted Faeries away, ensuring their party members could deal with their two undisturbed.

Trusting his guildmates to do their job, the spearmaster turned his attention back to the fight at hand. He was mainly focusing on putting a spear through the mouth of any Wilted Fairy that tried to get Vallerk with their paralysis attack.

It was mostly working. 9 times out of 10, he managed to interrupt and cancel the skill before the mobs could complete it. And, when he couldn't, Vallerk simply had to tank the attacks for a while. His stats were great enough that the paralysis effect was vastly reduced.

"Coming up! Which ones do we take, Drifter?"

Barely 3 minutes later, Agil yelled. Drifter risked a glance over his shoulder and saw no sign of the other two Wilted Faeries, only the Warrior Merchant shaking his ax, with Kizmel and Wolv right behind him.

"The two to the left. Bait and switch."

"Got it!"

"Vallerk, push!"

The shield-bearer did just that, a point-blank Shield Bash sending one of the mobs tumbling head over heels. Wolv caught it right in the face with a swing of his mace, bashing the mob into the ground.

Kizmel thrust her blade at a second Wilted Fairy, piercing it through back of the neck.

Faeries 3 and 4 started to turn around to face the new threat, but Drifter stepped out from behind Vallerk and planted his spear on their backs with a fake Double Tap. The two Wilted Faeries shrieked and threw themselves at him again.

Drifter simply let his body drop, dodging both creatures. He fell on his hands, and immediately rolled to the left, thrusting his spear upwards and skewering one of the Wilted Faeries.

Vallerk shoulder-checked the other, and just like that, it was a fair fight. Well, as fair as it could be when you had 2 Reavers supported by Songstress Yuna's music - so not very fair at all.

Needless to say, the duo made quick work of the two mobs, ending the fight even before Agil, Wolv, and Kizmel were done with their two.

"Good work, everyone."

The party reconvened and sat down on the rocks the Wilted Faeries had been circling. Drifter took out a couple other drinks and passed them around.

"Hey! Why did you ki- Kyaa!"

The spearmaster was just about to inspect the loot when someone shouted way too close to his ear.

In a second, Drifter had dropped down to a knee and turned around, his spear stopping millimeters away from someone's throat. All the other Reavers also had their weapons pointed at the origin of the voice.

A blond girl with a ponytail and red glasses was eying Drifter's very sharp spear, just barely avoiding touching her neck. If she breathed too hard it would.

"W-Wait wait wait just a minute! I'm friendly! I'm friendly!"

Her eyes were wide like saucers, and she had her hands raised above her head in a classic gesture of surrender. Drifter didn't let his spear down.

"Who the fuck are you?"

The girl looked innocent enough. She was wearing a mix of mid and high-tier equipment, and she had a dagger strapped to her hips - a drop from a 32nd floor elite mob, if Drifter recognized it right.

All in all, he would normally not look at her twice if they passed by each other on the street. She looked just like any other clearer.

Except she had managed to sneak up on 6 of the most paranoid players in Aincrad. That was no mean feat, even if Drifter and his party had been focused on the mobs.

"M-My name is Ceba! I'm just a painter okay?!"

A painter? Drifter furrowed his brows.

"Kizmel."

"On it."

Drifter pulled back his spear, and Ceba let out a breath of relief, right before the dark elf placed her blade under her chin.

"Stay still."

Ceba did. Meanwhile, Drifter stood up and turned a full circle on the spot. His Searching didn't pick up anything, so he nodded to his party.

Agil lowered his ax and Wolv his mace. Vallerk stepped back from where be had been prepared to jump to someone's defense, and Drifter stuck his spear into the ground. Yuna sat back down on a rock, tucking away her harp. Finally, Kizmel released Ceba and sheathed her blade.

"I am sorry for the rudeness, Ceba. We were startled by your sudden appearance."

Kizmel bowed in apology, and the other girl hurriedly waved her off.

"Ah, n-no, don't be! I mean, you guys are frontliners, right? Reaver's Requiem. It's understandable you guys are jumpy. It was my bad, appearing like I did."

Drifter liked her already. She was surprisingly calm for someone who just had two different weapons at her throat moments ago, and she readily admitted it was her fault - which it was, you just don't sneak up on frontliners unless you have a death wish.

"By the way, you are Dark Elf Kizmel, right? Can I paint you? Where is your wolf? I always wanted to paint them. Maybe one of both of you together, it would look dashing!"

Ceba's eyes were glinting under her glasses as she started pulling out all sorts of painting supplies from her inventory while bombarding Kizmel with questions. Drifter didn't even know you could paint in SAO.

"Feredir is with Silica. He basically adopted her."

While Kizmel was still blinking from the rapid-fire interrogation, Yuna giggled. She stepped out from between Agil and Wolv, who had put her in the middle as soon as Drifter moved when Ceba appeared.

"Songstress Yuna, right? I have a painting of you, from one of the times you performed on Tolbana, I can show you later if you want! Feredir? Is that the wolf's name? How cool! Do you think I can paint him with Dragon Tamer Silica? Ah, and her dragon, as well! She is so cute! That color is just-"

"So, Ceba. You are a painter?"

Drifter cut her off, but he couldn't keep his amusement out of his voice. It was rare to find someone this passionate about something that wasn't fighting in SAO.

"Oh, yes! I'm an artist in real life - an aspiring one at least - so I also paint all kinds of things here in SAO. Take a look!"

She pushed a dozen sheets of paper onto Drifter's hand. The spearmaster looked at the topmost one and whistled.

"That's really good."

The painting was of a pride of Dust Lions from a few floors below lazing in the sun. The color pallette was immaculate.

He handed the painting to Yuna, who was peeking over his shoulder, and looked at the second one. It was a beautiful sunrise as seen from Aincrad's edge. The cloud layer reflected the red, orange, and yellow hues in a way that it almost looked like a picture.

The party spent the next several minutes passing the paintings around and appreciating each of them. They were all masterworks, showcasing mobs, towns, NPCs, players, landscapes, even a few bosses.

It was all really impressive. Ceba's proficiency of Painting, if that was a skill, must have been close to full mastery. And that was saying a lot, since most anyone couldn't be bothered to even pick up lifestyle skills beyond Blacksmithing and Tailoring, the two most directly useful ones for fighting.

Drifter couldn't help it. He collected the paintings from the party and handed them back to Ceba, who was beaming from all the compliments.

"Want to get a drink? I'm very curious."

Ceba's eyes widened. This was Broken Spear Drifter, inviting her to talk. Then her gaze took on a decidedly devious glint, and the spearmaster felt a tingling in his spine warning him he might have made a mistake.

Too late.

"Only if you model for me. I'll even give you the painting."

"Ah, there's no-"

"He accepts!"

Yuna cut him off, and the rest of his traitorous party members snickered. Drifter had shot himself in the foot in a stunning display.

The spearmaster could only sigh. He knew that look in Yuna's eyes. There would be no wriggling out of this mess of his own making.