The Survival Logs || Sword Art Online Fanfic

CounterQuest Arc: Chapter 102 - Hidden Content

7 March 2024

Horizon's Edge guild base, 30th Floor

The winds blasted my face again as the grand doors of Misuko's office swung open towards us.

I could never get enough of this moment. According to game lore, the guild base was actually an abandoned castle, where it was occupied by a long-lost royal family which ruled over a kingdom with land that stretched just under one-third of the area of the 30th Floor.

That included the hilly cliff that the castle itself was situated on to this day, hence the bird's eye view of the 30th Floor by the castle's balconies.

Misuko's office was, fittingly, the king's working quarters. In other words, it's probably just a room where the king would've simply sat and stamped papers all day, honestly speaking.

I wouldn't be surprised if that was also how Misuko spends her day in this room as well.

All the other leaders were already seated; there's Narnia, the vice leader who often helped out Misuko with the guild stuff; Nicholas, who was now the leader of Support Squad, which consisted of members from the old Sea Company. Incidentally, members from the old Sky Company were being absorbed into this Squad as well.

It felt like we were one person short. Or rather, our manpower in the leader group of Horizon's Edge wasn't exactly doing too hot.

Since they were sitting on the side couches facing Misuko's office table, Raku and I simply sat on the central couch. Misuko, who was leaning onto the front edge of the table, pushed herself off and stood before us.

"Right, let's start the weekly update meeting!"

I wouldn't say that these meetings were boring. It was like listening to the news on the current state of the guild, like how each of the Squads were doing.

Raku started off first, emphasizing her need to form stronger bonds with her members. Nicholas, who I was pretty out of touch with for quite a while, talked about stuff in Support Squad, which probably requires context that I was apparently lacking, but the idea was that they were doing well, I guess.

Narnia usually doesn't say much. She and Misuko are close friends, after all. She's the one who manages inter-guild relationships, especially with the Swords of Harmony, but other than that she does the same stuff as Misuko, whenever she's free to help her out.

As for me, there's a very specific reason Misuko wanted me to stay in these meetings, even though I wasn't technically a leader anymore.

I still believe that my ambiguous title of 'Leader Mentor' was an inside joke made by Misuko. This meeting was only for the leaders, after all.

In fact, me being a full-time Drifter now had everything to do with my reason for being here.

Even before Raku took over my leader role, I was already traveling outside the guild base, constantly moving between the Floors to find clients to Drift with.

With me spending the longest time outside of the guild out of any of the members here, it made sense for Misuko to have me in the meetings as a 'news source' of sorts. I was practically a news anchor who'd bring up any notable news that happened on the other Floors in the past week.

Of course, that information was subject to the places that I Drifted to with my clients.

I stood up and babbled my way through the past week. There wasn't any good news worth noting, aside from the mandatory update on the Assault Team's Floor clearing progression that Misuko had asked me to always keep an eye on.

"As expected, we're not gonna see the 56th Floor being cleared any time soon," I simply spoke. "But I estimate that it'll be cleared by within the next month."