The Survival Logs || Sword Art Online Fanfic

Journey to 25 Arc: Chapter 23 - Quarter Quell

31 March 2023, 7pm

25th Floor Labyrinth

Well....., shit.

I should've known better than to just enter the maze alone. I should've expected enemy mobs higher than my level lurking in there. What the hell was I thinking?

I knew that I could've partied up with anyone in my friends list, but I assumed they would never agree to it.

After all, my destination was the Floor boss room on the 25th Floor. How much more demotivating can that reason get?

Still, you could say it was a miracle that I did progress through half of the Labyrinth, but only using the tactic of shooting the mobs down from a distance. The traps placed all over the Labyrinth weren't making my progression any easier as well. Plus, it took 2 hours, way longer than the average time of an hour that a party of players could take clearing a Labyrinth.

It was at that halfway point that the enemy mobs, the Armoured Lizardmen, started to change their attack patterns into leaping at me while attacking. I was forced to devise another strategy to clear the second half of the Labyrinth, despite doing that reluctantly. But maybe I always relied on my bow to solve such problems, so it might be time I realized that I needed a Plan C from that time on.

I moved along the walls of the Labyrinth, trying not enter as many of the Lizardmens' detection ranges as possible. While detection ranges might just be a theory (that I'd thought of) of a game mechanic that enemy mobs have when roaming around, it did sound realistic, especially if they were in the shape of imaginary circles formed on the ground around each of them. Any player that entered these circles would attract the enemy mobs to them, basically speaking.

Every time I gained aggro from a Lizardman, it would always take seemingly long minutes to take it down with my spear. Each attack from the enemy required great concentration to dodge and figure out an opening to strike at right after, usually with one of my swift spear skills. If I didn't have a digital clock in my player menu, I would have thought that I had spent about another 5 hours through the Labyrinth before I first spotted the boss room.

And I finally did reach the area before the boss room. By then, I knew, from my menu, that April was only an hour away, and I was definitely late for the boss fight meeting. I silently asked myself again. Why the hell did I want to join that boss raid? Was it because it was the 25th Floor, the quarter-way point of the floating castle, Aincrad? Or was it just because I wanted to be there to see another Floor cleared with my own eyes?

I was completely alone, looking up at the towering closed doors, as I already knew what was happening right at that moment.

The 25th Floor boss raid had already begun.

My heavy-panting filled the dim-lit stone area. Frustrated I was not being able to join the boss raid in the first place, I hurried to the doors.

But I was interrupted before I could touch the giant door handles. At that time, it was surprising to hear a voice just materializing in the supposedly barren Labyrinth.

"Wasted your time, eh? Latecomer?"

I turned instantly, my hand instinctively grasping my spear on my back. I never once thought that a player would come to the Labyrinth at that late time, and I only ever heard of so few players whose level was high enough to clear the 25th Floor Labyrinth.

The player who called out to me walked into the stone room leisurely. He wore armour with the same design as any other player: shoulder pads, chest plate, boots and harness belts to hold the armour in place. At that time, I wore the same armour, but it was lighter and didn't include shoulder pads. Plus, I'd worn a shirt and coat over my chest plate as well. Judging from the thickness of his armour, which was worn over his clothes, he looked a bit like a rugby player, minus the helmet.