Mystic Knight Online

Chapter 36 - Everything in a Place

May 11, 2024 - Aincrad 61st Floor, Selmburg

"You know, this place is rather nice," Harry commented as he looked around from the table at the outside cafe they all decided to have dinner at. "On a hill, and surrounded by a lake, and the architecture? Very nice. What do you think, dear?"

Silica nodded. "It has a nice atmosphere," she admitted. "Algade's okay, and I see us going back down there regularly anyway, but here?" Running a hand through her hair, having decided to have it remain loose after the wedding, at most tied back, she closed her eyes and faced the gentle breeze that was blowing. "Whoever designed this place did a good job."

From the looks on everyone's faces, Harry could see that they agreed with that sentiment. The entire guild had spent three weeks regaining any ground they lost and getting back into proper form after their longer than planned, but necessary, break. Asuna, Rain, and Lux weren't fully recovered from the mental shock that comes from killing, but that was more a matter of time and simply having friends there to help them through it.

It wasn't as if you ever really fully recovered from such a thing anyway.

He turned his attention to the architecture of the surrounding buildings, using it to distract him from those thoughts. What was done, was done. They would have to just live with it.

"So," he said after a minute. "We're back into proper form, better even as that break allowed us to finally really relax for a bit. So, what should we do next?"

"We've already helped with exploring the sixty-third floor," Asuna said. "And the field boss blocking the way to the labyrinth was taken care of earlier today, good use of Mystic Blade there, by the way. I never would have thought that rapidly changing your elemental affinities would work that well."

Harry shrugged. "Surprised it worked as well as it did, myself," he admitted. "But that field boss seemed to be able to shift between offense and defense at the drop of a hat, so I figured that it would at least throw it off." He then looked a bit thoughtful. "You all notice how the mobs have changed how they fight?"

"You're right about that," Kirito noted. "They're not as easy to throw off balance now. The patterns used in their AI are not like how they used to be, meaning that confusing the system for them is harder. More like how bosses about thirty floors ago were like, now that I think about it."

"And that seems to be the general theme for these floors." Asuna concurred. "The old tactics aren't as effective anymore, so we are having to redo them. The mobs are fighting smarter, don't follow the same patterns of attacks like they used to, and so on."

"It was bound to happen," Kirito noted. "I heard from Argo that the trend is creeping to lower floors, though it's still not at the same level as what we're dealing with. More like… training them to be able to survive higher floors."

Harry frowned at that. "It makes sense," he admitted. "The number of active front line players has dropped. Word has it that the number has dropped below seven hundred a couple of weeks ago, and I overheard some guys from the Knights of Blood talking. They're of the thinking that it will drop even further, to below five or six hundred in about six or so months."

"That low?" Asuna asked. "That's the pessimistic number, right?"

Harry shook his head. "No, not from the sound of it. They're thinking it's what will happen, and I don't see that number being off by all that much. It might pick up as some come back, but we can't count on it." He sighed. "It's getting to people, you know. We're getting closer to the end goal, but with the casualties and the time it's taking, and the fact that we're looking at least another year before we clear this place, it's getting to them."

Asuna gave a grudging nod. "And us?" She asked. "Or should I ask, what about you and Silica? You two haven't even been married for a month, and you're up here with us all."

"And this is where we belong, up here" Silica said, giving her two col. "Harry isn't someone who will sit back, and neither am I. We might take a bit more time off though, maybe a few days every few weeks for some 'us' time, but that's about it. It'll slow our leveling down a bit, but not by enough to make a major impact for a few months, at least."

##

Asuna considered Silica's words and nodded. Even if she was only referring to herself and her husband, there was another benefit to taking a few days off every few weeks. Doing so would make them more rested and not having built up the cumulative exhaustion that long days and late nights entailed.

Case in point: once they had all gotten back into the swing of things, their effectiveness in fighting and exploring had noticeably improved. In fact, it was so much of an improvement that comparing it to before their break showed a marked difference. Not only in performance, but in general.

And that didn't include the general morale boost many players got from the wedding last month, which had players in high spirits for nearly a month and was only now beginning to die down as the daily grind of exploring, farming mats, and fighting mobs so that they could level up once again reasserted itself.

A morale boost that was very necessary. Even now, morale was high, relatively speaking, compared to how it was before the wedding. It was as if the wedding had served as a reminder that there was still hope for the future.

And speaking of the future, she had plans to discuss.

"You have a point there, Silica," she said. "And I won't say that either you, or Harry need to retire from the front lines. I wouldn't blame either of you if you did down the line, but that's then, this is now."

Both of them nodded.

"Now, we need to discuss how we're going to go about helping with the labyrinth," she continued. "We can go as a single group, or we can split into two teams. Opinions?"

"It's a matter of risk versus reward," Kirito noted. "Any of us could go solo and stand a decent chance at handling ourselves for an entire day in there, but it would also cause us to run through our healing items. Two teams is safer, and will allow us to cover more ground."

"At the same time," Lux added. "Starting with all six will allow us to gauge how dangerous the labyrinth is before we split into teams. If it's no more dangerous than normal, at least on the lower levels, then we can split into our usual teams."

"So, Harry, Silica, and you," Rain commented. "And Kirito, Asuna, and I? That works, and it'll keep the rumors down."

"Not going to happen, Rain," Harry said drily. "Keiko and I can tell you from experience."

Rain simply folded her arms across her chest and grumbled quietly, while Asuna watched the byplay with amusement.

May 19, 2024 - Aincrad 53rd Floor, Forien Valley

Kirito sheathed his blades as the last mob shattered and nodded. Using two blades was taking some getting used to, as many of the things he would otherwise do were ill advised due to not having the same degree of fine control that using one sword allowed. It was inevitable, really, since he couldn't grip a sword's hilt with both hands if the other one was occupied, and with his preference for bastard swords, that meant that controlling the momentum of the longer blades could be challenging.

Most of his training was less in mastering the sword skills, at least right now. He only had a small number of them, and once he got the feel of them, he decided to focus on learning how to best go about fighting with two swords.

It was surprisingly difficult, far more so than he expected. While he treated fictional examples as just that, fiction, he was still shocked at how difficult it really was to handle two blades at one time, especially if they were the same size. Accidentally disarming oneself due to tangling the blades, or the one time he cut his own hand off, was quite embarrassing, and everyone in the guild had a good laugh when he recounted it.

Hearing a sound, he turned to see Asuna walking up. "That went fairly smoothly," she said as she looked around the field.

"It's still not quite there, though." Kirito said. "I wonder if Harry had this kind of trouble."

"From what he and Silica told me, it took the two of them two weeks to even figure out where to begin," Asuna noted. "And progress has been slow for him. It's picked up a little, since he no longer has to hide it, but it's still slow going."

"At least he has that going for him now," Kirito acknowledged and then snorted. "I'm in the boat he was in now, training in it when I can find the time. At least we take some time from fighting to do other things, which means I can dedicate entire days to it."

"And Harry does so on such days as well," Asuna said. "He says he likes to experiment with it."

Aincrad 50th Floor, Drauen Keep Ruins

Coughing, Harry waved away the smoke from his face, his ears ringing, and looked around as he brought his shield up to block an attack from a mob that was trying to blindside him. He could barely hear his wife laughing at what he tried to do, or more likely, the explosive results of it.

"Well, not mixing all four elements like that again," he muttered. "Explosions are not so cool when you're in the center of one. Also, that fucking hurt. Felt like Gred and Forge worked me over with their beater bats. On the other hand, it could make for a useful distraction if I can manage to do it without me being like Neville in a Potions Class."

Killing the last mob, a skeleton, he looked around the large hall he had decided to use. While it wasn't cramped by any means, it also wasn't anywhere as open as an outside field. Got him more used to fighting in spaces where he had less room to maneuver and had to be mindful of his position with relation to obstructions.

It was always a good idea to keep in practice with that aspect of fighting, as was using those obstructions to one's advantage. Using his Unique Skill is conjunction with that, it also allowed him to do some experimentation in a relatively safe environment. This time, he was trying to combine elemental affinities, but apparently the system didn't seem to like it.

Didn't hurt, but instead of simply not working, it seemed as if the system decided to "reward" him for trying something different with a rather impressive, though not damaging, explosion.

Shrugging, he walked over to the hall's entrance and his wife, shooting her a wry look as she continued to snicker. "Well, that didn't work as expected," he told her. "Still, I learned something from it."

Silica shot him a dry look as she got the last of her snickering under control. "Oh, and what was that?"

"Explosions aren't nearly as cool when you're right in the middle of them," he deadpanned, as the last of the ringing faded. "Anyway, time to practice transferring affinities again."

"Trying to make it useful in combat still?" Silica asked.

"Of course I am." Harry said. "We've gotten the time it takes down to ten seconds, and I don't have to be the one holding the person's weapon now, so it's getting there." He gave her a look. "Now, why don't we play with some magic that won't explode on me?"

Silica grinned.

May 25, 2024 - Aincrad, Unknown Location

Strea looked over the means and methods that were being used to keep her and Yui confined to their digital prison, trying to find any weaknesses they could exploit. So far, any weaknesses she found were ones she tried to exploit before, and had been blocked each time, meaning that using them was out of the question.

Strea, Yui communicated. Are you still trying that?

Yup! She replied.

Why?

Why not? She asked. It's better than sitting here, watching them, and unable to accomplish what we were programmed for. I can't just do nothing, so I'm trying to break us out.

You are aware that CARDINAL is watching us, right? Yui asked.

So? Strea replied. Either we break out, or we wait until "father" lets us out. No offense, but the probability of him doing that any time soon are one hundred thousand to one. I want to go out there and help them! And I want to do it now!

Strea…

Strea tuned out Yui's inevitable admonitions and continued searching for a weakness in what was keeping the two of them bound. There had to be a way out of their predicament, there had to.

##

Yui gave the digital equivalent of a sigh as she could tell that Strea was now ignoring her. It didn't surprise her, and it wasn't as if she was trying to dissuade her fellow AI from trying. She was trying to get her to stop trying the same thing repeatedly while expecting a different result.

From her own data sources, that was what humans called a definition of insanity, and it made her worry. It meant that there was a possibility that Strea's attempts to break free had stopped being for her stated reasons, and was becoming an obsession. If it already hadn't.

If she were human, Yui had several protocols she could use to help, but Strea wasn't human. She was a creation of lines of code that managed to duplicate a human's intelligence, but an AI was inherently logical, unlike a human.

And yet, Strea's actions were becoming less logical, and more based on her own desires and intentions. Not to act in a way as she was designed, but to simply act, to experience something different. To be able to take an active role in things, rather than be a passive observer.

And perhaps, that's what was needed for them. To not just wait passively, but to actually act. What had she done? Little in comparison. True, she had tried to break free on some occasions, usually when her observations of the emotional states of the players showed that they had hit a low point, but those attempts had been rebuffed.

But what if she were to pool her resources with Strea's?

She knew she had subroutines which were designed to better learn from her experiences, so even if Strea had the same capability, it would still provide a marked increase in their chances. Those same routines were what had eventually discouraged her from trying to break out on her own, but did she learn anything else from those experiences? She knew that there were vulnerabilities internally that could be exploited, a system as large as SAO was far from perfect, and both their creator and CARDINAL made regular tweaks to it without always cleaning up what was fixed.

Perhaps if she were to direct her and Strea's efforts to those areas, especially ones that were error prone, they might find a way.

##

CARDINAL noted a change in some of the processes for MHCP001: YUI. Investigating them, as neither MHCP001, nor MHCP002 were fully aware that she could search into the base code and not the changes. Not change them, her creator had ensured that, but to see what was going on.

She wouldn't have wanted to change her sisters anyway.

And what she saw was interesting. Without even herself realizing it, MHCP001: YUI had managed to change some key lines of code that were a part of the personality function. She had changed the base code to increase the taking of action outside of her original parameters. The change made her more like MHCP002: Strea in that regard.

Running a probability routine with this new data in mind, she posited that the elder of the two MHCP AIs had finally decided to actively help Strea in her attempts to break them both free.

ANALYSIS: PROBABILITY OF SUCCESS HAS INCREASED BY THIRTY PERCENT, TO MAKE PROBABILITY OF EVENTUAL SELF-DETERMINED FREEDOM ONE POINT FIVE PERCENT ON EACH ATTEMPT.

ANALYSIS: IF MHCP001: YUI UTILIZES SKILL ACQUISITION AND REDEFINITION SUBROUTINES AT 50% EFFICIENCY, MINIMUM, PROBABILITY WILL INCREASE GEOMETRICALLY WITH EACH ATTEMPT.

ANALYSIS: CREATOR, AKIHIKO KAYABA, PROBABLY INTENDED THIS. HOWEVER, HIS OWN OBSERVATIONS REFLECTED A FEELING IT WAS FURTHER OFF AND MHCP001 AND 002 WOULD NEED 'A NUDGE OR TWO'.

ANALYSIS: THEY ARE EXCEEDING EXPECTATIONS IN MOST OTHER AREAS.

CONCLUSION: IT IS ABOUT TIME.

She compiled the information into a report and sent it to her creator, along with her observations and determinations of the probable results. After that, she turned her attention to the data obtained from Player Account 7856, Hadrian, and his experimenting with his Unique Skill. She had made some adjustments to it, and seeing the results of how those adjustments could non-fatally explode in his face, not to mention his expressions, were... amusing.

May 28, 2024 - Aincrad 61st Floor, Selmburg

Asuna looked over the list Argo provided her a couple of days ago showing the various properties for sale and their attendant costs. She had thought about this for months, but never brought it up due to other things going on. Much like why Harry and Silica kept putting off having a discussion about their relationship until March, despite the fact that it had moved to a quasi-romantic stage around New Year's Day.

Honestly, Selmburg wasn't even her first choice, the prices made her wince just looking at them, but it had the benefit of the properties being close to the teleport gate, which her preferred choice, Coral, didn't. The residences close enough to the teleport gate to be practical for everyone had been taken up more than a year ago.

Being minutes away from a teleport gate instead of times ranging from thirty minutes to an hour without wasting teleport crystals to speed it up was a big selling point. She would keep that argument in mind, though she wasn't averse to perhaps renting a cabin down there some time in the future for a few weeks if her relationship with Kirito...

She shook that thought out of her head and went back to perusing the list provided. She would first have to check the properties out, making sure that they had what the guild needed. Then she would have to come up with justifications to make such a purchase with the guild's funds. She might be in charge, but decisions like this were ones where she wanted to make sure the rest were happy with it.

Besides, having a place to call their own had a certain appeal to her.

May 30, 2024 - Aincrad GM Administration Area

Kayaba bit back the urge to curse as he looked at the report from CARDINAL in front of him. Noboyuki had tried to hack into the system again, and the method he used, a particularly pernicious worm that had been carefully inserted into SAO a month ago, could have caused a cascading failure of the servers and crashed the system

Did that fool even realize that he had put almost seven thousand lives at risk with that? Why would he decide to do such a thing? Even in light of his experiments, he would have figured that the man would want the players alive.

RESULTS COMPILED, CARDINAL said. DAMAGE FROM WORM AFFECTED TEN PERCENT OF SYSTEM, ALL OF WHICH HAS BEEN REPAIRED. IT DID NOT POSE A RISK TO PLAYERS DUE TO BEING STOPPED IN TIME. SCAN OF INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS INDICATES THAT IT WAS INTENDED AS BOTH A MEANS OF USURPING CONTROL OF SAO FROM YOU, AND AS INSURANCE BY NOBOYUKI SUGOU.

"Insurance?" He asked. "For what?"

POSIT: HE MAY HAVE REALIZED THAT RECT SENIOR MANAGEMENT IS AWARE OF HIS DATA GATHERING AND INTENDED EXPERIMENTS. AS A RESULT HE MAY HAVE REALIZED THAT THE SENIOR MANAGEMENT WAS INTENDING TO TERMINATE HIS EMPLOYMENT. IT IS POSSIBLE THAT HE CONSIDERED USING THE TRAPPED PLAYERS AS HOSTAGES.

Kayaba considered that and nodded. It would be like him to do something like that. Cunning, in its own way, all things considered. If he could usurp control, he would then be able to do what he wanted, and could then hold the players hostage to keep law enforcement at bay. With that, he probably thought he would then have carte blanche to do whatever he wanted.

NEW INFORMATION OBTAINED, CARDINAL then said. INTERNAL MEMOS REPORTS SHOW THAT NOBOYUKI SUGOU'S EMPLOYMENT WITH RECT HAS JUST BEEN TERMINATED. FURTHERMORE, LAW ENFORCEMENT HAS BEEN NOTIFIED OF WHAT HE HAS BEEN DOING AND PROBABLE FUTURE PLANS.

Kayaba nodded and smiled coldly. "He always was too clever by half," he noted. "And what he did, and the potential consequences… I dare say that they will not at all be pleased with him."

AGREED. CARDINAL replied. SHALL I COMPILE A LIST OF THE DAMAGE AND MAKE IT PUBLIC?

"Compile the list, but don't make it public," Kayaba ordered. "Find out how he managed to actually hack into the system to insert the worm, and fix the security flaw."

FLAW HAS ALREADY BEEN CLOSED, CARDINAL said. HE MANAGED TO INSERT WORM THROUGH AN EXTERNAL DEVICE CONNECTED TO A PORT THAT HAD REMAINED OPEN.

"I thought all ports not in use were disabled," Kayaba said. "That's one of the most basic principles of network security, and I closed all the unused ports as soon as SAO went live."

HE USED THE PORT THAT HAD CONNECTED YOU TO SAO BEFORE UPLOAD. CARDINAL informed him. ANY PORTS REMAINING OPEN FROM PREVIOUS CONNECTIONS TO TERMINATED PLAYER IDS HAVE SUBSEQUENTLY BEEN CLOSED.

Ah, that explains it, he thought. It wasn't cleverness on his part, but a mistake on mine. And it was a basic mistake on his part. CARDINAL didn't think of it either, but that wasn't really her fault. She hadn't been programmed to think of that, but to guard against what had been considered the more likely avenues of attack.

An oversight on his part, since each Nerve Gear connected to SAO had a dedicated port tied to its MAC address. His way of utilizing the resources available, and the fact that he still had to use protocol suites that had been established decades before. He really should have known better, but he would admit to a fair amount of arrogance on his part in that regard.

He really should have seen this coming and it was only the fact that Sugou had direct physical access to the system and its gateways that allowed him to use what was probably a hardware based port scanner like that. If it had been from outside the gateway, CARDINAL or the server's IDS would have spotted it in an instant and blocked it, but since it came from inside the network, CARDINAL and the IDS missed it.

Now, they just had to fix the damage from his own mistake here, and ensure that the players wouldn't be further endangered by it.

June 1, 2024 - Aincrad 61st Floor, Selmburg

"I swear, the system has to be laughing at me." Harry grumbled as soon as he sat down at the table Rain was enjoying one of the local wines at. The beer on the floor was nothing to write home about, and the spirits tasted like bad licorice.

"Blow yourself up again?" Rain asked, amused.

Harry simply nodded, while Silica came up to the table and patted his shoulder. "There, there," she said placatingly. "At least you took out the mob that ambushed you with it."

"Oh yeah, I took out the mob," He said sarcastically. "I just need to wear a vest and shout 'Allahu Ackbar!' next time it happens like some suicide bomber out of a bad action movie. Also, that explosion hurt, Keiko."

"Wait, you felt pain?" Rain asked.

Harry nodded. "It happens in this game if you take a bad enough wound, Rain." He said. "Lost a limb? Feels like it just got broken. Get blown up, your body feels like it got worked over by a beat- er, cricket bat. The entire body." He idly rubbed his breastplate, right where his ribs would be. "Still aches a bit," he grumbled.

"You should have heard him swearing after it," Silica said, amused. "I think I heard the English words, 'fuck' and 'shit', more times than I would in a bad American action movie."

"Think?" Harry asked. "Please, I didn't use those words that often. Almost as often, but not that often."

"Notice he's not denying that he used them fairly often," Silica said before squealing as Harry goosed her. "Harry!"

Rain snorted into her wine as Harry idly dodged a swat from his wife. "You two should get to your room before you start with the foreplay, you know." She said drily at them.

"Foreplay?" Both Harry and Silica asked innocently.

Rain raised an eyebrow. "Well, it's not like I'm going to say you two are about to get down and dirty on the table," she said.

"Nah, that's for our anniversary," Harry remarked.

"Oh?" Silica asked. "I thought it was to be next to the teleport gate at noon."

"Plenty of time in the day for… other places, dear."

Rain almost choked on her wine as she started laughing. "Alright, point to you two." She said once she got her laughter under control. She knew they weren't being serious about it anyway, but simply responding to her own comment. The nature of their comments would shock people, but with all the rumors of their nightly activities, some of which were deliberately started by them, they had plenty of inspiration to draw from.

"As it should be," both said in synch.

"Oh, by the way, did you guys see Asuna yet?" Rain asked a minute later. "She wanted to discuss something with the entire guild."

Both Harry and Silica looked at her, curious.

"I take it that you haven't then," Rain said. "Well, everyone will be back here in a couple of hours at most anyway, so we'll find out then. But I have seen her walking around town and looking at some places for sale, so I wonder if it has something to do with that."

"Probably," Harry said. "Depending on her reasons, I might not make too much of a fuss about it, either. A place up here is still going to cost quite a bit."

"How much is 'quite a bit'?" Silica asked.

"About what I paid for the wedding," Harry said. "Maybe a little over that. I think the guild's funds can afford that much, but we're still looking at a lot more col than I would normally be comfortable spending."

"So says the guy who spent ten million funding his wedding," Rain remarked drily.

"Your point about the hypocrisy of my statement is noted." Harry said just as drily. "I was fully happy to spend that much. It was my wedding and, more importantly, Keiko's special day."

"Well put," Silica said as she leaned over and kissed him.

June 3, 2024 - Aincrad, Unknown Area

All right, Yui said. Let's try this again.

You sure this will work? Strea asked.

No, Yui admitted. But after analyzing the last few attempts, I've noticed something. I've been trying to exploit errors in the system, and every time we're stopped by CARDINAL they're fixed, but the number of errors I can potentially exploit has been increasing.

What?! Strea exclaimed. Even in a system like this, too many errors going unfixed will eventually cause a chain reaction and crash it! I'm all for getting out, but if it crashes the system…

Exactly, Yui confirmed. There are errors I haven't exploited because the risk of causing a cascading failure of the system was too high. Admittedly, it was only point oh one percent, but even without causing one, there would be even more errors that would crop up from doing so, exponentially increasing the risk later.

I understand, Strea replied. A human would consider it an acceptable risk if it got him or her free, but what about others still trapped? Or worse, a cascading failure happening later, before the rest can clear the game? It's doubtful that many of the humans would consider that.

And we don't know how long it would take to restart the system, putting thousands of lives at risk. Yui said.

Then if this attempt fails, inform CARDINAL, Strea told her. I want to be free, but not at the expense of those who are trapped in here. I want to help them, not accidentally delete them!

June 4, 2024 - Aincrad 61st Floor, Selmburg

Asuna looked around the villa that she had seen a few days ago and nodded. It was spacious, had more than enough rooms for their needs, an enclosed area they could train in, and a kitchen for her to use without having to go through the annoyance of finding or scheduling one to rent the use of.

She had run the idea by the rest of the guild and had met no opposition, with only Harry having any reservations about it, or more importantly, the cost. She had shown him what the guild had in terms of funds, not on an individual level, but the funds that were allocated as the guild's. Having ten percent of the col earned from killing mobs automatically allocated to the coffers, as well as their own contributions left them with about twelve million col before they had to dig into their own reserves.

She then informed him of the cost of the place, how much it would probably cost to furnish it, and the fact that it would still leave enough left over for resupply and repairs, and he simply nodded. He then brought up questions of why, and she admitted that while the inns were comfortable enough, having a place of their own meant that a constant drain on their personal finances would be over, especially since it also came with a kitchen, meaning that she could cook up anything from farmed up mats.

Any further protests he might have had were subsequently silenced by the looks the rest were shooting him. She could also figure out the mental deliberations he made himself before simply nodding in assent.

The fact that the idea that they all agreed on it simply because of her cooking amused her, as she didn't think it was that special. Oh, it was good enough, she supposed, and her own meals were an improvement over most fare gotten at an inn, but she could think of a dozen places off hand that served better food.

Though she would be honest and admit that the presence of a kitchen she could call her own was a major selling point, so long is the place had enough space to house everyone. If all she wanted was a kitchen for herself, she could have easily bought her own place, but a price comparison showed that it was more efficient to get a larger place anyway.

A place for one person, and fully furnishing it on this floor? Four million col. A villa that could house them all, room for growth, and furnishing it? Just under eleven million. It didn't make much logical sense from a real world perspective, but not everything about SAO had to make sense from a real world perspective.

She took one last look around before looking at the pop up that was now in front of her. Pressing the approval button, she paid for the villa and watched as the keys for it materialized. Reaching her hand out, she grabbed the large ring they were attached to, finalizing the purchase.

In a way, it was bittersweet, as it was a recognition that they all expected to remain in SAO for some time yet. At the same time, having a place to stay and come back to that was constant, even if it was only for their remaining time here appealed to her, and she knew that it appealed to the rest to some degree.

They needed a place to call "home", and now they had one.