"Wake up, wake up, Kirito!!"

A "voice" suddenly sounded in my head, and the feeling of something hitting my head pulled me back from the dream to reality. No, to be precise, it's not true.

When I opened my eyes with a grunting sound, I saw Ralan's face.

However, Lilan's face looked a little impatient, and she was sweating profusely. When I turned my eyes out the window, it was still night, and it was still dark in the room. It might be late at night, but I wonder what Lilan is doing at this time.

"What's the matter, isn't it still dark outside Lilan or rather, it's already midnight"

"Kirito, hurry up! Shina, Shino has left here! “

As soon as these words came out, my consciousness completely woke up. Shino thought that she had regained her memory and that it would be dangerous to go out, and she was hit hard. I couldn't believe Shino had gone outside. Have you ever been poked in your sleep?

"What!? When was that!? ”

"I'm going to wake you up! When I was sleeping, I heard the sound of the door opening and closing, and Shino's presence was no longer felt in this room. Shino is out! “

"Shino seems to have gone out while we were sleeping." However, Lilan, who can use the enemy's search ability that is stronger than me, should be able to find out Shino's whereabouts.

"Lei Ran, where is Shinai!? Shouldn't it be that far!? “

Rylan paused for a moment before turning to look at the city.

"It's really clumsy, Shino seems to have used a teleportation crystal. The reaction is already quite far away, is this fifty-three layers!? “

"Fifty-three floors!? The fifty-third floor has just been captured, and the enemy level is quite high! Anyway, Shino alone is too dangerous! “

"No, maybe Shino went for this anyway, Kirito, let's hurry up! If you don't act quickly, it may be irreparable!! “

In my mind, I remembered the scene. Ever since I met Reran, then Diabel, and then Shino, I decided not to repeat the same mistakes. I haven't told them both yet, but at the same time I'm afraid I'll repeat, I'm afraid to repeat.

If you can reunite with Shino and hear her memories, you should talk to Shino. Sure enough, I can't be silent about it forever.

But before that, the first thing we need to do is find Shino. And the place where Shino is going is the fifty-third floor - although Shino's level is quite high, the werewolf monsters there are quite powerful. If you are surrounded and attacked all at once, you will be killed in the blink of an eye.

"Hurry up and run again!"

Lilan and I walked outside, and immediately summoned the teleportation crystal from the item window, and after reading the teleportation crystal with the transparent blue crystal in our hand, we pronounced the name of the city on the twenty-second floor.

The next moment, both my body and I were wrapped in the blue light of the stadium, our eyes turned pure white, and we approached the transfer gate with Lilan on our shoulders, which was now shrunk. I touched the transfer door, shouted the name of the city on the 53rd floor, and transferred again.

And when we arrived at the fifty-three-story town where Shino was, we were soaking wet. The weather on the 53rd floor today seems to be heavy rain and no wind.

Normally, I just think it's a terrible rain, but when I think of Shino recovering her memory, I feel like Shino's sadness. On top of that, I couldn't help but lose to this torrential rain.

I don't need shelter from the rain and I don't need an umbrella. As soon as possible.

"Lei Ran, you've come to the fifty-third floor, but do you know where Shino is?"

Rylan closed his eyes as if sensing something, and then opened them again.

"Get out of here and go to the northern steppes! I could feel Shino's presence. At the same time, the reaction of many monsters! “

"Shino, have you come into contact with monsters?" And if there are too many of them, Shino will be in danger of his life if he doesn't rush over immediately.

"Damn, hurry up! I'll take you out of town! ”

"Got it!"

With Lilan with me, I ran through the city's fifty-three floors in the pouring rain to the pitch, attracting the attention of the players who used canopies and umbrellas to keep out the rain.

After confirming that Lilan had returned to her original size, he jumped onto Lilan's back as he ran, and grabbed him firmly. The next moment, Lilan kicked away the slippery ground after the rain, didn't slip easily, and started running.

A typhoon-like gust of wind and downpour hit, and when we saw the trees and rocks in the distance sweeping with great force, Lilan was moving much faster than we realized.

As the two of us continued to run through the prairie in the rain, we saw a figure sitting in the depths of the prairie. If you keep your eyes open so as not to get lost in the rain, the real identity of this figure is a familiar player in the back, whose health bar has reached the red zone, and there are multiple werewolves in front of you, which can be confirmed.

"That's Shino!!"

"That figure must be Shino." It was dark and hard to see, but it had rain-soaked black hair and a red, black, and green combat uniform. And that back that I've seen many times.

The moment I realized that my life was in danger, I shouted out the name of Shino N.

"Poetry is ────────────────────────────────────"

◆◆◆

After jumping out of the cabin, I came to the fifty-third floor. Unlike the moon coming out on the 22nd floor, it was raining heavily on the 53rd floor, but it felt just right.

"If it rains like this, the players won't be able to go out, and there won't be anyone on the field." With this, you will be able to encounter monsters without anyone disturbing you.

No, no one would interfere, even if a murderer walked to the field in such a rain - thinking about this, he left the town and went to the field, through a dark and damp meadow. While I was there, I was able to meet a bunch of werewolves.

As soon as the werewolf noticed that I was soaking wet, he took up his weapon and had a happy expression on his face as if he had found his prey. After all, the people who greeted me were monsters and other non-humans.

"Normally, when I see a monster, I draw my weapon, but now I don't have the will to take up a weapon."

"I don't care anymore." I'd rather be attacked by such disgusting memories, scolded by all sorts of people, and treated like a hateful child

As if sensing my thoughts, the werewolf surrounded me with a one-handed sword and began to cut my body one after another.

The crunching sound, like a knife biting flesh, and an uncomfortable sensation similar to pain, my life bar, that is, the amount of my life remaining, instantly decreased, turned yellow, and entered a state of alert. It then turns red to indicate a warning condition.

There is not much left in life, and this scene will scream in horror for normal people. I was like that until I regained my memory. But for me now, it doesn't matter.

Let it continue to decrease and disappear - while thinking so, keep watching the amount of life remaining, and when the remaining life is about to run out,

"Poetry is ────────────────────────────────────"

Mixed with the sound of rain, I suddenly heard a voice calling from behind. Moreover, in this world, it is forbidden for SAO to call her by her real name.

"I'm not supposed to tell anyone my real name, who is that?"

Just as I was thinking this, the slashing of the sword towards me suddenly stopped, and at the same time, the remaining health that had been reduced to a few points also stopped.

What happened? - Just as I was muttering to myself, a large thing passed by me, and my hair stood on end, and a large amount of water dripped on my back. I couldn't see anything when I looked back, and when I looked ahead again, I couldn't help but be taken aback.

Just now, there were black-haired werewolves in front of me, and now, on the top of their heads, starting from their foreheads, there are white hair, carapace-like human hair. Sword. What's more, the werewolf disappeared without warning as if it had been replaced.

"You're running again?"

As if in response to my voice, something jumped off Rylan's back and came towards me.

The man was a man with black hair and black eyes, and a black coat. It was Kirito who decided not to see him again. I was soaking wet from head to toe because I had been running in the rain.

"You're Kirito"

Without saying a word, Kirito put his hand into his arms, took out the green crystal, and muttered "healing". The next moment, the green crystal shattered in Kirito's hand and disappeared into light. It goes back to green, which means it's safe.

Why. I almost ran out of life. I thought the life I hated would soon be over. Why are you bothering me?

"Good, just in time"

"Why? Why are you here? ”

"Why did you leave all of a sudden? Whether it's boss battles or now, there are too many out-of-the-ordinary behaviors. ”

"I'm looking back at what I've done so far." The reason why I did this in the boss fight at the time was because I thought that if the boss hit me in the head, I would be able to recover my memory.

Until now, every time I fall asleep, I try to recall my memories, and when I wake up, I forget them.

At that time, when I began to get tired of the disgust that I couldn't remember, I came up with a story about being shocked and losing my memory, and being equally shocked and recalling my memory: Rice Field.

If my memory is affected, maybe it will be remembered as well—that's why I do it. But the result was negative.

"I didn't expect that I would be reminded of my memories of killing people in the past."

"Who could have predicted this?" No, no one can predict.

"Because I thought that if I hit my head with all my strength, I might be able to regain my memory. Sure enough, I was able to regain my memory. ”

"They ran away in shock?"

"yes. It's worse than I thought, my memory is so bad. Therefore, I can only despair about life. “

Kirito's eyes saw it

is opened.

"What do you mean? What the hell happened to you? ”

"If you talk to me, you'll run away from me. Please tell me what you want to know. You're going to treat me like an abomination now. ”

"I don't understand what you mean by misogynistic children. Shino, can you tell me what's going on? “

Despite being soaked in the rain, Kirito's eyes seemed to have a soft glow. But after hearing this story, this light will definitely disappear immediately. And push me away. Don't touch me, tell me you're a murderer.

But I didn't want Kirito to be silent like this, and my mouth moved because I wanted to talk to Kirito.

"Okay. There's no one here, so I can talk to you. I can talk about the details, but you don't care about the details. ”

"I'm used to hearing it, but I want you to hear the details."

I sighed. This guy probably doesn't want to back down yet. This person is not going anywhere until he has listened to me.

And, as soon as I finished speaking, the man thought I was an abomination and ran away. Until then, we can stay together.

"Okay. I'll tell you everything I remember.

"I killed someone." Not in the game world or anything like that, of course, but in the real world.

I lived with my mother, grandfather, and grandmother, and my father died of illness when I was a child, and I never knew my father's face, so I always lived with my mother.

"My mother lost my father, but she still loves me very much." When I was younger, he read me picture books and sang lullabies to me. Mom is in very good health. That's why, for as long as I can remember, I thought I had to protect my mother in an emergency.

"Of course, my mom told me that I didn't have to, and I was happy with how I felt, but I couldn't stop doing it." I kept thinking in my heart that I would definitely protect my mother when the time came.

But when I was eleven years old, something happened and I betrayed my mother.

"First of all, it's been a long time since I've hung out with my friends, so it's my routine to go home after school and read books borrowed from the library." It is probably because of this accumulation that I can read and understand the instructions at a very fast speed when I am cooking for you. Before I knew it, I was able to read at high speed.

Also, my mom always protected me, but at the end of the day, maybe because I felt like I had to protect her, I really didn't like outside interference, so I beat up the boy who hid his indoor shoes. One question. I remember feeling a strange refreshment at that time.

"I love my mother." Mom has always loved me. He really loved me and raised me.

However, when I was eleven years old, I did something that betrayed my mother.

"There was a robbery at a bank in a small town in the Northeast." According to news reports, the killer shot and killed a police officer with a pistol, and he himself was accidentally shot and killed, but that was a lie. I really killed him. I was there and wanted to protect my mother, so I snatched the pistol from the robber and shot her. As a result, he killed the robbers.

I later found out that I had two broken teeth, a sprained wrist, a dislocated shoulder, and scarred all over my body. But my injuries healed quickly.

"I remember what happened after that very well." After killing the robbers first, I was hugged by my mother. Mom cried and hugged me and apologized over and over again: "I'm sorry. "Then the police came, told me to hand over the gun, and then put me in an ambulance and took me to the hospital. At that time, my mother was always by my side. Even though I was lying in a hospital bed and undergoing various tests, my mother was always there for me.

After the doctor examined it, the police came and asked, but they said, "Shino killed the robber with a gun not because she wanted to kill her, but because she wanted to protect me." Shino is not bad. He complained over and over again.

The police seemed to know what was going on here, so they shouted at me, "You're not bad, what you're doing is justification" and told me I was innocent. By the way, I found out at the time that the bank robber was a drug addict and insane.

"But even after being told this, the wounds in my heart did not heal." The wound bared its fangs at me mercilessly.

After that, night after night, the scene of the incident kept appearing in my dreams. The recoil when the shot was fired, the feeling of blood splattering, the moment when a person bled and fell to the ground. Every time I fall asleep, each and every one of them seems to reappear in my dreams. I remember jumping up and screaming over and over again and throwing up in the washbasin they gave me. — and it's not just after a dream.

From then on I wondered if it was a firearm or something, and anyway, just by looking at something related to a firearm, I remembered it clearly, as if I had been hit by something that was extremely strong and it was gone.

Watching TV in the hospital room, I saw a pistol in the TV series, I couldn't breathe, my body couldn't move, I didn't know the time, the season, and I didn't know where I was now. I threw up when I was beaten, and fainted when it was serious. As a result, I couldn't watch TV series or movies, and when I realized this, my hospital stay was extended and I was referred to a psychiatrist for an examination.

As a result of that incident, I developed a condition called post-traumatic stress disorder. During my hospital stay and after I was discharged, I received a lot of counseling. Of course, not just one doctor, but multiple doctors. They were so nice to me, but I couldn't believe them. I obediently took the medicine, but after all, those people just told me "it's hard, it hurts, I understand" and they didn't understand anything.

I want you to tell me if what I'm doing is good or bad, but no one can answer.

"After the incident, I was treated as an abomination." Murderer, murderer, all sorts of words related to murder. Of course, the news didn't report anything about me at all, and the killer died as a result of an accidental shooting, but what was scary was the power of rumors in a small local city. Like oil on fire, the news of my killing of him spread, and everyone knew about it.

My mom said, "Don't mind. My grandmother used to say the same thing. "She loved me as much as she did before the incident.

"But I can't honestly accept this love." Mom, grandpa, and grandma must be thinking in their hearts, what the hell did this guy do? I felt cold when I was picked up.

"People in elementary school have always regarded me as an abomination." Maybe because of this, I didn't want to live in my hometown anymore, so I went to a middle school and high school in Tokyo. That's when I knew no one was going to bother me anymore. But this situation only lasted for about a year, and by the third year, many people were cheering me on and bullying me.

"Of course, I didn't feel any heat or warmth there."

Elementary school students, junior high school students, doctors, mothers, grandfathers, and grandmothers are all cold. For me, the world becomes as cold as the North Pole or the South Pole.

"There's no place for me anywhere." Yes, it's strange to kill a person with impunity. No, this must be a punishment for me. You kill someone, and from now on, you will be forced to live in a world of extreme cold, which is your punishment.

"Whether it's because I think so, or because I still want to protect my mother, I'm starting to think about getting stronger." If I get stronger, I can endure this cold world, and if I choose to commit suicide, I feel like I can't bring back the people I killed.

"But even so, I don't regret killing that man in the first place." Partly because I wanted to prove it, I've been thinking about getting stronger.

"That's the time." My mother told me to consult a psychiatrist at a major hospital in Tokyo.

I went to the hospital to see a doctor in disbelief, but I was shocked by the encounter with the doctor. Anyway, compared to other teachers, he was very honest and listened to me very gently, which was like a friend. I can talk to him about anything. Wounds, guns, everything.

The teacher listened to me like a friend, accepted me, gave me all kinds of things, and finally suggested that I use Medicuboid. In the real world, there are probably a lot of things we can't talk about, so I told him to go to the VR world and talk about it. So I used Medicuboid.

Then I joined SAO.

"It's like this."

I finished in one breath, but Kirito's eyes never took off me, and he continued to listen to me soaking wet. However, from my experience so far, I feel like I already know what Kiritto will say next.

"You see, I'm a murderer. A murderer with nowhere to go, no, should not be anywhere. ”

"You"

Kirito finally spoke. The rain poured into my mouth, but I continued to speak without worry.

"You said you weren't going to die, but now you look like you're going to die, why?"

"The reason why I'm dying." Until now, no matter how painful the attack was, I never thought I would die.

"Is it because I'm afraid of losing everything, or because I don't want my mom, grandpa, and grandma to be sad?" That's part of the reason, but I think it's better to think that if I die like this, that person won't be able to live.

"But until just now, I thought I was going to die." I'm ready to die. Is that

"I'm tired."

"What are you tired of?"

"I'm going to be betrayed. I have lived with you until now. If I tell you this, you will definitely reject me. I will lose my place. ”

"My mother, grandfather, grandmother lost their belonging, and I lost my belonging." Once again, I'm about to lose my place. I hate the idea of nowhere to go. ”

“”

"But you know what, Kirito. I don't think so anymore.

No. I may have thought about dying at one point, but not now. I'm used to being alone, you don't have to live anywhere.

"That's why I can live alone." Live alone, fight alone, die alone. This must be my fate. Thank you for meeting you again and allowing me to reconfirm. ”

I was about to stand up when Kirito touched my shoulder with his wet hand. A bad feeling hit me and I shook it off.

"Do Not Touch"

Kirito shook his head.

"You're wrong, Shino. No one dies alone. When a person dies, he dies with him. I already have Shino in my body. "If Shino dies, so will Shino in me."

Although Kirito is drenched in the rain, his eyes are still sparkling and full of charm.

"And, Shino, you couldn't be more wrong. You said you didn't have a place to live, but in that wooden house, Shino, Reiran and I have lived until now. There is no place to stay. “

Kirito continued to place his hand on my shoulder.

"Shinai, I'm telling you, it's a lie to say that you don't belong.

"What are you talking about?" Is it because I selfishly think I don't have a place to live?

"Though you despise me, you call me a murderer."

"No, I don't have a place to belong. I don't have a place to belong to such people. ”

"There's no such thing"

"That's right"

"Not the one"

No matter what I said, Kirito bluntly denied my words. It wasn't long before I heard a creaking sound in my heart and spit out a word.

"Well, there is indeed that house in this world, so you might say I have a place to belong. However, if I go back to the real world, it will disappear. No! ”

"There's nothing like that."

"That's right!"

"It's not true!"

The squeaking in my heart grew louder and louder, and finally became the sound of something collapsing. The next moment, thoughts moved from my heart to my chest, from my throat to my mouth, and words like never before.

"Why can you say that! You say so much, you say so much"

"Then, you are my destination!! You will protect me for the rest of my life!! ”