Aereth

Once again he felt a tug on his arm. She still didn't want to let him go. Why... Why for gods sake did she care so much about the life of an orange player that she barely knew. He didn't understand... But if she knew what he had done  would she still want to stop him...

"Why?" he simply asked the purple haired woman. "I know now that we share a similar burden.. But do you even know who I am? What I did?" Aereth paused.

"I'm currently considered as one of the most dangerous players inside of this whole game. The Army wants to see me behind bars or worse and the biggest Red Guild in the game wants my head. Look me in the eyes..." Aereth demanded as he turned around and locked his brown ores with the cobalt ones of Teion.  "My username is Aereth, currently the player with the highest kill count in the game. 12 People Teion. I've take the life of 12 people inside of this game and I'm done, I have no reason to fight, because only my own pathetic little life isn't worth it anymore. I'm tired. I just want to rest..."

After this revelation, would she still want to stop him from resting, or would she stay adamant and stubborn in her attempt to change his mind? He didn't know... But what he did know was, that he was slowly loosing it again. His voice was rising and he could feel how he was slowly starting to shake again...

@Teion

Aereth took a step back and waited for Teion to speak up.
With every word Teion spoke Aereth managed to understand more about the woman, and as the realization struck, he felt a huge wave of guilt wash over him. His hand was slowly moving up towards her shoulder as she faltered, but he stopped mere centimeters before he touched her. 

"I have no right..." he thought, as his hand hovered over her shoulder for a few seconds, also thinking about earlier how he had pushed her against the wall yelling at her that she wouldn't understand anything. Guilt was washing over him. She only tried to help, but he pushed her away in such a harsh and cruel manner...

Thankfully his thoughts got interrupted by the rumbling sounds and the quaking floor as the wall on one side of the cave crumbled away, revealing a staircase. As none of them moved, Aereth spoke in a low voice, "Let's go. We need to get out of here..." and started to slowly walk towards the dimly lit staircase.

The mood was heavy as they walked up the stairs, and neither Teion, nor Aereth spoke a single word until they finally were able to exit the dungeon through this hidden exit. They could already see Tomoika in the distance as well as the main dungeon entrance some meters away, and Aereth finally decided to break the silence. "If you head this way you should get back to the main settlement without problems..." he paused. "Look... I'm... I'm really sorry for what I said back in the dungeon. And I'm really sorry for attacking you like that, but let me give you an advice. Find somebody who understands you, who you can trust, somebody who's there for you. And talk... Cry... Talk and cry until there is nothing left to say and no more tears left to cry." Another few moments of pause. The words were heavy as stones inside of him, since he knew that what he was going to ask her was almost impossible to accomplish. "And most importantly, forgive yourself..." His hand slowly took hold of his hood and he slowly pulled it over his head. "Or you will one day end up like me..." 

With that he turned around and slowly began to walk towards the dungeon entrance again. He still had to pick up his sword after all...

@Teion

Aereth frowned. Today wasn't one of his best days, so was this game trying to see how far it can push him until he looses his sanity completely? He closed his eyes and focused only on his breathing. In..... Out.... This was all he did for a couple of moments. "Don't question the game..." he repeated inside of his mind in order to calm down again.

"F*ck this sh*t." Aereth said as he opened his eyes once more as he prepared his answers. 

He hesitated for a few long moments before he started to speak...

Confess what darkens your heart,
"The injustice of this world, The loss that came from this injustice and the constant thirst of Revenge that cannot be quenched no matter what I do."

What haunts your dreams,
"The thoughts of the past, or better, that one day where I lost everything."

And what falters your step.
"My own weakness, and the fear of having to watch my own sanity slipping away with every passing second..."

With that, the brunette answered all the questions on the statue. It took all of his effort, not to loose his composure again. He was honest with every word he said, but he doubted that he had a pure heart and mind. His heart got ripped out of him the day he lost his love. Only to be replaced by a dark void that grew with every PKer he killed. His dreams always were only about the past. What he could have done, how he could have prevented it. But in the end it was all the same...

Suddenly one eye of the statue began to glow, but nothing else happened. "Seems like this is some kind of partner thing...." Aereth guessed in low voice, doing his best not to sound weak.

@Teion

Aereth nodded understandingly. Traps like these were very common on this particular floor, so it only made sense that Teion also got dropped in here by one. It really seemed that the girl managed to calm herself down again by the time they found the handle. 

Aereth only shrugged when Teion started to pull on the handle. He had tried to find other things as well, but in this room there was only this handle, nothing more, nothing less. A slight rumbling sounded and the cave floor under their feet began to shudder and after some tense moments, the big room finally got dimly illuminated by the various arious plantlife--moss, mushrooms, and algae.

"I have no f*cking idea..." Aereth asked in confusion as they eyed the statue in the middle of the room. "Why the hell wasn't I able to see this thing when I scanned the room with my search skill?" he asked himself and re-read the words on the statute.

"But seriously? How should this sh*t get us out of here? Don't tell me that stupid thing has some kind of truth detector running in the background..." Aereth whined, lightly bumping the statue with his fist.

@Teion

"Do you think you can stand up?" Aereth asked, trying his best to keep his voice warm and low. Even though he might seem direct and dumb at times, it wasn't hard to notice that Purple was afraid of something. He just couldn't pin what it was exactly. "Maybe the shock from falling... Maybe the fear of mobs spawning here..." he thought while opening his inventory and changing his battle ring for his scouting equipment.

Still not getting up on her own, he gently let his hand slide down from the shoulder of her until he reached Teions hand. "Hey, it's alright. I'm gonna get us out of here." Carefully taking a hold of her hand he started to pull her to his feet. "Traps like these always have some kind of mechanic to escape. Maybe we'll even find some treasure." he joked weakly as his eyes flickered for a brief moment, indicating that he triggered his searching skill. For some minutes the duo was slowly walking along the walls of the trap room trying to find some kind of hint how he could get them out of here. 

Suddenly he saw something like an odd handle sticking out of the wall. It was almost too obvious, but they didn't find anything else that might lead to an exit. "What do you think? Exit, or just another trap?" he asked, still holding her hand and pointing at the handle in front of them.

@Teion

One wrong set and one clicking noise later, and the two of them found each other in free fall. There was no time to react, no time to scream. With a dull thud Aereth was the first to hit the floor, shortly followed by Teion who crashed directly into him. 

A deep "Urgh." escaped the brunette and after he managed to sit up, he asked. "Hey, Teion... You ok?" as she hastily and without any words pushed herself away from him.

As he didn't get an answer, Aereth finally activated his Flame Aura enhancement on his armor, to bring some light into the dark hole. White flames erupted from his armor which filled the dark pit with some light.

Now he could finally see her. He let his brown eyes wander over his purple haired partner and didn't like what he saw. There was fear and terror written all over her face and she seemed to be frozen in place. Slowly he pushed himself away from the ground, and slowly walked over to her before he crouched down right in front of her. "Teion. Teion. Talk with me. What's going on?" he asked, putting a hand on her shoulder.

@Teion

Aereth's head hung low. His messy brown hair slowly falling and covering his face. Oh how much he wanted this all this pain to be gone. To finally have some peace...

Expecting that the woman would leave, Aereth was surprised to hear her voice. She wanted to know. She wanted to understand. But why, why on earth did she care? He attacked her, and shouted at her. He was a stranger... Aereth didn't understand. The few persons that knew about his misery never asked. It was always Aereth who told them, because he felt like he owned it to them. And he never showed emotion. Keeping up a strong facade was always the most important to him. And yet, today that girl witnessed him break, and instead of running away like everybody else would have, she stayed. Asking him to tell her. To help her understand...

"Why?"

Was all he managed to get out in between his heavy breaths. He was exhausted, tired and drained. Not even a whole day worth of fighting and grinding made him tired like the way he currently felt. It seemed like all of his energy left him as he lost his calmness a couple of minutes ago.

"Why do you care so much about a stranger?"

Before Teion could answer, the sound of players or mobs coming towards them interrupted her. Aereth frowned. He wanted to find out her motivation, but he didn't want to find out who or what was coming for them. Most probably his little outburst attracted every mob in the near area sooooo...

"We need to get you out of here." Aereth said in a low voice, and extended his arm to help Teion to her feet. The paths where his tears went down his face were still visibly wet, but at least no new ones were coming out. "And I want to hear an answer... But not here..."

@Teion

Thud.

His back hit the wall and Teion was throwing harsh words directly into his face. For the first few moments Aereth was stunned. His body didn't know how to react, and his brain refused to come up with a proper response. "I... I..." he mumbled, trying to buy himself some time, but to no avail. And as he was about to respond that he didn't even needed that sword since he was using mainly material arts in serious combat, she finally said it. 

"Or do you mean to tell me you're just trying to edge on getting yourself killed?"

Then something inside of Aereth broke and his mind went blank. Yes. He was trying to kill himself. He had nothing to live for anymore. No reason to fight. All he wanted was finally some peace... And suddenly his body started to move. With one hand he broke Teions hold and held it tight. The other one went to her own collar and with one swift movement the two of them switched places.

"What if I told you that I was trying to get myself killed? You have absolutely no idea who I am..." his grip on her arm tightened, and his voice grew louder. "You have no idea what I have lost... No. What was taken from me..." his grip tightened even more, and he was almost shouting by now. "And you have have absolutely no idea what I have seen, done and endured inside of this game."  Tears started to roll down his cheeks. Aereth was actually crying. The last time he cried was when he had to watch his girlfriend die. And here he was, standing in front of a stranger and he couldn't control himself anymore. "So Why do you care so much about my life? You. Know. NOTHING!" His grip grew so tight that it was starting to drain health points from the female.

Then his brain started to work again and he finally began to realize what he had done. He had lost it... Immediately breaking the hold on Teion, Aereth looked at her with a pained expression and said in a shaky voice. "Leave... Sorry..." The last word was almost a whisper as tears still streamed down his face and hit the dusty ground beneath him...

@Teion

Purple turned around and looked at him with an angry expression. "Now she's p*ssed. Well done, great job." he thought as she implied that he was the crazy one of the two and explained that she only got here by accident. But he wouldn't back down now. Even as the pathetic little piece of trash he was right now, he still had his pride.

"Hey! I knew exactly what I was doing. I was just getting some mob grinding done. And you can't tell me that you just teleported on this floor and left the safe zone just because of an accident." Aereth lied, still fueled by the fact that a level 29 player was solo exploring the front line floor.

He picked up some speed and walked up right besides her. "What was that?" Arereth asked as the purple haired female muttered something under her breath that Aereth wasn't able to hear clearly. He could guess that it was another remark about his armor, but he wanted to be sure. 

@Teion

Aereth agreed with the blonde tank and nodded. "Yeah, let's continue moving. I wanna get this quest done." The two mobs guarding the chapel were pathetic to say the least. Both of them didn't even last two attacks before they scattered into little polygons. 

Then they encountered the boss mob they were looking for. Tagas emerged and challenged them for a battle. They didn't know exactly how strong the boss was, but he would undoubltely put up more of a fight than the two mobs that were guarding the entrance of the chapel. Jonathan howled and Tagas prepared for battle. 

"I'll wait and safe some energy, until he's fully corrupted. I want to see how strong he can get. And it is said that he yields higher rewards if we let him go fully corrupt." Aereth told his blonde comrade, while staying put for now. In case Jonathan needed some help he would immediately jump in and start fighting....

Forgoing Action.

@Morgenstern

"Teion...." Aereth thought. That name was ringing a bell somewhere in his head, but he couldn't quite put a finger on it. Back in the real world he would have easily remembered a girl with such a striking hair color, but inside of Aincrad fancy hair colors were nothing out of the ordinary.

He shrugged and both of them were walking in silence. Only broken by the small exchange of words that came from time to time. But as Teion mentioned that she was only level 29 inside a dungeon on the frontlines. "Seriously? Then what the actual hell are you doing here? Alone in a dungeon on the highest floor available. Are you crazy?" Aereth asked in disbelief, his empty shell slowly getting replaced by the only thing that kept him alive until now. His will to protect.

Finally Aereth activated the items on his Battle ready slots and his body got engulfed in light. His casual clothes instantly got replaced by his sturdy unique armor under the same cloak as before. "Let's get you out of here..."

@Teion

Just now he finally realized how exhausted he really was. "For how long have I been doing this?" he silently asked himself and glanced into the upper corner of the HUD. 18:13. That means that he was almost nine hours today into that dungeon. Aereth frowned.

Initially he only came here for some tier three materials and some Col farming, but somehow one thing lead to the other and he found himself dismissing his armor and starting to dive head first into the mob groups. Finally all the bottled up mental stress and pressure was getting to him. And there were days where he just couldn't bear it anymore. Today was such a day...

"Huh..." Aereth replied, after the purple haired woman asked him for his name. "I'm Aer..." he stopped for a brief moment. Oh how he hated this name. A constant remeinder of who he was in this game. He grunted. "You can call me Max. Yours?" Aereth finally answered, giving away his real name and asking for hers in return.

After that not much interesting happened. Teion gave him a health potion and asked for the way out. Aereth stood up again and pulled out his map from the inventory, showing her the way he took to get to this particular place. "By the way, which level are you?" he added nonchalantly.

@Teion

Slowly but surely the sounds of their followers grew quieter with every step. Honestly? He didn't care. It seemed like cruel fate didn't want him to meet his creator today. Not that he was a religious person who believed in such things, but anyways. 

Heavily panting, the two players reached the safe area, and Aereth stumbled forward as the the purple haired player forced him to enter the clearing. After two steps Aereth regained control over his body and turned around to face his 'savior'.

He took a few moments to take in her appearance. Her eyes radiated an intense heat as she spoke to him, and her words were filled with obvious sarcasm, as she mentioned his choice of armor for this floor. But at the same time there was something lingering in the back. It was a glint of fear... No. It wasn't fear, it was... worry. But why the hell would somebody worry about him? He was just a stranger with an orange cursor... Excluded from society, a killer and a monster.

As the moments of silence stretched out for a tad bit longer than it was comfortable Aereth averted his gaze. "Maybe... You are right..." He answered completely ignoring the sarcastic remark about his armor. "Just give me some time to catch my breath..." His words were empty and shallow as he took a seat. And he didn't fight her about leaving him behind since he knew that she wouldn't do that..

It didn't matter if today or tomorrow...

@Teion

Thanks for all of your input up until now. Since I'll be the one creating this hotfix your ideas really help me out a big time and I hope to get the fix out as soon as possible. 

From what I was able to gather the majority of players want the patch consisting of something like this:

• Back to NK per default for every thread. (@Pretty_Much_Everyone)
• Allowing players to enter threads and "scare" (needs proper definition) others ( @Kisodeth, @Itzal)
  • Also needs to be looked at from a SP gain perspective
  • RP combat only
• Orange players can ALWAYS be attacked and killed (@Lessa)

@Everyone_Who_Likes_2.5_Rules
While I also see the RP advantages of this new mechanic, we need to take care of what the majority of the players want. And if you really enjoy the thrilling feeling of getting killed all the time you can put a Killing Enabled Tag into your signature.

@Ryo 
I have to agree with Itzal and the likes on that matter. If you accept a duel and kill your opponent, there is no need to become orange, since both parties agreed on the consequences of that battle.

@Thorsten
I feel like the ruling for "little" crimes is adequate. If you are a pickpocket, that's no big deal for the first 3 times. But at some point these guys also need to be punished.

@Lessa
I totally love the idea of Orange players being open to be attacked at all times. It's like you said, their choice if they want to become orange.
Entering Cities:
Honestly, I feel like being able to enter cities is an important thing for RP. You can go for a drink, have some fun etc. Besides that, it's even canon for orange players to be able to enter safe zones. They can enter, but they get hunted by NPC guards, and thrown out of town if caught. And the implementation of using the Hiding Skill in order to enter and move inside of Save Zones is something I feel is appropriate. (Maybe the numbers need to be tweaked but that's what I'm here for right?)

Hey there.

Now that the 2.5 Patch has been out for a couple of days it's time to speak about changes made to the Thread Tags. With the new PK mechanic you are now always at the risk of dying when RPing with others. A good friend of mine told me that this new mechanic is heavily frowned upon by you, the player-base. 

The staffs intention was to make RPing on the site a little bit closer to the actual anime, where you also would have to take care who you trust before heading out for some happy adventuring. 

But now it's time to tell us if you guys and gals like the new mechanic or not. We as staff don't want create things that the player-base does not want.

I personally have already thought about some possible solutions for that problem. For instance: We could implement something like a "Spawn Protection" that keeps new players safe for x Levels, so they can find some trustworthy people to RP with, but I'd also like to hear some suggestions from you guys.

So please share your input on that matter, and help resolving this problem. :)

17 hours ago, Ariel - The Crowned Lion said:

Skill(s) Being Dropped: 
Mod(s) Being Dropped: Bullrush
SP Refunded: 8
Cost: 8,000 Col

Approved.

Slowly getting back up to his feet, the brunette adjusted the grip on his sword and readied himself for the next barrage of attacks. It was almost over. The end of his suffering, the end of the nightmare called Sword Art Online seemed to be so close, but suddenly Aereth felt something pulling away on his arm. He lost the grip on his sword, and with a high pitched voice, the blade hit the ground.

The force grew steadily stronger until he noticed that he was already running. But why was he running? He was supposed to fight. Supposed to lose... Suddenly an angry sounding voice snapped him out of his trance like status. 

The brunette looked up and noticed that a female player was trying her best to flee from a seriously far too big number of mobs. His clouded mind cleared up a little bit and he answered in a low voice. "Two times left, and middle way of the bifurcation afterwards leads to a small safe area..." 

As much as he wanted to go back, he needed to make sure the other player was safe. The thought made him chuckle. How ironic. Even when he just wants to finally rest, his over the top urge of not wanting others to die as well, wins....

@Teion

"Only a few times, but the guards on the higher floors are really annoying to deal with..." Aereth answered with a small sigh. "So I usually work with my cheap crystals." 

"Always. But lets end this quickly." Aereth said and followed the tank swiftly. If he wanted he could overtake the tank and start the first attack, but that would mean that he would have to let the opportunity of getting a free opening pass. And Aereth wasn't that stupid. He waited until the first mob got killed by Jonathan and activated his charge skill swiftly in the last second before he would be too close.

A glowing fist connected with the skull of the second guard and the monster immediately scattered into tiny polygons. "Great teamwork." he said to Jonathan.

"As always." The brunette added with a sly grin. They were working together like a well oiled machine when it came to combat. 

ID# 89466 results:
Battle: 10
Damage: 19*9-15= More than enough DMG
 

@Morgenstern 1261/1261 <> 95/106
Aereth 900/900 <> 80/90

Mage Knight A 0/115
Mage Knight B  0/115

Floor 21, Unknown Dungeon

For how long had he been here? Some minutes? Some hours? He didn't know. All he currently was thinking was to fight like a Berserker. He had slain so many of the stupid mobs that he had stopped counting them long ago. It has been a long time since he had such an intense training session, only problem here: This was no training session...

One moment of not paying attention and one of the four goblins he was currently fighting landed a heavy blow on the brunette. His body got thrown back and he crashed into the cave wall behind him. Usually such a hit wouldn't have done so much damage to him. But usually he was wearing his best set of armor and not just his casual cloths with a black cloak over it. His health dropped under 50 HP and the sound of a bell notified him that he was closer to death than ever before.

In the background the four goblins he was currently fighting as well as the many other mobs that have gathered around the fight, ready to jump in in case one of their comrades fell, roared after Aereth hit the wall. 

Aereth's hood fell back and revealed a face that was littered with red gashes from the previous combat. It was almost  over....

Aereth: 46/900 HP

@Teion

Skill(s) Being Dropped: OHSS 5 Ranks
Mod(s) Being Dropped: N/A
SP Refunded: 50
Cost: 50,000 col

Link to Col-Log: LINK

Col: 67121
T1: 39
T2: 45
T3: 20

PS: I've been playing around a bit with the economy system BEFORE it got implemented, which explains the current balance on my account.

Aereth gulped as he caught the glance of his blue haired companion. "Well.... I don't know if you are an Asian food lover, but he makes one of the best miso ramen in the whole. game. So I'll go with that, and pint of beer." Aereth said to Ren before Birdie led them to an empty table.

"No need to thank me. I'm just glad you're back. Just like old times. With the many things that changed in the last couple of months, it's good to have some constants in one's life. It really was fun, and yeah... F*ck these bees." Aereth answered as shortly afterwards also a yawn escaped him.

"Oi! No cursing around pretty girls. I mean, seriously Max... What the f*ck?" Ren shouted out of the kitchen which resulted in the few other people in the room starting to chuckle, to which Aereth simply shrugged with a toothy grin.

After that Birdie asked if they should meet up for some questing, gathering or something else in the near future. Aereth laughed, as she began to stutter again, in fear that he would understand something wrong. "Sure, anytime. Just shoot me a message on the evening before you want to do something and I'll be there. Oh, and you don't have to be so embarrassed around me. I'm just good in messing around with others." Aereth said and his laughter turned into simple chuckling. He would never try to hit on girls that were unsure about their own feelings for another person. But messing around? Always...

@Birdie

Aereth chuckled lightly. He couldn't deny the thing mentioned by the armoured player. "It's no problem." And after hearing that this player wanted to make the lower levelled floors safer for the weaker players, Aereth rose an eyebrow. If the player really told them the truth, then he really was a good guy, naive but still a good guy. "That's an honourable goal you have there, but you should know that information brokers are mostly cowards and a**holes that just care about their own Col balance." He sighed. "No problem at all," Aereth answered, before starting to turn away. After some moments he stopped and asked. "How about you join me for some mob grinding? I need to get some anger management done and could need some company to have my back. We'll split the rewards equally so everybody will have something out of that day."

@Arc

His eyes shone in a faint red for a little moment as he continued his search for some more materials. Only some moments later another set was spotted and stored away into his inventory.

"Yeah, I can imagine. Must have been some rough months after finding out about all the stuff... Believe me, I can relate more than you think. But still thanks for answering the question, though. And I'm glad that I managed to gain your trust." Aereth said while putting a hand on the shoulder of his friend and listening to his last comment. "Oh really? And what could it be that you would need a player like me for?" Aereth asked, his curiosity getting the better of him. Was Hikoru trying open some kind of PKKer guild of sorts? Well, the brunette would get to know as soon as Hikoru would decide to answer his question.

@Hikoru

ID# 88184 results:
Loot: 11+5

Materials: 12+4 = 16

"Hey, to my defence: In case that I'm really doing it, I'm not doing it on purpose, you know?" Aereth gave back with a smirk. "And in case you somehow forgot: That girl isn't into guys. She much rather likes girls... Makes me wonder if you'd be her type..." Aereth rambled while he did his best to find any traces of the huntress with the fiery temperament. 

They walked side by side for a couple of minutes in complete silence, before Aereth decided to break it. "Sooooo. What is my little princess doing after she finally got her clean cursor back. I already have some ideas, but you can never be sure..." Aereth wanted to tease the blonde a little bit more with the start of the sentence, but quickly dropped the teasing tone, as he really wanted to know what Kooh would be doing as soon as she would get back to her home.

@Kooh

ID# 88183 results:
Loot: 3+5