"I'm sorry. Goodbye."

Only three words, but each one struck harder than anything Heathcliff could've thrown at him. Kirito held Asuna's semi-translucent body in his arms, tears streaming down his face. Asuna jumped in the way of Heathcliff's final blow and as result, she took the brunt of the attack. Unfortunately, her health wasn't fully recovered, and the attack was more than before enough to take out the rest of her HP. According to the parameters set by Healthcliff, Kayaba Akihiko, once your health bar was depleted, your in-game avatar would be erased from the cardinal system's database, and a high frequency scan would be sent into your brain, killing you instantly. Thus, Kirito couldn't do anything but watch as his first and only love began to disappear in his on arms.

"P-please.. Don't leave.. me. Asuna..."

But it was too late. Before he could even think, her digital self shattered into thousands of glimmering polygons. Everyone, including Kirito, had seen this sight many times before now, but even though in each instance someone in the real world lost their life, this particular one put that much more dread into everybody's hearts. Kirito, who could do nothing but fall to his knees remembered that day, over a year ago now, when the same thing happened to him.

"So this is how it felt Keita," he said to himself in between sobs, "This is what I did to you. I hope you can forgive me."

"Mm. That was, unexpected."

Heathcliff himself, said this. Calmly sheathing his sword into his shield's built-in scabbard. His face bore no emotion as he stared down at the black swordsman on the floor below him. He took a look around at the other players, seeing their disgust and faces of betrayal, a smirk made it's way on his face as he spoke once more.

"The Black Swordsman tearing his way to the Tyrant King's doorstep on a quest to avenge his fallen love, with an army of men and women at his back. It'll make for one good story; I only hope you'll all be ready when the time comes."

Kirito immediately looked up at the avatar representation of Kayaba Akihiko before him, his sadness being replaced by rage. "No." he growled as he saw him begin to walk away.

"Hm?"

"I'll.. I'll kill you first!"

Without a single warning, he dashed forward while picking up the weapon that laid by his feet, Asuna's Lambent Light. Not even another moment later, more than half of the blade was plunged into Heathcliff's chest, completely ignoring his armor. Kirito wrenched the blade while it was still inside, turning it so that it was facing the other way, before ripping it out. Immediately, he began to thrust multiple times, each so fast that the sword was just a simple blur. Soon enough, he had successfully drained the remaining third of Heathcliff's health bar, while hanging on to the tiny morsel that he had remaining.

A genuinely happy smile came across the knight's face, as he thought to himself in his last few moments, So that's what it's like to have someone to fight for. Then, the body of Heathcliff shattered into its thousands of polygons, as the world around Kirito began to fade into a brilliant light.

The next thing Kirito saw was the yellow/orange sky that you'd only see as the sun was setting on the horizon. It had such a magnificent feel to it, but something didn't feel quite right. He inspected his clothes only to note that he was still in his blackened out attire. Looking around, he noticed that he was standing on the air.

"Still in the game, but, where am I? Is this an invisible platform or something"

To his left he could hear the cracking of stone and metal, but it was distant, almost as if he were kilometers away from it. He glanced over, only to see the floating castle of Aincrad below him, falling into pieces. Each piece falling, on by one, from the bottom up.

"Don't worry, as per the game's final directive coding, everybody's already been logged out. Which means it's just you and me left."

He didn't even break his line of sight with the dying castle, and spoke to the voice behind him.

"If everyone's supposed to log out, why am I still here?"

"I thought the winner of the game would like to see the end credits before he went back to the real world." The voice replied.

"You mean, it's really over?" Kirito stopped, as a thought crossed his mind. "She only had to live for another minute.."

"Ah. That." Kayaba said as he walked up to the now disarmed swordsman, "I paralyzed everybody to make sure something like that wouldn't happen. I assure you, I didn't wish for things to be that way. But either way, I'm truly sorry."

He didn't respond, and instead continued to stare off at Aincrad as he painfully watched Floor 22 fall from the sky.

"I know I don't have the right to ask, but I do have a favor of you, you can also consider this your prize."

Kirito turned to face Kayaba, and looked at him curiously, lessening his cold attitude.

"A prize?"

"Like I said, it's more of a favor. Something I'd like you to do for me, especially since it's worth far more than anything else I could give you."

"What do you want then?"

"I want you to take care of this."

With a gesture of his hand, a golden orb began to materialize into the shape of an egg as it lowered itself into his palm. It gave of a magnificent glow as it slowly revovled in place.

"This is called the World Seed. It has everything you need to make a new VRMMO. You can use it for yourself, you can give it to anybody, or everybody. You can even simply delete it if you want. But, if there's any part of you that still loves this world, then you should keep it."

The egg transferred itself from Kayaba's hand to Kirito's, it's beautiful glow even stayed up until it disappeared and saved itself onto Kirito's NerveGear.

They both looked back at the castle, which was now breaking down the 50th floor, silently watching, as if almost mesmerized by it.

"I spent years of my life, creating and building this place from the ground up. Only to have it destroy itself in the end."

"Why did you do all of this? Make this a death game?" Kirito asked.

"There really isn't an easy answer for that." The man replied, "All I can remember is that when I was little, I always dreamed about a castle in the sky, a place that all of our imaginations can run wild. I guess in the end, I wanted to create a new life. To live in a world not bound by the limits of the real world."

"And it cost the lives of over four thousand people."

He simply stood there, his eyes closed, as if accepting that he had no reason for it all. Suddenly he opened them again, and turned to look at Kirito. He then asked him a question.

"Perhaps I don't have a reason, but you know what I've discovered these past two years?"

Kirito once again brought his attention to Kayaba, who at this point was beginning to become less and less of an enemy, and more of a mentor.

"What's that?"

"The only difference between this world and the real one is the amount of information."

He immediately glanced back at the castle, noting that it was now on Floor 75.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Give it time.. Hm?" Kayaba widened his eyes as if he realized something important. "I suppose this is where we part ways, Kirito."

Kayaba started walking off, slowly fading as if the game was deconstructing him bit by bit.

"W-Wait!"

"Hm?"

"What do I do about Asuna?"

"Ah, yes. Her physical body is dead due to the waves sent into her brain upon death. I'm sorry not even I can bring her back."

Sorrow began to fill his heart once again.

"However-"

"However!?"

"I'm sure you'll see her again. In the virtual world, anything is possible."

With those last words, what seemed like a ghost of Kayaba Akihiko vanished completely, leaving the lone Black Swordsman to watch the palace on top of the castle broke into a dozen pieces, as it fell from the sky. He stared off into the never-ending sunset, with his hand covering his heart. As the empty sky before him, started to fade away.

A/N (Revised Nov. 14th.): For those of you that have already read this part, you know I had a whole spiel here, asking for support with the wonder if this was a story even worth working on. Due to an overwhelming amount of Views, Follows, Favorites. I decided to continue on with the story. And it's all thanks to you guys! So I decided to end this chapter by formerly welcoming aboard my train. If you like this story, don't be afraid to favorite it! Also I love reviews, it's always nice to hear from fans just like me, what they think of what I spend my spare time doing. All of that being said, I can't wait to see where this train stops. Enjoy the ride.

-AK