Author's Note: I do not own Sword Art Online. It, its story, characters, settings and all other aspects are the property of A-1 Pictures, Aniplex USA, and Reki Kawahara. I also do not own Dark Souls. That franchise and its entirety is owned by Namco Bandai and FromSoftware. The only aspects of this story I can claim is the theme to the plot, and occasional original characters.

-1-

Oh, Chosen Undead

"Come on! You're going to have to move faster than that if you want to really learn how to master this skill!"

"This skill ain't about speed, man!" Klein protested his friend's suggestion as he slashed downward for his opponent's glowing black wings. "It's about power and precision!"

The Spriggan swordsman, Kirito, flew back with a grinning face as he released his skirmish above the ground with the fiery Salamander, Klein. The red fairy hovered in a stationary position while the black Kirito swarmed around him from all different directions.

Klein normally would have fallen by now, due to a lack in stamina, but an outside source of magic helped keep him afloat in the air. "Just a little more, Leafa! I'll get him on the next go around!"

"Idiot…" Leafa spoke softly to herself. "You have to have patience if you're going to make attacks like that!"

She stood on the ground and held her hands high as a radiant light of yellow and white flew from her hands to surround Klein in a glowing orb. The party of friends were competing in a tag-team dueling event, and the group slugging out in front of the gate to the next boss room were the final contenders.

Kirito spun away from Klein, and twirled his sword with satisfaction. His body glowed with a blue hue accenting his dark. "No kidding, man. That move may be better suited for the ground."

Klein chuckled to himself, and let his sylph partner recharge his stamina. "Nah man, I got a secret power up, and I need to be in the air to show it off."

"You won't show off anything if you can't even hit your target!" Lisbeth, the smug Gnome yelled out from the sideline, standing next to her defeated friends Silica, Sinon, and Agil.

Silica continued petting the tiny Pina resting on her head, and only appeared half entertained by the battle. "Yea, I don't really like this move. It would never work in an actual boss fight."

"Let the man have fun, alright?" Agil chuckled with his arms crossed. His green gnome armor looked sturdy and new despite losing to his friends earlier in a dual. "After all, he came up with that move all on his own IRL."

The Cait Sith, Sinon, sighed with little support for Agil's argument. "Yea, something tells me Klein isn't exactly suited for theory-crafting."

"Sure I am…" Klein let Kirito fly around for a second attack, but kept his stance firm in midair as he held a shining katana in both hands down to his right side. "I just need the right support."

The Black Spriggan flew down, and targeted Klein with his sights. The blue orb that surrounded his body followed him down to his mark, but just then a spark lit off the blade of Klein's sword, and a swell of air rushed from behind the Salamander's body.

"NOW LEAFA!" Yelled Klein.

Leafa surged as much magical energy as she could away from Klein's defenses and buffs, and powered on a mighty wind gust spell to surge the two fighters in a vortex of air. Meanwhile, Klein kept his stance from earlier, but now raised his blade through the air as the spark around it turned into a full column of fire.

Klein brought the fire sword down on the unsuspecting Kirito's head, but a thin veil of crystal blue energy shielded him from the attack, leaving him unharmed, and the spell to dissipate.

"WHA-?!" Klein nearly fell out of the sky, and even Leafa looked rather alert after seeing how quickly that defensive spell was cast.

Kirito drew in a breath of fresh air and sighed. "Ugh…thanks for the save, Asuna."

The proud Undine, Asuna, smiled with glee as she whipped away her defense spell using the Crest of Yggdrasil. "No problem at all, Kirito! Just be a little more careful next time."

"Those two…" Lisbeth sounded annoyed in her quiet tone as the black spriggan flew in to pummel Klein to bits. "Who thought it'd be fair to let them tag-team on this thing, anyway?"

Silica sighed reluctantly. "They are pretty good together, and this boss fight only let's two people in at a time."

"Stupid event bosses…" Lisbeth did not mind stepping away from the ALfheim version of Castle Aincrad's boss climb, but ALO's tag-team event was starting to run a little stale to her now that she was knocked out of the fight. The idea was for players to hunt down event gates scattered throughout the world of ALfheim, and compete against the bosses inside as a tag team of fighters. When one team would run into another outside a gate, however, they would compete in a duel to determine which team would challenge the boss.

Seeing how Kirito and his companions are so close, their party usually stood outside the boss gates for a while fighting each other for the rights to claim the gate.

The only problem? Kirito and Asuna partnered with one another every fight, and had yet to lose a challenge thus far.

"Ooff!" Klein slammed into the ground after Kirito slung him downward with a swift heave of his black iron great sword. The defeated salamander with his snuffed-out fire sword tried raising to his feet, but met a flurry of blades courtesy of Asuna charging in from behind.

Leafa drew her blade to react, but the triumphant married couple fell on her fast with swords drawn, aimed right at her neckline.

Leafa gasped, then sighed in anger as she tossed her golden sylph sword into the dirt, forfeiting the match for her and Klein. Asuna and Kirito high-fived one another in their victory, and let the others grumble and groan in disappointment for yet another Kirito/Asuna victory.

"Are you serious!?" Lisbeth yelled with a towering voice. "That's like four straight wins!"

"Eh, five actually." Kirito was normally not this rude with his boasting, but he did enjoy teasing an angry Lisbeth all too much.

Sinon shook her head. "Yea, you guys ever consider changing things up? It has to get kind of boring just playing together for every boss fight."

"Why would we do that?" Asuna said, cheerfully grabbing Kirito by the hand. "If we keep winning, then there's no reason to change our formula!"

"She's right!" The tiny navigation pixie, Yui, sprang up from Asuna's side to alert them with her presence. "I've projected Mommy and Daddy to beat at least 10 more bosses as a pair before the event ends, and statistically they match up very well against everyone else!"

She flew down to her parent's hands that were holding one another, and sat peacefully on top of them. "They're just perfect together!"

Kirito and Asuna both smiled at one another as the accepted Yui's compliment. Their friends were not so enthusiastic.

"Blegh." Lisbeth turned away for the road. "Well, have fun at your boss fight. I'm going to town then logging off."

"Hold on!" Kirito sounded sad to see them go, and a bit embarrassed that he and his relationship were to blame. "You don't want to share the loot?"

"Ah, keep it, pal." Klein had a smile on his face as Leafa helped him onto his feet. "After five bosses, I think you guys deserve all the loot to yourselves."

Asuna noticed a similar resolve in the rest of her friends' faces, and gave them a sad wave. "Oh, okay then, we'll see you all tomorrow!"

They agreed, and Leafa turned to Kirito. "I'm going too. I'll leave the front door light on for you, Kazuto. Don't be too late!"

Kirito gave his cousin a wave, and looked at Asuna. "Yea, let's beat this thing and log off. I almost forgot that I'm over at your place, tonight."

"How silly of you to forget, Kirito." Asuna enjoyed treating him like a child, and started walking for the boss door. "Who knows, maybe if this fight takes too long, you might just have to spend the night here."

"Uhh…" Kirito felt a warm blush take his face as Yui flew up to his shoulder and crossed her arms. "Well if I remember, this one does take the longest to beat."

Asuna put a hand on the door, but turned to give him a wink. "Sounds good, but the deal's only on if we beat the guy."

They opened the door, and a black void filled the space as the two gamers readied themselves in a stance with swords ready at their sides. Kirito went to follow Asuna inside, but just then a flashing red light surrounded both their heads, and blocked out their vision.

"What's happening!?" Asuna put her sword away as she never made it inside the portal.

"Mommy! Daddy!" Yui waved her hands frantically in Kirito's face, then flew over to Asuna as both parents failed to fully respond.

Kirito did have time to speak, however. "Ah man…power outage."

Their visions both turned black, and suddenly they were both thrown back into the real world of Japan, lying face up in Asuna Yuuki's bedroom within her family's home in Setagaya.

Kazuto Kirigaya felt his head ringing, and noticed no lights or power showed itself when they landed in her room, and as a result tried to feel around for his girlfriend in the dark of her room. "Asuna?"

"Kirito?" She replied, locating his hand, and a flashlight with her other. She turned it on, and stuck the light right in his eyes. "Well this is really weird. We haven't had an outage like this in a long time!"

"Yea, even weirder since it's not storming outside…" Kazuto covered the light from his now burning eyes, and tried to think how a luxurious Tokyo district like Asuna's could let a power surge like that shut the grid down. "I doubt it will be out very long, knowing your neighborhood."

"Yea, you're probably right…" Asuna and Kirito let things get quiet for just a moment, and held each other's hands in a tight embrace. They drew closer and closer, until Kirito stopped her.

"Uh-h, w-we should probably head over to my place. Your parents are out of town, so you can stay in Sugu's room while your power's out."

"O-oh." Asuna took her retreating hand with the other, and rubbed the top of it gently. She then shut off the flashlight. "Yea, that sounds like a good idea. I-I don't really want to stay here tonight all by myself."

"Cool, cool." The awkward Kazuto hoped that his red face would stay masked by the black of her room, and scrambled around for scattered cords and hardware along her bedroom floor. "Let me grab my NerveGear and other stuff and we can head ouu…!"

He reached over Asuna with his outstretched body, but in the black of her bedroom managed to fall on top of her, quickly making the situation between them quite warm despite the shade.

"Kirito..." Asuna knew they could hardly see each other as it was, but decided to turn her blushing face away as she laid flat on her back in the middle of her floor. "Your stuff is all on the other side of the room..."

"R-Right..." Kirito hesitated in removing himself from on top of her body. "My mistake. Just wanted to make sure you were okay, I guess...hehe..."

The room was dark, but just then a cloud passed from over the moon, and let a column of bright white light shine down to highlight Kirito straddling Asuna's waist in the middle of her bedroom floor. Both of their faces were flushed with emotion, and this spotlight cause the young boy to quickly roll off of her toward the other side of the room, and swiftly scrounge up his belongings.

They both gathered their things, and once Asuna finished locking up the front door, the two rounded the corner in their early spring coats and went to find Kazuto's motorbike. Asuna held him by the hand, but kept her face turned toward the ground.

"H-Hey, Kirito? Can I ask you something?"

"Yea?" Kazuto sounded confused as his eyes scanned the nighttime air. "What is it?"

"Do you…do you think we went a little overboard during the event, today?" She held a finger up to twirl a long lock of her hair. "I get we're really good together, but I felt a little bad when the others logged off."

Kazuto stopped walking, which forced Asuna to stop with him. He smiled, and turned to grab both her hands. "Why would I feel bad about that? No one had to challenge us when we got to each gate. None of them wanted to split the loot with the whole group, so they were the ones to suggest the tag-team duels. That's all. Besides...if you and me play well together, then I really wouldn't want any other partner by my side."

"I'm glad you think that." Asuna beamed underneath a dim streetlight. "And…what stopped us…you know…back there?"

"Back there?" Kazuto did not like where this conversation was going. "You mean in your room? I-I dunno, I just felt weird being alone in a house without any power. I just though you wanted to stay somewhere else for the night."

"Sure…" Asuna nodded, and turned to keep walking. She seemed satisfied. "I guess that does make sense."

Kazuto was glad that ordeal was over, but once they arrived to his bike and chain, his heart stopped from its impulsively rapid beating.

"My bike." He looked at the empty pavement. "It's gone."

"And your chain." Asuna held his hand even tighter now, but bent down to pick up the cut metal-link chained to the pole. "Someone cut it loose. The person who did this has to have a pretty big tool to do that."

"Yea…they do…" His palm was growing sweaty as Asuna grabbed it even tighter than before. He looked around the street, which appeared as empty as it usually was at the 10 o'clock hour. Then it hit him.

"And now I know what cut the power lines."

*Click*

Kazuto went to turn around, but suddenly felt a large, sharp pain stick into the side of his neck. He drew his hand upward, and failed to turn fully around as his knees gave out. He used his right hand to stop from crashing into the stone, but held Asuna with his left as his eyes started twitching softly.

"Kiritoooghh!" Asuna held him as he fell, but a bag was drawn over her head, and a figure from behind pulled her backwards away from the falling Kazuto. His eyes were blurry, and his ears were fading, but while he tried to see the faces of the monsters handling Asuna, his ears managed to pick up one last conversation.

"Why the hell do we not just kill him now?" Said the man holding Kazuto's now frozen body.

"Because that's boring." Said a higher pitched voice, the same figure who now held Asuna's flailing body. "After everything that beater did to us? You Glowgen punks just don't get it."

"We need him. Alive." Said a third voice, clearly a little older and more sinister than the other two. "Grab his bag, and let's get out of here."

This is the prologue for a new SAO x Dark Souls story I've been working on. It's going to focus primarily on the relationship between Kirito and Asuna. It might also be important for me to mention this story takes place between the Mother's Rosario arc and Alicization, so nothing from the newest season of SAO will be used except a few names and easter eggs. That means no worries if you're not all caught up with SAO!

Anyway sorry this chapter is a little short since it's just an prologue of sorts, but keep an eye out for more installments! Also remember to stay healthy and safe during such a dark time in our own world!