Am I the only one streaming Sword Art Online on the entire internet?

Ivy felt her lips being sealed by another girl. She pondered how to respond to Vector, who had suddenly become so proactive. However, at that moment, her processor, which had seen many things that could only be understood but not explained, suddenly seemed to freeze, leaving her at a loss for what to do.

She felt Vector's hand gently stroking her back, as if saying, "Don't worry, leave it to me." Then she felt something suddenly pass between her teeth and slide into her mouth.

Her eyes were tightly closed, so she didn't know if many people were watching, and her face turned even redder. Vector, on the other hand, had her eyes open. She didn't care about the onlookers, because she just wanted to admire Ivy's adorable appearance... Since she had already gone this far, she didn't care what others thought.

Here's something interesting: the thought processes of artificial intelligence are actually quite different from those of normal humans in some ways; they tend to think more directly in these areas. When both parties are AI, some things can progress particularly quickly. For example, the little angel seems to have been completely won over by Vector.

It's true that daughters often resemble their fathers, because when Vector looked up, Ivy looked exactly like her father. She lay softly in Vector's arms, her eyes glistening with tears, making Vector feel completely adored by this little angel.

"Vivi is really going too far. Doesn't this mean it's all about you?"

"Yes, my little angel, we still have a long time to spend together."

298. Sollin Markov

"Dad, Ivy isn't coming back tonight, she went to Vivi's."

Mo Yulan looked at Aiweixin sitting hand in hand with Vector in the center of the AR screen and suddenly sighed. He first looked at You Na, but You Na's expression didn't seem as complicated as Mo Yulan's; she was simply happy that her daughter was having a good time with her friend.

"Go ahead, be careful... although I think with Vector with you, there shouldn't be any safety issues."

After he finished speaking, he suddenly felt that he had aged a few years.

"Okay! Ivy will be careful!" Ivy said cheerfully, then hung up the phone impatiently, leaving Mo Yulan on the other end of the line feeling inexplicably melancholy.

“My daughter has grown up… Why am I already an empty nester at only twenty-five?” Mo Yulan shook his head helplessly and looked at You Na sitting next to him. “You Na, what do you think?”

"Why did I suddenly want to reply with 'Sir, there must be something fishy going on here'?" Yuna replied with a smile. "Don't worry, Ivy is very sensible, and after all, she has her own life. She's all grown up now."

“Hmm, from the time she was born until now… it’s only been two years, isn’t that a bit too fast?” Mo Yulan relaxed her body and lay back on the bed, letting You Na stroke her hair, and closed her eyes slightly. “It’s not that I have any complaints about Ai Weixin going out with her friends, it’s just… I suddenly feel a little uncomfortable with one less person at home.”

“It’s okay, you still have me, right? If it really doesn’t work out… I can consider giving you another one…” You Na said, then suddenly brought her face close to Mo Yu Lan’s, admiring his face which had suddenly turned red because of her bold words, and gently hooked his chin with her index finger. “That way, Lan shouldn’t feel lonely anymore.”

"We'll talk about it later. I have to go live today, and I need to log into the game." Mo Yulan was still finding it hard to adjust to the significantly increased speed. He was panting slightly and quickly changed the subject.

"Well, I waited for you for so long yesterday, and all we did was chat in front of the fountain. Today, I'm going to make the most of it."

"I don't know who insisted on dragging me to chat in front of the fountain..."

------

Welcome to the Hyperdimensional Fantasy World

Your location is: Public Area B3 - Fountain of Sacred Heart

[Quests may appear in public areas, generated in real-time. Completing these quests will earn you faction reputation.]

[Since you chose the Russian Senate faction, your current faction reputation is Senate: 100/1000 (Friendly)]

The Sacred Fountain was no longer as peaceful as it had been when Sorin and Yuna sat on the bench at night. Everywhere he looked, soldiers in blue and white armor patrolled, and the sky was filled with soaring griffin riders and blue and white flapping-wing aircraft, indicating that the area had entered a state of combat readiness.

"Lan, what's going on? Why does it feel... different from yesterday?"

"It's just a temporary mission, similar to those in FF14. Besides, the city of Ravnica isn't a safe zone to begin with. The current expansion is set in the War of the Spark, so it's normal for all sorts of events to happen in the city." Sorin muttered thoughtfully, looking at the notification flashing in front of him. "The problem now is that I'm planning to grind Senate reputation, but Dorwinbane is a traitor in the story. It wouldn't be good if I accidentally ended up on the villain's side."

(Senate: also known as the Russian Senate, the official name of the Russian Council)

"So the Senate is the villain? So you've been saying you're a member of the Senate... implying your true identity is the big villain?" Yuna suddenly looked at Sorin with curiosity, as if she had just realized something. "Sorin Markov, why did you let PoH escape twice? Why did you have so much trouble dealing with a mere Death Gun?"

"Stop talking!" Sorin looked at Yuna with a dark expression, but his meme-loving nature, ingrained in his DNA, still prompted him to continue the line.

"There's only one answer!" Yuna said triumphantly, pointing at Sorin.

"Shut up!"

[What did Hosho Emu Sorin say?]

How did this suddenly become a famous scene?

"Solin Markov! You are the true founder of the Red Name Guild—Smiling Coffin! Hahahaha!"

Yuna wanted to recreate Dan Kuroto's superb acting as much as possible, but she was really not suited for this kind of comedian's job, which made her expressions always look strangely odd.

"Stop for a second, Yuna. Speaking of which, when did you watch Ex-Aid? I didn't know that." Seeing that Yuna was about to continue, Sorin quickly stopped her, after all, there was more important to say. "No, the Senate is not the villain. It's just that the head of the Senate is in cahoots with the villain."

"Oh? It seems Arashi knows this plot quite well." Yuna nodded seriously. "Then I'll leave it to you in a bit."

"Don't worry, I've been a seasoned veteran in Lower Ranika for ten years. I've seen it all, so guiding a newbie like you shouldn't be a problem." Sorin's words were quite confident at first, but when he saw the solitary Beginner's Longsword hanging at his waist, his confidence immediately plummeted. "Alright, friends, have you ever seen a weapon master who only carries one sword?"

We've seen weapon masters who only brought one lamppost with them.

To be honest, one sword is a bit too few, but it's not really appropriate for Uncle Suo to fight this without having queued for a dungeon.

"There's nothing inappropriate about it, friends. As long as it can break through my defenses, I'll kill even a god for you to see." Solin shook his head, drew his longsword from his waist, twirled it in his hand, pointed it into the air, and said in a deliberately cool tone.

"Lan, do gods really exist in this world?"

“Yes, there are five, the kind that even the Forgotten Wheel can’t suppress. The storyline in the open area hasn’t progressed to that point yet. If you keep playing, you should be able to see the gods soon. Of course, the gods aren’t really anything special, except that sometimes when they appear on your table, they make you want to curse.” Sorin replied nonchalantly. He looked around, intending to pick up a quest in the Senate area first. “Let’s look for them. Although Dowinban is Nicol Bolas’s informant, we’ll probably need to get in touch with him first.”

Just then, a regional message suddenly appeared in the center of Sorin and Yuna's field of vision.

[Yuuki: Thorough investigation of the first district mission 5=2, missing one support and one attacker, looking for someone reliable]

299. Planting the Flag

“Yuuki…that’s a familiar ID.” Sorin looked at the public message displayed in front of him and immediately became interested. “Perfect, I also want to see what makes the so-called ‘Absolute Sword’ so amazing. Let’s go, Yuuna.”

"Wait, are we really capable of participating in such a high-difficulty mission?" Yuna asked with some concern. "We both seem to be complete newbies, what if we drag them down?"

"I don't think you know anything. I guarantee they'll let us join their team." Sorin always had an inexplicable confidence when he said this. He calmly opened the menu, sent a team request to Yuuki, and then explained, "First, there's the support role. You're probably using the same skill tree you used in SAO, right? They won't refuse a professional support like you. As for me... I just need to convince them that I'm a native of this world."

"The natives of this world? What do you mean... Oh, I see, it's about their understanding of this city." Yuna immediately understood what Sorin meant. "So you have additional value besides fighting, and they won't easily exclude you from their team, right?"

“That’s it. To be precise, it’s not just about understanding the city; I have the city’s past, present, and future in my memory, which is very rare even among Magic: The Gathering players.” Thorin’s tone was quite confident. At this moment, he saw that the other party had accepted his party request, and five health bars representing teammates appeared in the upper left corner. At the same time, the location of the other five people was also shown on the minimap. “They look like they’re not far from us… They took the quest in the Senate? How high did they get their Dowen reputation? This expansion has only been out for two days.”

“You know, Lan, there’s never a shortage of hardcore gamers in this world who can grind for ten or even twenty hours a day, especially with the current full immersion games.” Yuna’s tone was strangely subtle when she answered. “Don’t be like them in the future.”

"I definitely won't. I'm just worried that with such high prestige, these people might just join Bolas's camp after a while."

Solin shrugged. He didn't take Yuna's worries to heart, because as someone with a very fulfilling real life, he certainly wouldn't be a shut-in who just stays at home playing video games all the time.

(Senior, back when you thought you didn't have a girlfriend... I'm sorry, I won't say it again.)

Ravnica is a city so large it rivals Aincrad, or rather, Ravnica itself is the prototype for Aincrad. In such a vast city, even if two people's cursors are right next to each other on a map, it often takes five minutes to walk there. While Sorin and Yuuki's location seemed close, it actually took them half an hour to reach it.

Five people stood before him. At the very front was a pale-skinned girl, a distinctive feature of the Ko tribe. Her tight-fitting short top and flowing long skirt were a deep lake blue. Two sword sheaths hung at her waist, one on each side. Behind her was a bald, blue-haired Vidoken man (though this wasn't particularly important, as Vidoken are naturally bald), fiddling with a sphere made of intricate parts. His eyes narrowed with a smile, adding a touch of comicality. To his left was a fiery-skinned goblin wearing glasses, giving him an air of intellectualism that seemed somewhat incongruous with his race. Finally, two fairy (elf) girls stood to the side, one with light blue hair appearing to be the slightly shorter, turquoise-haired girl's older sister.

"So you're... the ones who answered the call to duty?" The girl in the lead looked at Sorin and Yuna with obvious hesitation. "You're still wearing beginner-level armor. Are you really capable of fulfilling your roles as support and attackers?"

"Don't worry about that. At least Yuna's support ability is not a problem." Sorin replied calmly, while being glad that the girl in front of him did not mistake him for a girl at first. "As for me... you can give it a try. Anyway, I think that sometimes good micro-management can make up for a lack of strength to a certain extent, just like using two SCVs to take down four dogs."

“Those are two SCVs that can repair each other, big sister. Do you also have healing skills? It doesn’t seem like it.” She glanced at Sorin and then said, “Big sister, you also chose the Kora race, so you should also specialize in main weapons, right?”

Upon hearing Yuki's words, Sorin instantly turned into a pale, defeated person, squatting on the ground drawing circles while repeatedly muttering "why why why..." It took her a while to recover and stand up again.

"...I knew things wouldn't be that simple. Here's what we'll do, Miss Yuki: if you don't trust my strength, you're welcome to plant a flag here and see what happens." He stared intently at the Ko clan girl in front of him, uttering words that sounded like a provocation. "And, I am a man. Don't get that wrong, Archmage."

“Grand Magister? Oh~ I see.” Yuki didn’t understand what Solin meant at first, but when she saw Solin’s ID, she thought about it carefully and understood what he was referring to. “Then let’s plant a flag here, Ash Spirit… sir.”

She drew the two swords from her waist and crossed them in front of her chest. Then she quickly tapped the virtual panel in front of her with her index finger, and a duel request was sent.

Player Yuuki has issued a challenge to you: [Win by half health, activate the self-balancing system]

"Yuna, lend me your rapier for a moment." Sorin turned around and said to Yuna, "I can't unleash my full power with just one sword, and two aren't really enough either."

"It's alright, there are plenty more here. I just got them for you from the auction house." Yuna smiled and patted Solin's head, then took out a rapier, a long katana, and a long staff from her backpack like a certain blue-skinned fat man. "It's strange that I couldn't buy such a standard set as a sword and shield."

"Wait... We clearly entered the game together, so why do you have so much money?" Solin suddenly felt that something was not right, but Yuna just kept looking at him with a smile.

"The Gold Edition comes with a better set of starting weapons and equipment, you just didn't claim it. The quality of these items is actually much better than your Beginner's set."

Yuna naturally pointed out something that Sorin had overlooked before, and only then did Sorin belatedly open his email inbox and see two whole pages of "unaccepted" messages. For a moment, he felt like an idiot.

Seeing that the girl opposite him was clearly getting impatient, he quickly equipped himself with all the weapons Yuna had given him, then drew his one-handed sword and assumed an offensive stance.

"Duel...Start!"

Three hundred, rua! rua! rua!

"The duel will begin in ten seconds, 10, 9..."

Sorin slashed his weapon back and forth several times, just to warm up. Yuuki, on the other hand, didn't make any obvious moves, simply standing there motionless in her dual-wielding stance, her eyes fixed on Sorin's flamboyant movements, wondering what he was up to.

"I have this feeling of fighting Kirito..." Sorin muttered to himself. What puzzled him was that Yuuki and the others didn't react when they saw his ID at first, but when he started doing these fancy tricks, they still didn't react at all.

Of course, he quickly put this doubt out of his mind. After all, although he was very well-known in this circle, it was normal for some people not to have heard of SAO's Sorin Markov.

There are even people who have played Dota for ten years and still don't know how many classes there are in Tang Dynasty Warriors.

"...2, 1—The duel begins!"

Sorin's consistent style in PvP is to seize control of the game with powerful preemptive attacks, and that's exactly what he was thinking at the moment. He charged forward, quickly switching from his longsword to a rapier mid-flight, and unleashed the rapier's signature skill, Deceptive Charge. This skill follows the initial dash with a series of back-and-forth slashes; if you only dodge the thrust, you'll suffer significant damage from the subsequent two slashes and be inflicted with the bleeding effect unique to cutting damage.

However, Yuuki didn't dodge or block the attack as he expected. She subtly shifted her body, then thrust her sword with her left hand, striking his wrist where he was holding the sword, directly interrupting the latter half of the Deceptive Charge skill. This was somewhat unexpected for Sorin, because while Deceptive Charge could be interrupted midway, it required extremely strong dynamic vision and reaction ability—the ability to clearly see the position of his hand during the charge and strike that position with a swift attack. And the only person who could pull off this... he had only ever seen Kirito do something like this.

"What an unexpectedly formidable opponent," Sorin remarked casually, then quickly took advantage of the moment before Yuki could continue her attack to adjust her stance, switching her weapon to a long staff and assuming a defensive posture. From the moment his surprise attack was interrupted, the balance of power had shifted, a fact he was acutely aware of.

However, what he didn't expect was that after this switch of offense and defense, he never launched another offensive, and was instead forced to defend under Yuki's fierce offensive.

"This is just the beginning."

As Yuuki spoke, taking advantage of Sorin switching to a long staff for defense, she immediately charged forward, wielding her twin swords. This differed from Kirito's swordsmanship. Kirito's fighting style tended towards a single-direction assault, always focusing on a direct confrontation. Her swordsmanship, however, was quite agile, changing direction mid-attack at any moment, always targeting his blind spots.

This is troublesome... Solin thought to himself. To the viewers in the live stream, he looked like he was being beaten up, and in reality... it wasn't that bad. Although it wasn't as exaggerated as "beating up," he was indeed at a disadvantage the whole time.

The war staff is inherently an excellent PVP weapon that combines defense and crowd control, but at this moment, its sword skills—neither aerial attacks nor ground control techniques—are effective in breaking the deadlock because the wind-up animation is too long. While constantly attacking him, Yuuki also closely observes his movements, then uses her slightly shorter left-hand sword to unleash an extremely swift sword technique to interrupt any skill he tries to use.

This combat experience was absolutely terrible. It felt like the opponent had over twenty islands on the field and a whole hand full of cards, and when it was his turn, he would shout "I've already played this!" and then play whatever counter he wanted. At this moment, Sorin felt the same despairing sense of suppression he had when facing Yuki's Rubick. He was so badly beaten that he started to doubt his own existence, wondering if he should learn some spells instead.

Is Grandpa Su getting old...?

The God of Rain has departed on a yellow crane, leaving only Master Suo behind.

[Thinking about it carefully, that makes sense. Have you ever seen Uncle Zoro seriously fight since he came out of SAO?]

"Hey, hey, hey, I'm always serious when I fight, okay? Can't I even play a game? I got totally wrecked, didn't I? I'm not the best in the world... Stop it, friend! Stop it! *chuudou madai* *chuudou madai*... *rua*!"