Darkness was not simply the absence of light. It was an abyss that stretched infinitely, a denial of existence itself. Something that once was human floated in that primordial void. It had no recognizable form, no mass, no substance. It was merely a pattern of pure information, a set of electrical impulses trapped in the limbo between the physical and the digital.
It tried to remember what it meant to breathe, but all it felt was emptiness. Its mind (could it even be called a mind without a brain?) stripped of a body, sent signals to phantom lungs. But there was no response, no expansion of ribs, no air filling its lungs. Just the echo of a bodily memory that no longer belonged to it.
The name "Kirito" floated in the void like a flicker of broken code, trapped in this primordial emptiness, suspended between physical reality and a digital world it couldn't see. There was no form, no weight, no substance; just a stream of consciousness floating in a limbo of pure information. It—no, "that"—which once was Kazuto Kirigaya, no longer had hands to wield a sword or lungs to scream. Only the echo of a question remained:
—"Am I? Am I Kazuto Kirigaya?"
The question arose in its mind like a distant echo, reverberating in the void. The system responded with silence. But in the deepest corners of its Fluctlight, something clung to two syllables: "A-su-na." Like a corrupt program refusing to delete itself.
The name burned what would have been its chest, and a wave of memories overwhelmed it. Images of its life with her, their laughter, their battles, moments of sweetness and pain. The idea that all of that could have been ripped away filled it with anguish.
With time, the nothingness began to acquire texture. It was not vision, but pure perception that allowed it to sense the existence of something beyond its own consciousness. Like when the eyelids are closed, yet shapes can still be distinguished in the dark. The sensation was akin to being submerged in a calm and deep lake, where the surface had frozen, but beneath it, life surged with intensity.
Kazuto Kirigaya found himself immersed in a kind of digital limbo, a place where time and space seemed to have stopped. However, its mind remained active, processing information and generating thoughts with a speed and clarity that allowed it to reflect on its situation.
As it concentrated, it began to distinguish:
"Data streams": Rivers of information flowing in all directions, carrying encrypted messages to unknown places. These data flows were like threads of silver intertwining and separating in a complex pattern, revealing the existence of a network far vaster and more intricate than it had imagined. Some of these threads seemed to have a brighter glow, as if carrying information of vital importance.
"Firewall barriers": Walls of purple energy separating its prison from the outside world. These barriers were like impenetrable mountains, erected to prevent its escape. The energy they emitted felt palpable, and Kirito could sense their presence as a force trying to keep it contained.
"Your own Fluctlight": A pale blue sphere from which fine threads of consciousness emanated. This sphere was like a beacon in the dark, representing its own existence and connection to the digital world. The threads of consciousness emanating from it intertwined with the data streams, allowing it to feel the presence of other beings in the vast digital space.
—"Where am I? What is this place?"
The question reverberated around it, disturbing the data streams. The resonance of its voice in its own mind was like an echo that slowly faded, leaving a sense of disorientation and fear. Kirito recalled fragments of its past, of its life in the real world and in the virtual world of "Sword Art Online" (SAO), the virtual reality game where it all began. It remembered the feeling of freedom and adventure it had experienced while exploring the vast landscapes of SAO, and how everything changed when the game became a deadly trap.
—"This can't be real."
It thought, feeling desperation take hold.
—"It can't be the end."
The idea that everything had ended, that its consciousness was trapped in this place with no escape, was too much to bear. Kirito clung to hope, however tenuous, that there was still a way out, that it could find a way to escape and return to the real world.
—"Is this my death?"
The idea settled in its mind, and with it, a deep unease. There was no sky or ground, no up or down. Only the infinite void of a system designed to harbor soulless souls. The darkness enveloped it like a dense, silent, and oppressive fog, and in that moment, time seemed to have stopped.
Suddenly, a voice emerged from the darkness, resonating like an echo in its mind.
—"No, Kirito. This is not death."
The voice was familiar, and in an instant, Kirito recognized it, the same voice that years ago had explained the Soul Translator with the coldness of one dismantling a device. It was the last person it expected to hear in the midst of this uncertainty.
In its memory, a scientist from Rath appeared as it always remembered— a thin man with a sharp face, straight black hair brushed back, cold brown eyes behind rectangular glasses, always dressed in a pristine lab coat over a formal suit, with gloved hands and a calculating expression that showed more interest in the data than in the humanity of his subject.
—"Higa Takeru."
Its voice sounded like a whisper, laden with disbelief and distrust, accompanied by the mental image of his glasses reflecting screens of code, as if Kirito itself were just another experiment. Emotions surged in its chest like an uncontrollable storm.
Without waiting for Kirito to regain its emotions, Higa Takeru's voice continued.
—"This is what ancient poets would call limbo. Although technically, it is the transfer buffer of the Soul Translator Mark III."
Higa spoke with a detached, almost clinical calmness as the words floated in the void.
—"Transfer buffer?"
The temporary storage space for Fluctlights before being loaded into a virtual world, it was like a temporary file before being sent to another device. Confusion became a tide overflowing its reason. Higa, the man who had been behind its connection to this machine, had turned its life into a cold, calculated experiment. The thought tore at its heart; how could they do this to it?
—"What did you do to me?"
Kirito projected its indignation towards the voice, trying to modulate its Fluctlight so that its words would be audible, but the echo of its question seemed to get lost in the abyss. Higa continued, with the coldness of a scientist explaining a complex concept. His words were like knife blades tearing apart the only perspective it had of itself. He explained that its Fluctlight had undergone a quantum bifurcation. A perfect copy of it had taken control of its biological body, while its original essence remained trapped in this limbo.
—"The original remained in the buffer, that is, you, while a copy occupies your place, in your body."
Higa said, his tone technical and distant. Kirito could feel the rage growing within it, burning and stinging.
"That's not me, and you know it!"
Kirito's protest reverberated in the void, creating chaotic patterns in the data streams. In its mind, every memory burned with intensity; moments with Asuna, its friends, the battles won and lost, all those experiences felt more real than ever.
—"Philosophically debatable."
Higa's voice sounded almost bored, like a teacher explaining a concept that his student should already have learned.
"Technically, it's a perfect copy down to the last detail."
Kirito felt a chill running through what would have been its spine.
—"And my two centuries in Underworld?"
The weight of its past life crushed it, and it wished to scream, to question every decision that had led to that moment.
—"Ah, no. That was precisely the reason."
Higa said, as if reading its thoughts. The malice in his tone made it tremble.
—"A Fluctlight with two centuries of experience is too valuable to leave in a perishable body. The copy with Asuna only remembers until before your first entry into Underworld, as you requested before leaving."
Its Fluctlight compressed as if someone had squeezed its heart with a fist of data, hitting it with the force of a crumbling world.
—"Traitor!"
Kirito felt an anger building inside it, bubbling up to burst. The images of its life, of its struggle and love, intertwined with the betrayal that felt like a dagger piercing its being.
—"I'm sorry, Kirito."
Higa whispered, but his voice sounded like a lie.
—"Science always requires sacrifices, and Rath needs guarantees. You... are our insurance policy."
In that grim exchange, the weight of his words resonated much louder than any thunder. Kirito found itself trapped in a web of foreign decisions that had severed its autonomy, its will. Its voice, now broken but determined, emerged from the depths of its despair.
—"Asuna and Rath will realize this horrible experiment of yours!"
Kirigaya Kazuto's shout echoed in the digital void, distorting like a wave of interference. Its Fluctlight— that essence that was now just a pattern of data— surged violently, projecting reddish flashes into the darkness. It was pure rage, the same that once made it traverse entire levels of SAO just to protect its loved ones.
Higa, unmovable, responded through the microphone without altering his robotic tone:
—"First of all, I am conducting this experiment in total secrecy. Rath has no official records of you... nor of the copy in the real world."
A calculated pause. Kazuto could almost imagine him behind the observation glass: those cold brown eyes behind the glasses, the index finger raised as if explaining a theorem to a slow student.
—"All data is stored in a personal location. Just for these eyes."
Kirito could feel the void closing around it. Was this worse than death? Not only had they reduced it to a hidden file, but Asuna would never know that the man she embraced was an imitation.
Higa continued, indifferent:
—"And secondly, I already mentioned that you both requested to erase the memories of those 200 years before leaving. Asuna won't find it strange that her 'Kazuto' forgets details."
**CRACK!**
It was the imaginary sound of its fist crashing against a wall that didn't exist. How dared he speak of her with such calmness?
—"I saw you two very... 'syrupy' when you said goodbye."
Higa added, almost mockingly.
—"I guess your copy was a success."
And then... Kirito exploded.
—"SHUT UP!"
Its voice was not a scream, but a system error, a peak of data that made the buffer barriers flicker.
—"You are not God to decide who deserves to remember!"
The words came out haltingly, as if each syllable tore pieces from its soul. Because that was now: a torn soul, screaming in a prison of zeros and ones.
Higa merely adjusted his glasses.
—"No. I'm just a scientist."
—"I won't allow you to use me that way."
Kirito's voice did not tremble. Not this time. It was a virtual edge, cutting through even the static of the digital void.
—"I am not an object for your experiments."
Higa did not flinch. Instead, his glasses reflected lines of code scrolling at an abnormal speed, as if analyzing each syllable.
—"But you are."
He replied, with the calmness of one dismantling a device.
—"And for your information, you have already provided me with invaluable data."
A calculated pause. Kirito felt the weight of those words. Was that all that remained of him? "Data"?
—"How do you remain conscious without self-destructing, despite your fury?"
Higa tilted his head, pretending to have academic curiosity.
—"Is it because you are the original... or because those 200 years added a layer of resilience to your Fluctlight?"
Kirito felt another strong blow to its emotions.
—"Do you see?"
Higa smiled—the first genuine expression in hours.
—"You are already yielding results. Satisfactory outcomes... And you can do nothing to prevent it... The risk was worth it."
And then... Kirito understood its situation better.
It was not just a prisoner... It was a lab rat.
Suddenly, the connection was cut. The "data streams" around Kirito solidified like crystal without it realizing.
Leaving Kirito once again plunged into the infinite silence of the buffer.
—"Higa!"
Kirito shouted into the nothingness, but its voice produced no echo. Just silence.
—"Answer me, damn it! Don't ignore me!"
It tried again, louder, as if it could break the void with sheer willpower.
—"HI—!"
Nothing.
The darkness was not a space, but an absence. And in it, its words faded before they were born. It understood that it had lost the last communication with the real world.
It did not notice that time had accelerated.
There was no clock, no abrupt change. Only the slow agony of loneliness, minute after minute (or were they hours?) in which:
It attempted to rationalize its situation.
(-"Is there a pattern in the data streams?").
Rath.
(-"How long had this experiment been going on? Days? Months? Had they finally realized this experiment?").
It cursed Higa.
(-"How could he do this?").
It thought of Asuna.
(-"Would she be okay? Would she notice something was wrong with the copy?"
- "Or was that replica so perfect that it would deceive her forever?").
It recalled the day at the Underworld lake, when Asuna—with the reflections of the water illuminating her face—swore that no system could separate them. Now, that promise was just corrupt code.
Even its own existence.
(-"Was it still 'Kirito' if no one remembered it?"
- "Or just a forgotten file on a hidden server?").
Every thought was "a second and a century at the same time."
Until, without warning...
Time normalized.
---
—"I apologize for the interruption."
Higa's voice broke into the void, as cold as the metal of an operating table, but now with an urgent tone.
—"And I regret even more having disappeared without warning."
A calculated pause. Kirito felt the weight of that silence like a slap.
—"But you see, I had little time."
Higa continued.
"And I couldn't waste it on sterile talks. So I decided to act."
His words were precise, like lines of code executing. Not an ounce of guilt.
—"You have all my respect, Kirigaya."
Kirito thought with great fury.
(-"'Respect'? Was that what he called 'torturing him in slow motion'?").
Higa adjusted his glasses with his index finger before adding through the microphone:
—"The results are more promising than expected. To be honest... you are a gem."
The compliment sounded more obscene than an insult.
—"Your resistance to the buffer without self-destructing is... fascinating."
Higa continued, and for the first time, his voice had a glimmer of scientific enthusiasm.
—"And as my time with you runs out, I decided to grant you one last conversation."
Kirito did not know whether to feel relief or terror.
—"In recognition of your... 'involuntary contribution.'"
Higa's voice dripped with viscous irony.
—"I offer you a life in Underworld."
The words sounded almost generous or a charity wrapped in gift paper, but Kirito knew that tone. It was that of a scientist satisfied with his experiment.
A holographic menu materialized one that it could "see" even as a "Fluctlight."
[1. RESTORE_AVATAR: KIRITO_UNDERWORLD_200YR].
[2. CUSTOMIZE: PARAMETERS_MOD].
—"You can choose."
Higa then summarized for it.
—"Option one: recover your original avatar, with the two centuries of memories intact. Or..."
A nearly imperceptible smile.
—"Option two: modify it. Different eye color, longer hair... trivial details."
—"Isn't it ironic? You fought so hard to save Underworld, and now it's your only salvation?"
—"Why?"
Kirito forced the words through what would have been its throat.
—"What do you gain from this?"
It managed to articulate, very distrustful.
Higa smiled.
—"Because even a lab rat gets its piece of cheese at the end of the maze."
—"And if I refuse? What if I reject your 'gift'?"
Higa did not blink. With a languid movement, he turned off the holographic menu.
The silence was more eloquent than any threat.
—"Then you will remain here... Perhaps forever... or perhaps just until I press this 'charming' red button."
Then appeared in place of the previous fading holographic menu a new one with a "bloody glow," displaying three letters that froze Kirito's code:
[WARNING: COMMAND_DELETE_FLUCTLIGHT? Y/N].
The hologram of the button blinked with a bloody glow, and Kirito felt something it did not believe possible: fear. Not of pain, but of absolute emptiness. Of ceasing to be.
Its Fluctlight pulsed in electric blue.
—"The choice is yours, 'hero.' But I have already won anyway."
Higa said cynically and mockingly.