Eden's fame as the brightest star of an era wasn't an undeserved title. Even off stage, her every movement makes her the center of attention, but on the stage, she can dim even the sun. It took more than five minutes for the audience to wake up, after which thunderous applause followed, not ending long after both of us left the stage.
As we entered the backstage, Eden smiled at me, clearly waiting for me to speak. Not playing dumb, I approached her while taking off my veil and, after slightly lifting her chin, lowered my head to meet her lips. Satisfied with my answer, she leaned her body on me, embracing my neck as I held her waist.
We didn't separate even after the noisy outside quieted down, enjoying the passion we shared. We ended our kiss only when we heard a knock on the door. As we turned our heads toward that direction, Elysia barged in, with the rest of the group following closely behind.
-"Eden! Yue! You were... Aah?!"-Elysia froze after seeing us still hugging.
-"It would seem that we entered at the wrong time."-Mei smiled, understanding what must have happened.
~"Can't say it's the best moment to come in."~I smiled wryly.
-"Ellie..."
-"Sorry."
~"OK, let's finish the quest, and we can find someplace to eat and talk."
As the atmosphere was already lost, there was no need to stay here.
On our way back, I was sandwiched between Eden and Elysia, both talking with each other like true sisters, not caring about all the eyes on us. While answering their questions from time to time, I mostly focused on conversations with Mei and Vill-V as we planned our next steps.
-"So our next target is the twenty-fifth floor."-Mei spoke after thinking for a while.
~"Sounds appropriate. I believe that if we keep the current tempo, two or three months will be enough to achieve it. Anything worth our time on the floors between, Sofia?"
-"There is a skill worth investing in on the sixth floor and some rare materials here and there, but nothing big like a guild."
-"A skill important enough to be mentioned independently? Can you elaborate?"-Mei looked at Sofia, who was walking a step behind me.
-"It's called 'meditation'. By itself, it is rather useless, giving minor boosts to some parameters, but its synergy is important if you want to climb high floors. You can gain unique skills by maxing out meditation and other sword skills."
~"Then it's indeed something we need to get."
-"Yue, can you cook something today?"-Elysia interrupted me.
~"Sure."
-"Can you recommend us some unique skills we should aim for?"-Mei talking to Sofia brought my attention back.
Sofia nodded and, after a short moment, started to list skills fitting our styles with descriptions of how to gain them. She gave suggestions to everyone but me, as when it was my turn, she seemed troubled.
~"No skill fits me?"~I asked with a smile.
-"Yes and no. All skills I spoke about before could be used by you, but I know that most skills only limit your true combat power..."
~"Sigh. Don't worry, then. I'll somewhat get by."
-"There is something that could fit your situation. The problem is it is an unfinished program left in SAO code for future development."
~"Hou?"
-"The OSS, Original Sword Skill, is a side project of one of Kayaba's assistants. In its current state, it is barely usable, but I should be able to repair it. The only problem is how to make Cardinal System add it to game functions."
~"Why not make it a special skill as synergy between meditation and mentoring?"~I suggested after thinking about a skill I acquired some time ago.
Sofia thought for a moment and nodded, indicating that it could work.
-"Then it should be feasible. I'll start putting pressure on the Cardinal System to add the OSS after I complete it."
-"How do you plan to do it?"-Vill-V was interested in how almost sentient AI could exploit her not-so-sapient kin.
-"Cardinal System's main directive is to enhance the game experience by changing the game according to players' requirements and expectations. By feeding it data signaling a need for systems like OSS, it is likely that Cardinal System will add it to match players' needs."
~"This is indeed a method that almost guarantees the outcome we want, but to achieve that, we will have to generate said data."
-"Yes, You and Fu Hua alone won't be enough to force Cardinal System to respond. My prediction suggests that a hundred players regularly using mentoring would be required for OSS to be added."
-"So we will need some propaganda."-Mei showed a dark smile, remembering her struggles during the fight with Honkai.
~"I'll deal with it. There are around five hundred kids below the age of fourteen in-game right now. By opening schools, we should be able to make at least fifty teachers focus on mentoring, and the rest can be made by sponsoring dojos."
-"You learned to throw money at the problems?"-Mobius asked me with a smile.
~"It works, so why not?"
-"I'm not implying it's a bad thing."
-"Guys! We are here."-Elysia brought us back to reality as we arrived near the NPC, who gave us a quest.
Quick dialogue later, the Fire Chasers Guild was officially founded. To celebrate, we returned to the house on the first floor we were renting, and everyone talked about their plans while I prepared the meals.
When I was finished, we sat around the table and started to eat while continuing to talk about some random things. As the food started to disappear, Eden brought some wine she found tasteful, so soon everyone was drinking. Even Griseo, Mito, and Asuna, who were legally underage, decided to drink with us, and none of us opposed it.
I must say that despite rather average taste compared to drinks in Hold, thanks to the game simulating the drunkenness, I could once again feel tipsy, and I was fully enjoying this feeling. Elysia, Eden, Vill-V, and Mobius also noticed that I was getting drunk, so they focused their full attention on making me drink, enjoying my drunkenness even more than I did.
Sometime later, I decided that it was enough and planned to leave, but the moment I stood up, Elysia and Eden caught me and brought me to their room semi-forcefully, not allowing me to rest for the rest of the night.
From the morning of the next day, I fully committed myself to further expanding our influence. First, I assisted in creating crafting guilds that would gather like-minded players who are allied with us. At the same time, I also negotiated with other guilds to create some laws so that weaker players could feel safe and avoid exploitation in the hands of others.
By making top guilds aligned with my ideas and making them sign the laws into existence, we made rules that all of us would act if any force violated any law. We set punishments for crimes as anything from in-game currency fees to imprisonment. While I advocated the death penalty, it was opposed, so I had to drop the issue.
I also advised players to create guilds that would function akin to worker unions to secure their interests further while forming a more solid manufacturing downline for frontier combatants. Of course, I always made sure that my interests were secured before taking action.
As more guilds focused on craftsmanship and gathering materials appeared, I moved to the second part of my plans, uniting players.
Despite over 90% of players being Japanese, there was almost no feeling of unity aside from small groups of friends. Guilds expanded those groups into small communities, and now I had to fuse them into a full-fledged community.
My idea was simple. Form a republic with representatives from the biggest guilds, leaders of special groups of interests, and elected members.
Elected members were chosen by normal democratic votes every month, and the only requirement they had to meet to be eligible was not to be a member of any big guild while in office.
Special groups of interests will be formed around special professions, such as alchemists, smiths, Cleaners on the frontline, and such. Their presence is needed to advise on the needs and situations of people like them.
When I proposed this to other guilds during one of our meetings, they were surprised, but seeing obvious benefits from centralizing and organizing players, most agreed quickly and cooperated with me.
After that meeting, my reputation reached the absolute height, as in the eyes of many people, I fought for their rights and safety. Despite those not being my main focus, the prestige I now had was useful to me, so I played along with peoples' perceptions of me.
As this was going on, Cleaners led by a power couple of Mei and Kevin, continued to climb the tower, clearing the fourth floor after a week, and without stopping, they continued until the tenth floor was liberated by the beginning of the third month since the start of the death game. After that, everyone took a week to rest and upgrade their gear before continuing to push forward.
That week also became the moment the 'SAO Republic' came into existence. Due to my reputation and the abilities that I proved before, I was chosen as the head of state, but rather than being called president, players truly began to refer to me as an Emperor.
With my new position, I was able to mobilize players' abilities and resources more effectively, allowing Cleaners to focus on the frontline fully. Thanks to that, after the week of rest had finished, they were able to clear the floor every five or six days.
With great progress on the frontline and feeling safe in their homes, the morale of players was through the roof. This allowed me to push more reforms, bringing not only schooling to life but also creating investment funds for aspiring Cleaners, crafters, and even social programs.
During all this time, Sofia was by my side, helping me with everything from gathering data to processing documents. She would often ask me about my plans and reasons for my actions, wanting to understand humans through me.
-"But it's illogical. If, by paying, players can guarantee their safety, why would they oppose taxes? Especially when the cost to be safe right now is much higher than the proposed tax."-Sofia was troubled by my explanation of why her proposed tax wouldn't be approved.
~"People rarely act by principles of logic. Emotions speak louder than truth, and experience is more prevalent than wisdom. If you want to convince others, first, you must conform to their ideas of good and bad, and as taxes are bad, you are out of luck."
-"But then, how did you gain funding for schools and orphanages?"
~"By donations. Standing on a moral high point, I made people donate their money to those by making them pity those children and convincing them that by doing so, they are not only assisting in conquering SAO but are also 'good people'."
-"'Good people'?"-She looked at me with visible confusion.
~"Yes. Few consider themself bad, let alone evil, so by appealing to the 'goodness' people feel in themself, you can easily convince people to do something. Of course, they won't do anything troublesome like changing their habits or wasting too much time, but simple donations of materials they don't need and can't sell in such small quantities is no problem."
-"Isn't that effectively the same as tax?"
~"It is, but tax makes them pay while the donation is willing, even though most are still paid. People rarely consider all consequences and reasons, gauging what is right based on their feelings."
-"I see."-Sofia looked at her proposal for a moment before continuing.-"Then how can we gather more funds?"
~"Why do we need more funds? Especially funds gathered in the name of governing that are hard to use without receiving dissatisfaction for 'misappropriating funds' from people not aligned with the ideas and matters on which we spend them."
-"With more money, we can reduce the burden on the front."
~"That might be, but I believe that reducing the burden even further might be counterproductive."
Sofia looked up from her document trying to understand what was I talking about. After a minute of silence, she spoke with slight hesitation.
-"You don't want those fighting to be too relaxed?"
~"Yes. The pressure will help them move forward. While the unity of players right now is not bad, if those with power are too spoiled, they might get ideas that will be hard to weed out later."
-"Betrayal?"
~"If they want the position of leader that much, I'll relinquish it, I don't care about that. My main concern is that they will believe that life in-game is better than one that is waiting for them outside. Aside from that, I'm worrying about corruption and exploitation."
-"Power corrupts..."
~"Yes. Especially in situations like here, where power is literal strength and not simply a social construct."
-"But, wouldn't you also turn corrupt in the future?"
~"Who says I'm not corrupt? Prioritizing my friends and family, and securing resources and contacts for personal use, aren't those textbook examples of corruption?"
-"This..."
~"A clean official is not always a good official. Especially on top, where you have to secure the interests of not only you but also your subordinates who have to secure people under them and so on. Our job here is not to create good country or care for players, but to keep this house of cards from collapsing before we can clear the game."
-"..."
~"While your proposals are always 'best' for the overall situation, those don't profit those on top. Right now I bought hearths for weak players by giving them security, craftsmen by giving them money, and Cleaners by giving them power. Each of those won't be remembered for long if they forget how bad it was before I appeared."
-"I somewhat understand... What you are doing now should be human politics, right?"
~"Yes. I'm not the greatest fan of those, but this is the only alternative if I don't hold absolute power over everything. Using all that Loki and Riveria taught me is not that bad compared to dealing with chaos. Sigh, I would still rather cook all day long, though."
-"I'll try to change my priorities then."
I nodded while returning my focus to the document in front of me. It was another proposal, but this one was submitted by Heathcliff. It was a rather simple suggestion to establish titles akin to those of nobles for players who distinguish themself.
This was why I spoke so much to Sofia before, as rather than focusing on defeating the game, this proposal focused on establishing a lasting power structure. For now, I decided to treat this as simple greed for power, rejecting it on grounds of being not important in the current state of matters, but from now on, Heathcliff was at the top of players I will watch out for.
If the players cease to feel the need to finish the game, it will be hard to rekindle it without drastic measures.