The life of a traveling merchant is a lonely one, a fact with which Kraft Lawrence is well acquainted. Wandering from town to town with just his horse, cart, and whatever wares have come his way, the peddler has pretty well settled into his routine-that is, until the night Lawrence finds a wolf goddess asleep in his cart. Taking the form of a fetching girl with wolf ears and a tail, Holo has wearied of tending to harvests in the countryside and strikes up a bargain with the merchant to len...

At long last, Kirito and Asuna have reunited with Kizmel the dark elf. But the happy reunion doesn't last for long. With remaining keys to collect, the appearance of AI that seem a little too lifelike, and a "secret quest" to deal with, Kirito and Asuna will have their hands full as they attempt to clear the sixth floor in one piece!

"There's no way to beat this game. The only difference is when and where you die..."Having cleared the first and second floors of Aincrad at great cost, Kirito, Asuna, and the rest of the players ascend to the third floor. Tenuous new allies await them--most crucially, Kizmel, the elven knight. Kizmel is supposed to be a minor NPC with low-level AI, but she soon reveals herself to be much more. With new allies come new complications, though, and the elves of the vast third-floor forest are...

Secrets of the lake revealed!When clearing the seventh floor, Kirito transforms into a Civis Nocte, kindred to vampires, and receives great power in exchange for a lethal weakness to sunlight. With Asuna and Kizmel, he pursues the Fallen Elves who have stolen the five sacred keys at the center of the “Elf War” campaign questline. To the group’s surprise, however, their search ends up taking them back to the fourth floor. There, Kirito and company accept a request from Lavik, the former com...

THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE DOWNRIGHT WEIRD.The Ikebukuro district in Tokyo is full of interesting people. A boy longing for the extraordinary. A hotheaded punk. An airheaded pseudo-stalker. An information broker who works for kicks. An underground doctor who specializes in truly desperate patients. A high school student infatuated with a monster. And a headless rider on a pitch-black motorcycle. Their story may not be a heartwarming one, but as it turns out, even weirdos like these sometim...

The strange kid at school, the odd woman in the apartment building, the troublesome man at work. Such people exist everywhere, in everyone’s lives. All it takes is a word for it to start. An unsettling question, a bizarre remark, or even a kind apology. Once their hooks sink in, the cracks form. Darkness floods into the recesses until nothing else remains, and then...Sirens, screaming, dull thuds on the pavement. They have always existed. They just are. And when they show up, people die.

"There's no way to beat this game. The only difference is when and where you die..."One month has passed since Akihiko Kayaba's deadly game began, and the body count continues to rise. Two thousand players are already dead. Kirito and Asuna are two very different people, but they both desire to fight alone. Nonetheless, they find themselves drawn together to face challenges from both within and without. Given that the entire virtual world they now live in has been created as a deathtrap, t...

After reaching the second floor of Aincrad, Asuna decided to have a player controlled blacksmith upgrade her beloved sword, a rare Wind Fleuret--but when the unimaginable happened and the sword was shattered in the attempt, Kirito suspected foul play. Did the blacksmith really just happen to destroy an incredibly valuable item? And if not, is there any way to get it back? And--if there really is a conspiracy of thieves--how can they be stopped before they spread too much mistrust? The game...

Ikebukuro has a slashing problem.Ikebukuro, Tokyo. A place where the clumsy and inept at love gather. A high school girl worried about her status. A third-rate magazine reporter covering the Ikebukuro beat. A teacher suspected of sexual harassment. A thug wearing a yellow bandanna, who is said to be the toughest around. A young man who deals in all manner of sensitive information. And a headless rider on a coal-black motorcycle. As these individuals and more are drawn into a whirl of unluc...

A RACE AGAINST THE CLOCK!The secret feud between the Nachtoy and the Korloy families, who control the Volupta Grand Casino on the seventh floor, takes an unprecedented turn when Kirito and Asuna intervene. But when Kirito attempts to expose the Korloy family’s misdeeds, he ends up stumbling into a trap. Now he has just two days to unravel a mystery, put an end to an unscrupulous conspiracy, and defeat the floor boss. It’s all leading up to a showdown in the arena where everything’s on the ...

Read the novel that ignited the phenomenon!In the year 2022, gamers rejoice as Sword Art Online - a VRMMORPG (Virtual Reality Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) like no other - debuts, allowing players to take full advantage of the ultimate in gaming technology: NerveGear, a system that allows users to completely immerse themselves in a wholly realistic gaming experience. But when the game goes live, the elation of the players quickly turns to horror as they discover that, for...

Following his good fortune in Pazzio, Lawrence is confident that he is on the path to realizing his dream of becoming a town merchant. One ill-informed business decision, though, leaves him teetering on the brink of bankruptcy and ruin! With no assets to his name - other than the cunning of his fetching traveling companion, Holo the Wisewolf - Lawrence may need to resort to illicit means to put his affairs in order. With all of the merchant's plans hinging on one beautiful young shepherdes...