"This game cannot be cleared. No matter where or how you die, the only difference is… sooner or later…"
One month has passed since Kayaba Akihiko launched his death game. In this brutally difficult VRMMO, two thousand players have already lost their lives.
The day of the First Floor Boss Strategy Meeting. Kirito, who has resolved to fight as a solo player and focus solely on strengthening himself, is on his way to the meeting hall when he encounters a female player — a rare sight at the front ...
Despite the nearly 4 year wait, this was one of my favorite Progressive novels. The writing and story flow is incredibly smooth, and it doesn't get bogged down in long boss battles (there is still a shorter battle though).
It's main focus is on a lot of Dark Elf history, culture, and happenings - and that's tied in well with Kirito's new status as a vampire. The vampire mechanic is also handled pretty well - while it could have gone the route of "I need another player's blood to survive", it instead focuses on the "creature of the night" aspect - and that makes for some interesting challenges and advantages. Kirito & Asuna's (and Kizmel's) friendship continues to progress very nicely, and while there were one or two dumb humor moments, they were more than balanced out by either sweet moments, or just signs that they've gotten more comfortable around each other (and clearly really deeply care for each other). There's one particular moment where Kirito basically says living in SAO without Asuna would be meaningless, in front of her - and she gets all flustered that was particularly delicious. I'm curious to see how far Progressive will develop their relationship without breaking what already exists in the main series.
The one thing I did miss in this novel was that Asuna wasn't the PoV character at any point (tho she is of course present and center for the whole story). And my only other complaint was that this really was a bit too short, given the long wait (some of the other Progressive novels have been between 300-400 pages). The setup for the events in the next novel is looking pretty great. Hopefully it won't be as long a wait this time!