[center][i]floor 20, eastern side[/i][/center]

Jason had carried Alphard all the way to an inn and purchased a room for the day. Then, leading her upstairs, the urged her to rest for a while. Heart in her throat, she sat down on the room’s sole bed and stared over at her partner. [i]What exactly is going on?[/i] she thought to herself as Jason returned her gaze, emotional fire burning deep within his eyes.

“Look Jason, I-” she began, but Jason stood up suddenly and cut her off. He crossed the few feet between them in a single burst of that unnatural speed of his. Before she could react, Jason had taken her face softly in his hands and planted a tender kiss lightly on her lips. 

“Alphard. I know I have already sworn myself to you as a knight, but now I feel that that vow is meaningless. I renew my vow to you now: I promise myself completely to you; mind, body, and soul. Not as a knight, but as the man whose heart you have completely stolen. You will want for nothing whilst I still live. You will no longer have to fight in this twisted madman’s game. I will provide for you in all that you will ever need.” His clear, green eyes locked on hers intently and he leaned in for another kiss. Alphard would have none of it, though, and stopped him in his tracks with a short uppercut into his chin. Jason fell backwards, sprawling out across the floor in a tangled heap as Alphard towered over him, anger and sadness flashing across her features. 

“Jason,” she said, tenderly but firmly, “I understand that you have apparently developed feelings for me. I am sorry that I have let this go on as long as I have without noticing, but I will certainly put a stop to it now. We can never be together. You and I will never work, in this world or any other. You’re a great guy and any girl should be overjoyed to have your affection, but I can’t. I need you to understand something. Kenshin and I had been in love with one another for years before coming to Aincrad. He was my first love and my only love. He helped me through many extremely difficult times in my life,” She thought back to her old fits of anger. When she would be set off by the smallest of things and instantly turn ugly and violent. Kenshin was the only one who was able to calm her down when she got like that. And even then, he wasn’t always successful. She could clearly remember times when he would just hold her and take the punishment she sent his way until she had eventually calmed down. He had more than once gone home bruised, bleeding, and stained with her tears. She shook herself back to the present and regarded Jason once more. “When he died while fighting that dragon, part of me died with him. It’s as if part of my soul had been ripped away. Do you understand? I don’t believe that I will ever be able to love again.”

Jason looked at her and, for possibly the first time yet, truly saw her. He saw all of the pain and sorrow and pure, unadulterated [i]rage[/i] that she carried bottled up within her. And he realized in that moment that it might not have really been her that he was in love with at all. The woman that Jason had fallen so hard for was merely the image she put up for others. He had fallen in love with her shell, that was all. In recognizing this, Jason also became aware of just how badly he had just hurt her. She looked to him for stability, focusing on his moral code and sense of right and wrong. He was her guide. He recited his code back to himself: A knight is sworn to valor; His heart knows only virtue; His blade defends the helpless; His might upholds the weak; His word speaks only truth; His wrath undoes the wicked. Jason stood and laid his hand on Alphard’s shoulder. 

“I’m sorry, Alphard, I didn’t realize how much of an idiot I was making of myself. I understand the state of things now, and will do my best to avoid another situation like this one. Will you still accept me as your knight and companion?”

Alphard looked thoughtful for a moment before nodding once. “I accept your services yet again. Now, let’s get back up to higher floors again and get hunting.”

[center][i] Floor 30[/i][/center]

Jason and Alphard strode purposefully across the great desert of Aincrad’s thirtieth floor. Both warriors had gotten fresh suits of armor to match the demands of this new harsh environment. Jason was bedecked in a thin, tan, button-down cotton shirt and a near perfect facsimile of blue jeans. A pair of sturdy leather boots came halfway up his shins. Additionally, he wore a wide, grey scarf around his neck, ready to be pulled up at a moment’s notice to protect against the blowing sand. Jason still carried his hammer <Defiler> and currently had it slung across his back in a black leather holster. The only metal on Jason’s body was the buckle of his belt and the knuckle guards of his fingerless gloves. He had designed the outfit, minus the gloves and hammer, after that of the famous American paleontologist Roy Chapman Andrews whose fossil-searching expeditions into the Gobi desert were legend.

Alphard was dressed in an entirely different form of desert combat armor. Her heavy plate mail had been replaced by armor forged of the chitinous plates of a massive, desert dwelling insect that the pair had happened across soon after arriving on the thirtieth floor. Alphard’s shield was a large, slightly convex sheet of bone gathered from a rather saurian beastie from a previous floor. The warrior woman also still carried her scythe upgraded using the dread dragon Mordred’s corpse. <Wyvern’s Talon> it was called, and she used it with the same devastating brutality that she always had.

The two had begun the long journey across the desert after a kind information broker named Crona had told them of rumors of a large monster lurking about by some sort of tower off in the desert. As always, Jason and Alphard had immediately pausing only to buy sufficient supplies to keep them safe in the desert. The two had quickly gained some small repute for taking on every major enemy that could be found on each floor, and they had even gained a couple of requests from acquaintances that they guild up. The two preferred to fight alone, however, and it was only with great reluctance that they had agreed to meet with a friend of Crona’s after their current self-appointed mission. Crona had insisted on the meeting, saying that she would refuse to give any information until they agreed to the meeting. It wasn’t until Crona had suggested the get-together be her payment that Alphard finally broke and accepted the terms. Jason was simply anxious to get out and make this new floor as safe as they could for its upcoming settlers. So here they were now, just having entered the desert from the town of Solis and continuing on to the mysterious tower off in the distance.