⭐Sword Art Online Volume 1 Chapters 15-16: Read Along & Analysis

I'll start out of order, because I really need to say this first, fresh from my mind by the end of the episode - if we'll get 16.5 here, I'm not sure if I'll survive listening to it all the way xD It's gonna be *hard* :D But as I said in one of the comments - 16.5 wasn't updated to the same version as the Novel. There are, though, chapters 16.6 and further, also known as "Sugary days" (YEP) which do more and also refer to this moment as a fact that did happen :D Back to chapter 15. I think, if there's a moment that is closest to a "problem" with a plot in a whole SAO, it's probably the moment when, suddenly, they had to give away their crystals. But I can understand why Kirito agreed to it. Interestingly enough, no matter how many flaws SAO haters bring up, I never heard them mentioning this moment - just says how much they know about the plot. Still, I wonder, if we think further into this situation, could it be possible, that Kuradeel was a source of that decision? I can imagine him brining up that idea to poor Godfrey one way or another, manipulating him into following along with it. The chapter also starts with Kirito reminding us, that the speed at which one can move is based on agility stat, when he looks at Godfrey - that comes back in the beginning of the next chapter with explaining Asuna's run. The whole scene with Kuradeel... it's hard to say something about it, one just has to experience it all by reading. This shift from normal to madness. The shift from "Kirito is the target" to "it was always about Asuna", to Kirito's mind wondering away as he slowly loosing HP, to the shift of realizing it's beyond just his life and Asuna is in danger too... As horrible the moment is, I love how it is written all the way. And anime pictured the emotions here well, too. They only dropped the nameless KoB member, and Kirito's HP further from 10% to somewhere around 1% :D And again, *that* description of Asuna from Kirito's point of view - that battling beautiful angel, which brings up the thoughts of her being his guarding angel at this point. And again, it also shows how Kirito values the swordfight. All of us have different things that we appreciate more than others, like watching a spider creating its web in the early morning sun, or simply watching someone else's art, when you tried doing it yourself - very different from watching it from no experience at all. And that is also a part of Kirito's personality, that is rarely mentioned - probably, because it's hard to see from anime alone, and even in the novel it's easy to miss. But he has that appreciation. "I went half mad trying to protect the lives of my fellow players" - just imagining him, going through the same thing again, from "I kept swinging desperately, trying to keep Sachi alive, if nothing else." where as I see it, "if nothing else, Sachi, keep her alive" was a prayer that he had during the fight back then. Oof. And now you see the connection between the moments to build up into something new in Kirito. Something that will surface again. This switch into battle mode... The moment when Asuna sees herself not worthy of being with Kirito hits so differently, when you see *what* she was doing the whole time. Looking after him, trying to pull him into the "safety" of being in the guild, being beside her. Only to realize, that *all* of her afford, once culminating, actually resulted in him barely deflecting death from it. If anyone in this chapter, she was the one to sit and see all of her decisions passing by in front of her, how they led to *this*, and started to doubt herself. But that is also a moment, when usually logical Kirito did not let her to fall, by casting her logic aside with emotions... I'll say it again, but I love every line of these moments in the book, especially the type like the very last in the chapter. They help each other *so much*, weird how people do not see that and say it's all "rushed" relationships. "It was an impossible number, faster than the agility stat boost could explain." and here, for the first time in SAO, we see someone breaking the system with sheer willpower. It wasn't Kirito, but Asuna. People always say that he's OP, but in reality, he oftentimes learns things from example of others. He oftentimes admits, that all he is strong at are worthless, numerical stats that comes from experience and work, but in everything else - he admires others, and tries to be the best version of himself. Being someone with good stats, he sees how not enough that actually is. How it was only enough to save himself when his guild died. How he admires the merchants who do a huge impact on life of others by sacrificing a lot of their own safety - since they still have to fight monsters but have portion of their skill slots dedicated to trade and etc. And separately, he sees Asuna, who's beauty seems impossible to express in numbers/polygons, who's speed cannot be explained in agility stat - numbers, again, and how much she is stronger than him as a person. And, funny enough, a lot of haters do concentrate on Kirito's numerical values, stats, and say he's a bad and OP character :D Irony. One of the things that was changed, but was hard to explain in the anime anyway - motivation for Kirito to come to Asuna for the night. Well, it probably could be deducted to some extent by the scene, but still - when you see him expressing his feelings for her, it feels natural that he asked her to let him in for the night. Here, when you see it from his point of view - you don't see Asuna first, but avoiding death, seeing death again, killing someone, and he actually experienced the existential crisis of a sort, and only then, Asuna comes to the picture - now not in the romantic light, but a guiding one for him... And that follows another set of changes. Anime left out the fact, that it was a question, that you could do sex in SAO. And followed it by showing Kirito sitting on the bed fully dressed. So a lot of people either deny *anything* happened or doubt it a lot. Here we have clear "she lay in my arms" while Asuna was sleeping. So. They were sharing the bed. *Yes*. Which brings me back to the start of the comment - yes, it happened, maybe 16.5 isn't canonical anymore, but Sugary days *were* published and admit it happened :D Also, "In the other world, I was always the type to hide behind someone else" - which is what she did back when running from the Kuradeel, when she hides behind Kirito. Because near him, she felt herself living, and thus, she could be herself near him. Not the tough vice commander, but Asuna. At the same time, here we see the reverse again, when she runs in front of Kirito to fight Kuradeel. Because to protect others, she would always be as strong as she needs to, casting aside that part of her that previously hid behind...

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