Kirito's Ar Part 2

“Ki..ito. …K..ri..o. …Kirito!” Alice yelled, waking Kirito up. She admitted that she may have gone a bit overboard, but he should have knocked first. And to come in naked? He was kind of asking for it.

“Huh, Alice? What’s going on?” Kirito asked, noticing that his nose was plugged with tissues, and he was wearing nothing but a towel, while Alice was now fully clothed.

“You tried to be a little creep and spy on me taking a bath,” Alice said to him.

“…Sorry. I thought everyone was asleep,” he said back to her.

“Kirito it’s only 8 pm right now,” she said to his surprise. “What are you talking about?”

“8 pm!” Kirito said in shock. “There’s no way! It feels way later than that!”

“Kirito you really must be tired to think that,” Alice said to him, still unaware that he had started to shrink as of this morning.

“Go back to bed and get some rest,” she said, helping him back to his room where he crashed onto his bed without a second’s moment of hesitation.

After falling asleep this time, he was lucky that he didn’t experience the same nightmare that he did before. This time he was able to get a good night’s rest.

When he woke up the next day, he felt a lot better than he did the day before. Though as he got dressed, he couldn’t help but noticed that his clothes seemed looser than before. This was because when he slept, he had shrunken down another half inch, making him the same height as Alice.

In addition to that, he noticed that his waistline and muscles felt smaller than they did before. Something was definitely going on, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Perhaps it was because he barely ate yesterday.

“You look much better,” Alice said to him as he came downstairs to greet the sisters.

“I feel better as well,” he said to her. “I guess all I needed was a good night’s rest.”

“That’s great,” Alice said to him. “That means that you should be in good enough condition to hunt down a band of rouge Orcs.”

“Of course not,” Kirito said, standing next to her, noticing that he was eye level with her now, though he thought that she might just be wearing a taller pair of heels today.

“Please be careful~,” Selka said to them, worried that something could happen to them. Orcs were strong and Kirito was only a normal knight compared to Alice. He was skilled, but he still had a long way to go.

“It’ll be fine,” Kirito said, reassuring her.

“Don’t worry,” Alice said to her sister, which eased her more than when Kirito said it to her.

Kirito felt like they were hiding something from him, but he didn’t know what it was. It was as if they knew something that he didn’t.

After they finished breakfast, Kirito and Alice made their way down to the rouge Orc camp. Luckily for them, there were only three Orcs there.

“Alright I will take care of the two on the left and you hold off the one on the right until I can deal with it,” Alice said to him.

“What are you talking about?” Kirito asked her. “I can take the one on the right by myself. I feel fine today," he said, thinking that she was trying to protect him because of his weakened state yesterday.

Though in truth this was how it always was. Alice would take the lead and fight while Kirito did his best to hold them off. She was confused about why he was so eager to fight today.

“Fine if you think that you can defeat it, then you may,” she said granting him permission. “But if you start to feel overwhelmed, please let me know.”

“I’ll be fine,” Kirito said to her, running straight towards the Orc on the right while Alice went to handle the two on the left.

Unfortunately for him, he soon found himself being overwhelmed by the sheer strength of the Orc. As the fight progressed Kirito finally realized that it wasn’t the Orc that was too strong, but it was him that was too weak. He constantly struggled to wield his sword properly, losing his balance on occasion and even messed up techniques that he spent years honing from time to time. It wasn’t that frequent, but it was frustrating that it was happening to him.

“Kirito watch out!” Alice yelled, jumping in and defeating the Orc just as he managed to turn things around and was about to kill it himself.

“What the hell was that for!?” Kirito yelled at her, frustrated that she took his kill from him. “I had it handled!”

“Hey, I was just trying to help,” Alice said, not understanding why he was so frustrated with her.

“I had it covered!” he said storming off. He didn’t know why he flipped out as he did to Alice, but it would be too embarrassing if he tried to apologize now. All he could do was try to solve whatever was happening by himself.

When they got back home Kirito secluded himself in his training for the rest of the night. While it was true that he seemed weaker and his techniques weren’t working properly, he wasn’t going to let this stop him needed to do was become accustomed to whatever was happening to him.

After completing his training, he ate dinner without a word to either of the sisters and made his way back to bed. Though to add to the bad events he had experienced throughout the day he was plagued by nightmares for the rest of the night, unable to escape or avoid them. They made him feel helpless like he was nothing more than a child. It was humiliating!”

“I’m not a child!” Kirito yelled waking up from his nightmare to notice that Selka was at the foot of his bed watching him sleep. After hearing about what happened yesterday, she felt worried for Kirito and wanted to make sure that he was alright. It wasn’t often that he lost his cool like that. He usually kept his emotions in check.

“S-Selka!? What the heck are you doing here?” Kirito asked, quickly putting a shirt on to cover his bare chest.

“Kirito… are you alright?” she asked him, getting straight to the point.

“I’m fine,” he said to her, not wanting her to worry. He overreacted yesterday and he just needed some time to cool off. He was fine now. Or at least that’s what he thought. If he wasn’t distracted by Selka’s sudden appearance in his room he would have noticed that his arms seemed skinnier than the day before and his hands were daintier.

“Let’s just eat for today, so I can go train,” he said leaving the room.

Selka knew that something was bothering him, but she knew that he would only tell her and her older sister if he wanted to tell them.

“Are you in less of a shitty mood today?” Alice asked him, seeing him sit down right across from her.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have overreacted like that,” he said, hoping that they could just forget everything that happened yesterday.

“It’s fine,” she said back to him. “I get it you are stressed, but it won’t help if you act out like that. If you need to talk, we’re here,” she said as Selka made her way downstairs.

“Thanks,” he said to her, eating only a small amount of eggs before leaving the table. “Since we don’t have anything planned for the day, I’ll just train.”

“Sure, I might come out back later to train with you myself,” Alice said, smiling at him, watching him walk outside.

Once there he began to train, going through his sword forms, but as the hours of the day progressed it became harder and harder to swing his sword. It had always been a heavy sword, but he got tired this fast from using it before.

Though he thought he was starting to feel tired he didn’t want to stop his training, so he swapped out his normal sword for one that was usually used by holy knight apprentices. It would be fine since he wasn’t planning to use it outside of training.

“Haah!” To his surprise, the sword felt natural to him, almost as if he held wielded it for years, but he knew that it was impossible. It must be that it was easy for him to use since he has wielded a much heavier sword this entire time.

“It would seem that I was worried for nothing,” Alice said to him, after silently watching him train for the past few minutes.

“Alice, how long were you here for?” He asked her, stopping his training for the time being.

“A while, but that doesn’t matter, since it would seem that you are finally using a sword that fits your strength stat now,” she said referring to the current sword he was using.

“Huh? What are you talking about?” he asked her, confused by what she meant.

“It’s nothing,” she said, trying not to embarrass him. For as long as she knew him Kirito had carried around that black sword, despite not being able to wield it properly. Though it would finally seem that he was growing up and using a sword that he was more compatible with.

“So would you like to go round?” she asked him, pulling out her golden sword.

“Sure, I could use the practice,” he said to her, still a bit troubled by what she was talking about before.

“Begin!!” they yelled out at the same time. For the first few minutes of the match between them, they were evenly matched, though as the time progressed it was obvious to both of them who had the upper hand.

Getting impatient, Kirito tried to win the match with one final swing of his sword, but before he realized it he had tripped on a small hole in the ground, dropping his sword in the process. He expected to laid face first into the dirt, but instead, he was meat with the soft bouncy feeling of Alice’s breasts breaking his fall.

“Wahhh! Alice, I’m sorry!” Kirito, remembered several days ago when he had accidentally tripped headfirst into her breasts, only to receive a giant slap to the face.

“It’s fine,” Alice said to him. Her face was a little red from embarrassment but other than that she didn’t look like she was going to slap him again. “Are you okay?”

“Huh?” Kirito asked, shocked that she didn’t slap him.

“I asked if you’re okay,” she said once again to him, with a worried expression across his face, which made him feel even more confused about what was happening.

“I-I’m fine,” he said running back inside, without another word. For that spilt second, he looked at her, he actually thought that she was cute! What the heck was going on with him?

That night Kirito locked himself inside his room, without dinner under the pretext that he wasn’t feeling all too well.

Though when the next day arrived he was abruptly woken up by Alice dragging him out of his bed, bashing his head against the ground as she did.

“Ouch! What the heck was that for?” He asked her, rubbing the back of his head, as he slowly rose to his feet.

“Come on it’s time for training~!” Alice said to him.

“But we haven’t eaten breakfast yet,” Kirito said to her, trying to wake himself up.

“We’ll have breakfast after we have our morning run,” she said to him. “Ten whole laps around the village. I know it seems like a lot, but let’s get moving~!”

Not fully understanding what was going on Kirito did as she told him. Though it really didn’t make sense to him. Running laps was more basic training that not even apprentice holy knights did. There were much easier methods for him to warm up.

Or at least that is what he thought at the beginning of the run. It was around the five laps of the village that Kirito felt like he was dying, gasping for breath. This was impossible! He should be able to do these laps with ease, not to mention that Alice finished her laps twenty minutes ago.

When he finally finished his laps, he was drenched in sweat. None of this made any sense to him. First, it was a bit of his strength and now it was his stamina. Why was he getting weaker? There had to be something that could explain these changes.

Little did he know that he had been losing his stamina for the past few days. None of what he was experiencing was a drastic change, but one that slowly progressed as the days went by.

“Good job~,” Alice said to him, handing him a jug of water which he chugged down without hesitation.

“A-lice I think that there is something wrong with me,” Kirito said to her.

“Hey just because you didn’t complete your run as fast as I did doesn’t mean that there is something wrong with you,” she said to him.

“Alice I shouldn’t be this weak right now,” he said to her. “I-I…huh? Alice since when did you get taller than me Kirito asked her, noticing that she was now a quarter of an inch taller than him, and this wasn’t because of heels. She was wearing plain boots just like him.

“Maybe you should sit down for a bit,” Alice said to him. “You might be experiencing heat stroke right now.”

“Get your hands off of me!” he yelled when she tried to help him sit down. “Alice, can’t you see that something is wrong here!?”

“All I can see that’s wrong is that you are pushing yourself way too hard and it’s starting to take a toll on your mental state,” she said to him, starting to get upset. She was trying to be gentle with him, but his current attitude was making it hard for her to have a proper conversation with him. Was this being parents felt when dealing with a rebellious teen? She wasn’t old enough to be his parent, but she did see him as a younger sibling.

“You need to calm down,” she said to him. “Go take a shower and cool off.”

Alice left Kirito alone after that, giving him some time to calm down, but that only made him feel worse. It was obvious now that something was happening to him and there was no way that he could dismiss it anymore.