But on the other hand, a build that wasn't planned-like having low STR and unable to equip a large machine gun and yet increasing the mastery of a heavy machine gun-would weaken one's own ability. Because of that, there would definitely be a fixed pattern where people have to attain certain statuses and skills before being able to equip certain weapons. Based on the slight differences of the skills, everyone would classify similar players as "Attacker", "Tank", "Medic", "Scout" and all sorts of names for different classes.

Though Sinon's class as a "Sniper" was extremely rare, it was one of these. To equip a large-sized sniper rifle, they have to strengthen their STR status, and then have to increase their DEX to improve their accuracy, and finally a suitable amount of AGI to get away quickly from the scene after a snipe. However, they would lose if they were discovered, so they gave up on VIT completely. As for skills, they need the necessary gun mastery and also other skills that could improve their accuracy. Of course, they gave up completely on defenses. However, there's also the possibility of a failed snipe because of the "heartbeat count system" even if the build was perfect, and this would be the hard part about this class.

Such an overly specialized class wasn't really suited for a battle royale. While aiming for an enemy far away, they could be easily approached by others. A sniper could only surrender once an attacker-type player with a submachine gun or an assault rifle rushes in. Even if a sniper barely managed to fire at the rushing enemy without aiming-which were normally unable to hit the target-the sniper would end up becoming a pincushion of bullets before they were able to get a second shot out.

Because of the above reasons, if Sinon acted on her own, she would have no chance of winning if a mid-ranged shooter who would value accuracy like the attacker "Xiahou Dun" reaches the range where the Norinco CQ would hit.

However, things were different now. Because of a chance occasion, beside her was a "lightsaber warrior" which no one else in the world of GGO would possibly have. This person looked like a black-haired beauty no matter how you looked at it-but he's actually a boy.

The 'lightsaber' was a weapon that the programmers of 'Zaskar' created out of their own whims, and its range would be far less than a sniper rifle.

The attack range was as long as the blade of the saber itself, about 1.2 meters. The GGO world's smallest firearm "Remington Derringer" had a range of merely 5m, but the attack range of the lightsaber was a lot smaller than it. However, that energy blade that was glowing blue and white seemed to have power that far exceeded expectations. The fact that it was able to slice the .50BMG the Hecate fired from close range was the proof of it.

In another perspective, since it could slice any bullet apart, it would mean that this would be the strongest defensive weapon in the world. But even with the "Bullet Line", it's not easy to use a 3cm wide blade to defend against a rain of bullet that was coming at a supersonic speed.

This needed a calm prediction of the bullet lines, order, and perfect response ability to use the sword. Also, the most important thing was not to show any fear when facing a fully-automatic rifle- What sort of training allowed him to learn such skills? Sinon really could not imagine it. No, this may not be just a VR game technique. It's when the player merged with the avatar through his own experience, belief and power of his soul.

Once he reloaded his weapon, Xiahou Dun again grabbed the CQ and started firing wildly. However, the lightsaber in Kirito's hand created numerous afterimages in the air and accurately picked out all the bullets that would hit him in the grid boxes and deflected them. Sinon could only feel that way on seeing from behind his back.

This real ability that far surpassed the barriers of the virtual world and the real world was exactly what Sinon was looking for. She learnt the calmness of a sniper, no, a coldness-ruthlessness, and then wanted to use it to crush Asada Shino's weakness. She had been moving through the wastelands during the past half year, looking for an opponent who would give her real strength.

Ever since she met Kirito yesterday, Sinon had this thought that she wanted to fight with this powerful foe with all she's got, and that she would get such strength if she could win.

But at the same time, she noticed that another emotion was growing in her.

I want to know him more, I want to talk to him more. What happened in that world before Kirito arrived in GGO? What kind of life did he have in that world, what did he learn, and how did he fight his way through? No-I want to know what kind of person he is in the real world. I had never had such thoughts about anyone else while growing up...

"SINON, NOW!".

Kirito cleared off the second barrage of bullets Xiahou Dun fired and shouted, and Sinon's thoughts were brought back to the battle on hand because of that.

Her right index finger moved half consciously, squeezing the trigger of the Hecate. It was a shot crippled by her severe lack of concentration ability right now, but the distance was less than 100m, after all. Sinon couldn't possibly miss with her build based on accuracy. The bullet piereced straight through the middle of the general warrior-type armor Xiahou Dun was wearing.

In a normal battle, a player whose HP was down to zero would shatter like glass and disappear. However, the special rules of the BoB tournament specify that the corpse would be at the scene. Xiahou Dun was sent flying back after he was hit, and the helmet decoration flew in the air. As he landed on the chilly ground in a wide position, the red [Dead] tag started to spin on him.

'Fuu~', Sinon heaved a sigh and got up, changing the magazine of the Hecate which could normally hold 7 bullets, but didn't have much left. Then, she placed her rifle on her right shoulder and glanced at her temporary partner.

Kirito skillfully spun the lightsaber in his hand and placed it back at his waist buckle. The side of his face was dimly illuminated under the red sunset, and looked as enigmatic as ever. After taking a deep breath to hold back that earlier desire to know about him, Sinon quickly said, "That battle just now will attract lots of people. We have to move quickly."

"Ok."

Kirito nodded his head and then turned his eyes to the river surface nearby.

""Death Gun" should have headed north down this river. He probably wants to hide somewhere until after the "Satellite Scanner" works at 9pm and then choose his next target. I want to stop him before he kills... shoots someone. Can you think of a plan, Sinon?"

On hearing this sudden request, Sinon blinked a few times and then frantically thought about what she should do. Though she really couldn't think of some good idea since she didn't really understand what was going on, but she immediately opened her mouth and said, "...No matter how mysterious his power is, "Death Gun" is still just a sniper, so he shouldn't be used to fighting in a place without cover. But if we continue moving north from here, we'll leave the forest stretch on the other side of the river. We'll continue moving up to the center of the island, the abandoned city, and it's all a grassland with great line of vision."

"In other words, he could have chosen that place as the next hunting ground... right?"

Kirito muttered and then looked over at the ambiguous buildings that were far away in the north. Though the distance effect made it look very far, it was just 3km straight on. Without bad AGI stats, they can reach there in around 10 minutes if they run and watch their surroundings.

"Alright then. We'll head towards that city too. If we run down the river, we shouldn't be spotted from both left and right sides."

"...Got it."

After Kirito nodded and said that, Sinon looked back slightly.

Dyne's "corpse" was still lying at the end of the bridge slightly far away, but the existence of the red [Dead] tag showed that he was still alive. The person who was really dead-though it could be just a possibility-was "Pale Rider" who disappeared completely.

To be honest, Sinon still couldn't believe this, but at the same time, she couldn't feel that this was all a lie.

However, there was a definite feeling within her, that during the 3rd BoB tournament, something in her would change. It's just that she didn't know what direction the change would occur-and she didn't know if the opponent who would change her would either be Kirito or that mysterious mantle guy.

Right now, she could only act on her own inspiration. That's because 'inspiration' was a skill that couldn't be enhanced with any build.

Though Sinon didn't boost it that much like Spiegel, her AGI wasn't that low, and it should have at least been about the same as Kirito's who should have boosted STR stats.

But eventually after running together like this for a while, Sinon had to run with all she had before catching up to the flowing black hair in front of her. To put it simply, their "basic movements" were completely different. There were cracks appearing suddenly on the numerous rocks on the riverbank, and Kirito seemed to have memorized them as he quickly dodged them or leaped over them. He would often turn his head around to match Sinon's speed, which made her all the more unhappy.

Even so, it was because of Kirito's help, running in front of her and pointing out paths that were easy to move through, that she was able to pass through the mid-south area, the grasslands. Unknowingly, the riverbed below her feet became concrete, and when she looked up, she could see the crowd of skyscrapers. They were about to enter the main battlefield of this island, the abandoned city.

"We didn't catch him."

Kirito slowed down and said softly to Sinon. He was somewhat hoping to meet "Death Gun" who went underwater and head towards the city, and attack him while he was unarmed.

"...Maybe we went past him somewhere..."

Once Sinon answered, Kirito turned over, gave a deep thought, watched the river flow behind him, and said, "No, that's impossible. I checked the water while we were running."

"Is-is that so..."

Speaking of which, a person couldn't stay under water for more than a minute without an aqualung. The large sniper rifle Death Gun was carrying shouldn't allow for more space to carry one. Then, he must have slipped into the river below the metal bridge, swam north together with the water flow that was heading there, and then got up before running into the abandoned city.

"-That means he should be lying in ambush somewhere inside this city. The river flow stops there."

The river in front of Sinon became a drain that flowed to the city's underground, and the entrance of the underground drain had sturdy metal bars there, which any player could tell that it wasn't to be entered. That obstacle couldn't be destroyed even if hundreds of plasma grenades were thrown.

"I see... there's still 3 minutes till the scan. We can't avoid the satellite scan if we stay in this dump, right?"

Sinon considered Kirito's question and then nodded her head forcefully.

"Un. During the last tournament, the map would show even the 1st level of a tower. If there's really a need to hide, it'll be water that's extremely dangerous or a cave. Other than that, there's no other way to avoid the scan."

"Okay. Once the scan locks onto Death Gun's position, we can immediately attack to stop him from firing. I'll run straight at him. Please provide covering fire then."

"...I'm fine with that..."

Sinon shrugged, but after that, grabbed Kirito who had been waiting for this chance and said, "But there's a small problem. Haven't you forgotten that "Death Gun"'s not that guy's real character name? If you don't know the name, you can't track his position through radar."

"U...Tha-That's right."

The lightsaber warrior crumpled his beautiful eyebrows and sank into deep thought.

"In fact... amongst the 30 participants, you don't know three of them, right, Sinon? Amongst these three, the "Pale Rider" I was tracking wasn't Death Gun. Which means that remaining two... "Jyuushi X" and "Sterben", one of them is Death Gun... if there's only one person in the city, it'll definitely be him..."

"If both of them are present, we don't have time to hesitate. Now we have to decide which side we want to attack. Well-I just thought of something..."

Sinon coughed dryly a few times and continued, "...If you read "Jyuushi" backwards, wouldn't it become "Death Gun"[1], and "X" can be read as "Cross", which is the Cross that guy drew... no, things shouldn't be that simple..."

"Hm... but most of the character names in VRMMO were randomly created. Someone like me merely modified my own real name... what about you?"

"...Me too."

They stared at each other with a strange expression, and then coughed dryly a few times, Kirito seemed to be undecided as he sighed and said, "If that guy called "Sterben" was really a foreigner like what his name indicated. Are there players from overseas in BoB?"

"Well..."

Sinon looked at her watch. There was less than two minutes before the next scan, so she tried her best to explain as quickly as possible, "During the first tournament, we could choose American (US) or Japan (JP) servers, but there were still a few foreigners who played the Japanese version. I hadn't played GGO then, but from what I heard from Shi... Spiegel, the winner of the first BoB was a foreigner. That person seemed really strong. He managed to kill off all the Japanese with a knife and a handgun..."

"I see... what's his name?"

"I believe, Sato... Satori or something weird like that. But when I started playing, the Japanese server only allowed those in Japan to connect to it, so the players from the 2nd round and the 3rd round this time are all Japanese... or at least, living in Japan. Though that "Sterben" was written alphabetically, he should be Japanese."

"I see..."

Kirito blinked hard and looked like he finally decided as he said this, "Okay, if both of them are at the dump, we'll head to "Jyuushi X". You don't have to panic when I get stunned by the stun bullet like Pale Rider, so just get ready to snipe. Death Gun will definitely use that black handgun for the final hit, so use that chance to hit him."

"Eh..."

On hearing those words, Sinon immediately forgot that there was less than 1 minute left as she widened her eyes. She looked at the black eyes beside her and asked, "...Why are you so..."

Trusting of me? However, Sinon could not let out the voice at the latter end- "...I may not attack Death Gun and snipe you from behind, you know..."

Kirito lifted his eyebrows in an unexpected manner and smiled "I know that you won't do that. Come on... it's about time. I'll leave it to you then, partner."

The black-coated lightsaber user then patted Sinon on the left hand and then walked towards the stairs as he wanted to move from the riverbed to the street.

The place that was touched felt mysteriously hot and painful as the fingers from yesterday, but Sinon chased after the figure wordlessly. Though she told herself that this was an enemy countless times since yesterday, she did not have that feeling anymore.

On the upper levels of the short concrete steps, Sinon and Kirito crouched down at a position that couldn't be seen from the street and waited for the 4th "Satellite Scanner".

Her right hand held onto the device as she watched the watch on her left hand. Right now the time is 8.59pm 55 seconds... 56, if the proceedings of the finals was as fast as last year, it should be about time to enter the second half, which meant that there were only half the number of players left. In fact, she could even hear gunshots and explosions from the abandoned city. However, the sounds finally stopped for now, so everyone should be hiding in the shadows and watching the device.

58 seconds, 59 seconds, 9pm sharp.

The device map showed numerous white and grey dots.

"Kirito, check the north!"

After saying that softly, Sinon then touched the two gathered spots that were at the soutern-most part of the street. The names that were on them were naturally [Kirito] and [Sinon]. As a battle couldn't last for more than 15 minutes, the other players should know that these two weren't fighting, but working together as partners. Even though this wasn't against the rules and there were many instances of players working with each other, the rest would have the thought that 'this Sinon would actually work together with others'. She couldn't help but pray that they won't be caught on camera together.

-She abandoned those unnecessary thoughts and quickly checked through the names. "No-no", "Yamikaze", "Huuka", "Masaya"...these were all famous players Sinon knew of. The names she was looking for weren't in this city, so that would mean that their hypothesis was wrong- No.

"...Got it!"

As Sinon shouted this, Kirito's voice answered in perfect unison.

The center of the street had a round building perimeter that looked like a stadium. A light spot remained in what looked like a perfect sniping position. As Sinon touched it with her finger, the name of the character appeared-"Jyuushi X".

She immediately exchanged glances with Kirito, but immediately returned back to her device. To check through the information again, Sinon continued to move her fingers north, and Kirito moved south at the same time. 5 seconds later, they lifted heads at the same time.

""Jyuushi X"'s the only one in this city for now."

Kirito then answered Sinon with a nervous voice, "Yeah, looks like "Sterben"'s not here. In other words, "Jyuushi X"'s the "Death Gun", and the prey is..."

Kirito used his finger to point at his own device, showing a building that's slightly west from the stadium in the center-the name was "Ricolo". Being alone, if he wanted to move his hiding place to somewhere else, he would have to put himself in shooting range of "Jyuushi X".

As Sinon nodded her head, the light that represented Ricolo started moving to the exit of the building. Once he stepped onto the road, he would be immediately hit by the L115 sniper rifle stun bullet. They had to stop Death Gun no matter what before he fired that black handgun.

Kirito kept his device and looked at Sinon. He looked like he had something to say, but he merely said, "Please cover me."

"Understood."

Sinon answered simply and got up. She then moved up the stairs where Kirito was in front of, observed the surroundings, and moved her right hand to indicate that they should move on before rushing up the steps.

The official name of this lone island that became the grand stage of the tournament finals was the "ISL Ragnarok".. Right now, the ancient city was right in the middle of it, and it should be modelled after famous cities from the world like New York City. There were many skyscrapers that mixed all sorts of functions with traditional beauty, and there were numerous English adverts and bulletins. Of course, these things had become old and were covered by weeds and sand.

Sinon and Kirito tried their best to run up the river that became the drain. Right now, other than the two of them, Death Gun and his target, there were also 5 or 6 players in this city. However, they wouldn't care about that. Luckily, the scan just now did not show anyone who could immediately move to their position. Also, those broken yellow taxis and large buses on the road could act as perfect cover. Both of them moved through like this and continued north.

This abandoned city was about 700m in radius, and with the assistance of AGI boost, both of them ran past this distance in less than a minute. They could see a large round building, and that was their destination, the stadium was in the center. Sinon gave the hand signals, and they ran into the shadow of the bus before observing the surroundings through the broken windshield.

The stadium wall was about 3 stories tall, and there was a exit at the north, south, east and west areas. If Jyuushi X did not move away after using the Satellite Scanner, he should be waiting above the west exit. Sinon widened her eyes and stared at the top of the outer wall. With the improved vision skill 'Hawk Eye', the distance effect of an object would be reduced, and the visual identification rate would increase. She found that there was something like a gun muzzle in a triangular hole on a damaged concrete wall, and behind the hole- "...Got it. Over there."

Undoubtedly, the sniper gun's gunhole was under the place where the sunset shone. At this moment, Kirito seemed to recognize the thing Sinon saw and whispered softly like her, "Looks like he's still waiting for "Ricolo". Okay... I'll use this chance to attack him from behind. Sinon, get ready to snipe at the building opposite this street."

"Eh... I can go into the stadium too...'

Though Sinon objected, she was immediately interrupted by Kirito's strong and forceful expression.

"This is a battle where you can use your ability to its maximum. I trust that you'll definitely use your gun to cover me when I'm in trouble, so I can fight with that guy. This is what partners are for."

Once these words were out, Sinon could only nod her head and agree with Kirito's plan. He smiled, glanced at his watch and continued, "We'll begin action 30 seconds after I leave. Is that enough?"

"...Yeah, that's enough."

"Okay, I'll leave it to you then."