"We have to watch the situation...but I should be leaving then, so I won't attack you."

"But I may snipe you from behind, you know?"

"That can't be helped. Please understand. It's starting!"

As Kirito anxiously turned to look at the metal bridge, he actually put the FiveSeven in his left hand down. Even though the enemy was pointing the submachine-gun right in the middle of his forehead, he still placed the handgun back into his holster.

Though she was angry, Sinon felt that it couldn't be helped, and her shoulders relaxed just like that.

If she exerted a little more force on the finger that's on the trigger, the 24 4.6mm MP7 bullets could shoot out all of Kirito's HP. However, Sinon had already viewed Kirito as her biggest enemy, so she was really unwilling to end her fight against him in such a half-effort manner.

If it's Kirito, maybe he can dodge the Hecate's snipe without even a trajectory, Sinon had already planned for this and thought of all the ways she could use to fight him head on. If they had to fight, of course she would hope for Kirito and herself to be the last two standing amongst the 30 players and then fight an intense deathmatch that would use all their heart and soul.

"...Will you fight me properly if we do this over?"

"Yeah."

Kirito nodded his head, and Sinon puts down her submachine gun after watching his eyes for half a second. She knew that it wouldn't be likely, but to prevent Kirito from suddenly attacking her, she still didn't move her finger away from the trigger. However, Kirito himself immediately relaxed his entire body and proned himself in the bush beside Sinon. He took out mini-binoculars from his belt pouch and started watching this battle.

This attitude of not even paying attention to consider her a potential threat at all made her angry and reluctant at the same time. Why must this guy watch someone else fight? Speaking of which, when did he appear? There wasn't Kirito's name within 1km around her when she checked the "Satellite Scanner" a few minutes ago.

However, Sinon still swallowed her doubts back in and placed the MP7 on her left waist. She then carried the Hecate with both hands and used the scope to watch the two people who were fighting.

On the long metal bridge, Sinon could still see Dyne in a prone position near her. The SG550 that was stuck on his face wasn't moving at all, and this uninterrupted concentration of his showed that he wasn't someone to be underestimated. Of course, the Pale Rider who forced Dyne into such a tough situation couldn't possibly appear easily from the forest across from him.

"...The battle you're so looking forward to may not happen."

Sinon muttered at Kirito, who was beside her, in a mocking manner.

"Dyne won't remain proned there forever. Once that guy gets ready to move, I'll snipe him first."

"In that case, you can take action...no, hang on."

Kirito's answer was tense out of a sudden. Sinon moved her eye away from the scope on reflex and turned to look at the metal bridge with her naked eyes.

At this moment, a figure suddenly appeared from the path that's deep within the thick forest.

It was a tall and skinny player, wearing mysterious blue and white camouflage clothing. Since he had a black helmet on, they couldn't see his face. That person was armed with only the light "ArmaLite AR 17" shotgun. This guy should be-no, he's definitely the "Pale Rider" who was chasing Dyne.

Dyne, who was lying on the other side of the bridge, immediately went tense on this shoulders, and this abnormal atmosphere spread to Sinon who was far away. In contrast, she couldn't feel any pressure from Pale Rider's standing position. He didn't seem to be scared of that SIG in Dyne's hands as he merely crossed the bridge easily.

"...That guy's strong..."

Sinon couldn't help but say that, and beside her, Kirito suddenly moved his body slightly. Sinon glanced at him for a while and found that the side-face that looked just like a girl was giving of a very tense presence. In other words, Kirito was watching that Pale Rider? Even though it was Sinon's first time seeing this certain player's name and appearance, his actions showed that he did possess a certain amount of ability.

Thus GGO had the "Bullet Line" assist prediction ability that that couldn't be possible in real life, it's not easy getting near an enemy with a fully-automatic machine gun. Normally speaking, there would be an obstacle for the person to hide behind to run from one cover to another cover, using the lateral movements to close in on the enemy.

However, Pale Rider merely stepped onto the metal bridge in a defenseless manner casually. There was nothing, no landscape or objects to block the bullets. Even Dyne, who escaped to create this situation could only remain prone on the floor, and a slight doubt could be seen on his back.

However, Dyne was a leader of a squadron for quite some time, so his experience made him abandon his inner doubt. A second later, his SG550 assault rifle fired with the sturdy sound that fit a Swiss machine, and immediately spread throughout the river surface.

However, Pale Rider himself dodged those numerous 5.5mm bullets that were fired over in a manner Sinon didn't expect. He actually ran to a cable that was supporting the bridge and used the left hand to climb up. Dyne hurriedly tried to aim the gun at him, but it's tough for a person in a prone position to aim at an enemy above; as he missed the second shooting, Pale Rider himself used the recoil of the ropes to jump onto the bridge at a position that's rather near Dyne.

"A STR type, using light equipment and boasting 3-dimensional mobility...his skills' points are rather high too."

As Sinon muttered, Dyne got up to show that he wouldn't be tricked a second time and squeezed the trigger for the third time. However, this attack of his was anticipated by Pale Rider. Thus there was a little gap in the firing line and the ground, that blue and white profile immediately rushed in without falling by using his left hand to support the ground and doing a barrel roll forward. He was only 20cm away from Dyne when he got up.

"Damn you...!"

Dyne let out the familiar cursing and tried to quickly change the 30-bullet magazine that was empty. However...

The ArmaLite in Pale Rider's right hand let out a silent flash.

Under such a distance, the bullets of a shotgun couldn't miss completely. Dyne immediately fell backwards as the special effects lighting spread all over him. But remarkably, he didn't stop as he reloaded and got ready to put his gun at this face-however, there was a second gunshot.

Pale Rider again got near and shot for the second time to cause Dyne to lose his balance. This was the terrifying part about this weapon called the shotgun; It causes a high delay beside ordinary damage, allowing people to be continuously attacked helplessly.

--There was no need to bring the SIG to the face, as the muzzle flash that's aimed while holding from the waist would be extremely powerful.

However, Sinon's thoughts couldn't spread to Dyne's brain, and it was too late. Pale Rider continued to close in and slowly reloaded the AR17 before squeezing the trigger right in front of Dyne for the 3rd time. The 12 gauge shell exploded, releasing a rain of bullets and bringing Dyne's remaining HP to zero.

Dyne, who was on the floor lifelessly, had the large word [Dead] in red on him as it slowly spun. Now he's eliminated from the finals. He wouldn't be able to log out during this time as it was to prevent players from exchanging information in the real world. This "corpse" could only watch the live broadcast in his conscious state until the match ends.

"That blue guy's really amazing..."

Beside her, Kirito said with a soft voice. Sinon was subconsciously about to nod her head in response, and immediately pricked her eyebrows on hearing what he said next, "...Is that guy...one of the guys we talked about on the list...?"

Sinon felt extremely suspicious, but immediately remembered that "Pale Rider" was one of the three numbers Kirito was worried about. In other words, Pale Rider could be that target, both of them tried to kill each other in that VRMMO game Kirito played before, and that game's name was-no, maybe it's that one that became infamous...

At this moment, Sinon forced herself to stop thinking.

Kirito should have his own problems too, but those were his own problems. Nobody else had a way, not should they bear responsibility for it.

Sinon seemed like she wanted to shake off this little doubt and turned off the safe of the Hecate before saying softly and simply, "I'm going to snipe that guy."

Without waiting for Kirito's response, she placed her finger on the trigger. After Pale Rider eliminated Dyne with an exciting attack, he left the bridge and was ready to head north. Sinon's crosshair immediately caught sight of his skinny back, and considered the wind direction and distance before readying herself.

At this moment, Kirito finally answered with a hoarse voice, "Ahh...I understand. But, if he's that guy..."

--So what if it's that guy? You're telling me that in less than 300m with his back turned, he could dodge my sniping specialty the "first shot without a bullet line"?

"...Stop joking around."

Sinon merely moved her lips to answer Kirito and fired the trigger without hesitation- But at this moment...

Sinon saw an unbelievable sight in her scope.

A little bullet exited the right shoulder of Pale Rider's blue and white camouflage, and this tall and skinny guy was knocked to the right like he was knocked aside from the bullet that hit him.

""Ahh...!""

Sinon and Kirito, who was watching the scene with his binoculars from the left, shouted out at the same time.

Though surprised, Sinon still focused on her hearing instinctively. Of course, this was to check the gunshot that sniped Pale Rider, where it came from and the sound quality. However...

No matter how Sinon pricked her ears, all she could hear was the dry wind and the water flowing in the river.

"...Did I miss it...?"

Sinon muttered, and Kirito, who seemed to be thinking about that, silently responded, "No, I didn't hear anything as well. What's going on...?"

"The only thing I can think of...is that it was a laser rifle that lets out a very soft sound...or a live weapon with a suppressor. However..."

"Wh..what?...?"

Sinon glanced aside and stared at the puzzled Kirito, thinking how much stuff must she teach him and started explaining.

"It's a muffler. An equipment that's placed in front of a gunbarrel to suppress the sound of gunfire."

"So, so it's a silencer..."

"You can call that. Anyway, a sniper rifle that's equipped with this can suppress the sound of gunfire to a certain extent. But this thing will affect accuracy, shooting range, and is rather expensive."

"I see..."

Kirito nodded his head as his eyes glanced slightly at the tip of Sinon's Hecate II. The front of the gunbarrel was merely a muzzle brake, and even an amateur like Kirito knew that that wasn't a suppressor. Sinon added on before the other party wanted to say something, "This wasn't to save money, but because those things don't fit my style."

Fuun.

She snorted and again looked through the scope. Pale Rider, who collapsed on the floor, didn't look like he was about to get up, but that wasn't a fatal blow. If it was, there would be a red 'dead' tag on him that's like Dyne, who was slightly far away from him. ''He's alive, so why didn't he run away or fight back'- Also, there were other doubts as well. 10 minutes ago, on the map of the "Satellite Scan", Sinon checked that there wasn't anyone else within 1km. In other words, the mysterious sniper shot Pale Rider from a rather far distance. But in that case, the enemy would be using a rather large caliber to snipe him. In GGO, the larger the gunbarrel, the weaker the effect of the suppressor, and the accuracy and shooting range would be even more affected. However, there was no gunshot heard just now, and she couldn't understand why.

As she was thinking, Sinon suddenly remembered that she was wondering about the same thing about that player who was right beside her, and felt that it was time to ask this. She turned around and said softly, "...Speaking of which, Kirito, where did you appear from? You weren't around these hills 10 minutes ago on the satellite scan."

"Eh...? I was tailing that guy Pale Rider from about 500m away, so it should show up on the screen...no, ahh, I got it."

"What is it?"

"Speaking of which, I should have been wading in the river 10 minutes ago. Maybe it's because I was hiding underwater that the satellite didn't discover me..."

-YOU, YOU SWAM THROUGH THE RIVER!?

Sinon tried her best to hold back her voice, and didn't shout out.

It's known that the rivers and lakes in this game weren't some forbidden zone, and they won't die if they dropped inside. However, the HP will continue to drop in the water, and the player won't be able to swim at will due to the weight of the equipment on the body. It's practically impossible for any player to swim over that wide river except for those frogmen-type players with the breathing equipment.

"How, how did you do that...?"

After she finally raised this question with much difficulty, Kirito himself simply shrugged his shoulder and answered, "Of course I removed all my equipment for the time being. All VRMMO that uses the specs of "The Seed" can remove their equipment in their personal window back into the item box. There's no need to carry it, right?"

Perhaps this would be a suitable example to describe someone who was so shocked that she couldn't make a response. Forget about swimming, the boldness of even removing all the weapons and armor in the middle of a battlefield was extremely unbelievable.

"...People would definitely be happy to see your character in underwear like that."

"Arre, isn't the live telecast only showing the battle scenes?"

Seeing Kirito give that don-try-and-fool-me line, Sinon merely snorted coldly and answered, "...Anyway, so the "Satellite Scanner" can't catch people who are underwater. I'll remember that. But, the Pale Rider you swam through the river just to trail was strong, but not some outstanding player. He's unable to get up after getting hit by a bullet, looks like he's..."

Just when Sinon was about to say 'not going to survive', she was interrupted by Kirito, who again raised his binoculars.

"No...I don't think he was so scared that he was unable to get up...look at him, isn't there some strange light effect on his avatar...?"

"Eh..."

Sinon hurriedly increased the range of her scope. Though it was hard to tell as the sunset was too strong, the blue and white camouflage of the Pale Rider did have blueish-sparks all over him. Sinon did see that effect before, and that was- "An...an electric stun bullet...!?"

"Wha, what's that?"

"Like the name, it's a unique bullet that would cause high voltage of electricity once it hits a target. But it needs a rather large caliber rifle to load it, and even a single bullet's very expensive, so they're barely ever used in PvP. That's a bullet that's used when a party hunts a large Mob"

In fact, as Sinon was explaining, the sparks that immobilized Pale Rider started to turn pale. A few more seconds, and the effect would disappear. His HP shouldn't wear down because of that, but now she really didn't know why the enemy would do such a difficult snipe- "-!"

Sinon couldn't tell whether that little tremor was from her or from Kirito beside her.

200m north from where both of them were hidden was that large metal bridge that extends to both east and west. On the west side of the bridge was Dyne, who was dead. Pale Rider was knocked down by a stun bullet that came from the forest on the east side, and was now 5m north from him. However, he was about ready to get up.

Right between the bodies of Pale Rider and Dyne, a black profile came out from a shadow of a supporting metal pillar.

On first glance, that didn't look like a person (player). The avatar was completely covered with a mysterious presence. After trying her best to look at it, Sinon finally understood the reason why she couldn't see him. That person was covered with a grey hooded mantle, and that hood was fluttering irregularly like some little thin material because of the wind. That was a Gille Suit a sniper wears. No, it should be called a "Gille Mantle". But- "...Since when was he waiting there..."

Sinon subconsciously muttered. That mantle guy should be the one who shot Pale Rider. However, since when did he move out of the forest and cross the bridge? Even if he had a Gille Mantle that had outstanding camouflage ability, he would definitely be discovered if he moved on the metal bridge without anyone noticing. Or did he swim through the river like Kirito? But if that happened, she definitely never saw him summon a window and control his equipped figure.

But at the next moment, the next stunning revelation that shook all of Sinon's doubts aside occurred.

The tattered mantle moved forward, and then revealed the main weapon that was hidden under the body in his right hand.

"-"Silent Assasin"."

She let out a panting like voice.

It was a large sniper rifle that was about as long as the Hecate. Though the gun itself was slimmer than the Hecate, the several bolt holes that passes through the mechanisms, the highly-advanced grip that had a thumb handle and the dark-grey gun body that was polished all gave a bone-chilling feeling. However, the most unique specialty about it was the large suppressor that's attached to the tip of the gun barrel. No, it wasn't right to call it installed, but rather, it was a sniper rifle that was designed with the intention to use the suppressor.

Its actual name was "Accuracy International L115A3", and it used .338 inch Lapua Magnum bullets. Though the firepower was far inferior to the .50BMG the Hecate II, but the L115 wasn't an anti-tank sniper gun. One can tell from the fact that this was originally equipped with a silencer that it was created to snipe humans. As the largest range was more than 2,000m, those who were shot by the bullet couldn't see the shooter, and couldn't hear the gunshot before dying. Thus, people gave it a nickname-the "Silent Assassin".

Sinon did hear of this terrifying sniper gun in GGO, but she had never actually seen it before. Speaking of which, she never heard of a sniper who could work on his own other than herself. However, that tattered mantle was able to shoot from deep within the forest across the river and shoot Pale Rider. It's impossible to accomplish such a shot without enough skill, concentration, control and heartbeat.

-Who is that guy?