A spear stabbed forward, deadly. Drifter pierced through the gaping maw of a << Mud Jaw >>, a kind of mob that looked like an alligator made of wet soil and reeds, but with sharp teeth nonetheless. Then, while his weapon was still stuck inside the mouth of the monster, he kneed it in a << Dirty Play >>, pushing it so that almost half of his spear was now inside the mob.

Letting go of his weapon, Drifter jumped to the side to avoid a tail swipe, and smacked the mob in the back with a downward chop. << Martial Arts: Brick-break >>. While the << Mud Jaw >> trashed around, disoriented, the spearman grabbed his weapon again and heaved, activating a << Vertical >> while it was still inside the mob's mouth. The spear came out amidst a cloud of polygons.

That was one of the secrets of weapon skills that he had learned over the months. Every time you used a skill, the system would automatically guide it, as long as your stance is correct. Usually, for << Vertical >> with a spear, that meant standing with your legs spread apart, one in front of the other, knees slightly bent, arms semi-flexed, the tip of the spear almost touching the ground. Then, you just had to let the system take over and guide your body through the upwards cutting motion.

But it didn't need to be always like that. You had to know a skill well enough - not just have many mastery points in it, but truly know the skill. You had to be able to perfectly accomplish the motions, without relying on the system. As long as you could do that, it was easy to adapt. So, instead of needing to take on a rigid stance, Drifter used << Vertical >> by twisting his body such that he would have fallen, if it weren't for his weapon being stuck on the, until then, very solid mob. Almost as if the bottom jaw of the creature, where his speartip was wedged, was the ground. And then his spear lit up, and the skill went through.

Looking around, Drifter saw his party fighting off another two << Mud Jaws >>. The Reavers and their guests had split into two parties so they could cover more ground.

He made to go help Yuuki and Vallerk, charging a << Rage Spike >>, but then canceled the skill. His friends had the battle in good hands. Silica had been supporting him against the first mob, and her partner was keeping the second one at bay with his tower shield while Yuuki darted out from behind him to attack. Yuna was playing << Firemare >> from the back while Asuna was using the last monster as a training dummy to get used to her new weapon.

Stopping in place, Drifter eyed the two mobs. Asuna was having fun, and she would get irate if he interfered. That left the one Vallerk and Yuuki were fighting. So the spearman raised his weapon in one hand and... Threw it.

The spear flew through the air, wobbling, and struck the << Mud Jaw >> right behind the head. The tip of the weapon penetrated the mob... And then it fell. It did about one-sixth of the damage a normal blow of Vallerk's shield did. Meaning, almost nothing. Drifter groaned, much to the amusement of the others, and Yuna poked his side cheerfully.

"Still no luck, Drif?"

He glowered at the grinning songstress, and didn't deign to answer her. Drifter had been trying hard, for the last month, to unlock some kind of spear-throwing skill. And it wasn't working.

The thing was, everyone had thought it was impossible to create skills on SAO, just unlock pre-existing ones. Sometimes they might have some requirements other than simply a high mastery on one of the base skills - that was the case with shield-users' << Counterforce >>, for example, which needed players to fulfill the hidden requirement of learning how to manually redirect blows.

But then, Yuna had gone and created all those songs, which became skills. She even got to name them! Now, no one was sure if that was something specific to musician players, or if everyone could create new skills - no one but the songstress had managed to do so as of yet.

Really, Drifter was shooting for both options, no matter how slim the chances. Whether it was an existing skill he simply hadn't achieved the prerequisites for yet, or creating a new skill, if that was even possible. And it wasn't simple stubbornness. He felt it, really felt it, that having a throwing skill like that would be useful, if not necessary. Even without it, it had already saved lives three times. And if he managed to accomplish it, the skill would become part of his arsenal, just as much as << Martial Arts >> and normal punches and kicks.

Sulking, Drifter walked over to the dying mob, and picked up his spear. Yuuki and Vallerk wisely decided to step back and let the spearman stab it to death, if only to vent a little of his annoyance.

"C'mon, Drifter, don't be grumpy. You are supposed to be the responsible one!"

"I can be grumpy and responsible."

"You'll get it someday, Drifter. You just need to keep trying."

The spearman wasn't sure which was worst - Yuuki's gentle needling or Asuna's soothing words. He was saved from having to give an answer when another << Mud Jaw >> spawned and torpedoed through the murky water at them.

Drifter waited until the mob was almost on top of him before he stabbed... Straight down. His spear pierced through the head of the << Mud Jaw >>, nailing it to the ground, and Drifter jumped and twisted, landing behind the creature. When his spear came out, it was in a long cut which left a red line from the mob's head to the base of its tail. The two-hit combo skill << Edge Vaulting >> took away 20% of the mob's health before it even realized what was happening.

Asuna and Yuuki were already there by the time he landed, dishing out slashes and stabs at the poor mob. Vallerk and Silica, who weren't as used to higher-leveled battles as the Reavers, took two seconds more to gather their bearings and clash with the << Mud Jaw >>. Once surrounded by 5 players, the mob barely lasted twenty seconds.

"We've got to the edge of the mapped territory Argo has. Everything from here on's new."

Asuna pulled up her HUD, set it to public, and showed everyone that they were now entering the foggy area of the 7th floor. The Reavers didn't have much of a reaction. Yuna was diddling with her harp, Yuuki examining the durability of her sword, and Drifter nodded to his fellow vice-guild leader. To them, this was nothing out of the ordinary.

Silica and Vallerk, on the other hand, were a little fidgety. They were clearers, but they didn't usually explore new areas - mainly because they were only two - but rather searched for quests, drops, and the like. Add to that that they were partying with four of Reaver's Requiem numbers, the third largest frontline effective guild - all of the Reavers fought in the frontlines - and it's not hard to understand why the duo was nervous.

"Behind us!"

Drifter spun, and saw two more << Mud Jaws >> encroaching on them. Vallerk hurried to << Taunt >> one while Yuuki and Drifter quickly intercepted the other.

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"Right!"

The spearman had just used a << Tidal Sequence >> to knock back the mob when Yuna cried out again as another monster approached. Drifter exchanged a glance with Asuna, communicating without words, and the fencer rushed out to entangle with the third << Mud Jaw >>.

The mobs were fast and tanky, but the party could deal with three of them with no problem. But Drifter and Yuuki had just managed to dispatch their << Mud Jaw >> when two more spawned, from an entirely different direction. They were getting surrounded.

"Something's wrong! We triggered some sort of event!"

"No kiddin'!"

Yuuki started to dash towards the incoming mobs, but Drifter put his spear in her path. He gestured towards Asuna, who was dueling a << Mud Jaw >> with half its health, somehow managing to avoid the tail swipes and snapping maw even in the knee-height water.

"Leave them to me, go support Asuna. Kill it quickly, before more spawn and we get overwhelmed. Yuna, << Del Din >>!"

"On it!"

To her credit, Yuuki didn't hesitate like she would have a few weeks ago. She gave Drifter a toothy grin and ran over to the fencer, already using a skill.

One thing everyone had learned was that Drifter was, in no uncertain terms, the best spear-user in SAO. And that also made him the best crowd-controller player, other than maybe Shivata and Litten, who ran pure-tank builds.

Of course, Drifter himself never acknowledged that. He knew it to be true, at least amongst the frontliners and clearers - and those were really the only groups that mattered in this, since no one who hid in the safe zones had the right to that claim. But even when other people brought it up, Drifter just brushed it aside. It wasn't that he was overly humble. The spearman liked to brag just as much as everyone else. But there was a limit to pride, and certain claims would only make others dislike you, while you gained nothing.

And Drifter had been humbled by the system more than once. So what if he was SAO's best spearman? He still almost died a dozen times. But... He was SAO's best spear-user.

He greeted the two << Mud Jaws >> with a << Tidal Sequence >> to the face, the three diagonal cuts blowing the mobs back and splashing water everywhere. Then he jabbed his spear at the one of the left, before kicking it in the face with a << Martial Arts: Low Blow >>. Like many of the << Martial Arts >> skills, the damage was negligible, but it was the stun effect Drifter was really after.

A giant maw snapped at his left leg, and Drifter jumped out of the way. Taking advantage of the two seconds where he would only have to deal with one mob, he fired a << Horizontal >> and a << Sting >>, both of which had close to no cooldown after his mastery of them reached 600.

Another << Edge Vaulting >>, and he was in the middle of the two mobs, who charged him without a second's thought. Right in time to get batted away by a << Tornado >>.

Drifter refused to let the mobs catch a breather. The first had yet to land from it's unscheduled flight when his spear went through its belly and out the back. Drifter heaved, spun, and launched the << Mud Jaw >> a good five meters away. Not much, but enough for him to charge and repeat the action, this time using << Rage Spike >>, enabling him to throw the mob twice as far.

Counting the seconds he had, Drifter turned around to the second mob and immediately dropped down, just narrowly avoiding the tail swipe. Without a change in expression, he kneed the << Mud Jaw >> in the snout with << Martial Arts: Hiza >>, and ran it through with his spear.

That was when another monster spawned, and lunged at him. This one Drifter didn't manage to dodge, and the << Mud Jaw >> chomped on his midriff, taking away one-sixth of his HP. Drifter's response was to elbow it in the eye.

The mob did not let go. In fact, it started twisting and turning, and Drifter's health started dropping, so he hit it again, this time with a << Martial Arts: Brick-break >>. Situations such as that were exactly why Drifter, Asuna, and Kirito had insisted all of Reaver's Requiem, as well as Agil's party and the Legend Braves, learned << Martial Arts >>.

The karate chop forced the << Mud Jaw >> to let go, and Drifter promptly smacked it away with a << Horizontal Arc >> before retreating. A quick glance revealed that, while Vallerk, Silica, Asuna, and Yuuki had dealt with the mobs he assigned to them, five more mobs had spawned, including the one that attacked him, and now each duo was fending off two. Yuna had walked closer to the center of their mishaped circle, to avoid being ambushed.

Surprisingly, even with seven << Mud Jaws >> attacking them, and two of their party members not being frontliners, this still wasn't a desperate situation for them. Mind you, it could turn into one very quickly, but it wasn't there just yet.

It would have left them in dire straits at the start of SAO. But they weren't the same players from back then. Their levels, gear, and skill had all vastly improved. Even if this was the 7th floor, Drifter reckoned it would take at least 10 normal mobs for things to become truly dangerous.

He snuffed that line of thought right away, lest he jinxed it.

So, it might surprise the lower-leveled players, but the party was, in fact, dealing with the mobs quite easily. They weren't relaxed, not by a long shot, but they also weren't feeling very pressured. Drifter himself, now that he had all three << Mud Jaws >> in sight, was dancing around them, and keeping them at bay with his spear.

He slid the weapon across his arm, nailing one of the mobs in the head. Then, using the momentum from the blow, he spun in a horizontal slash - not the skill - and then another << Tidal Sequence >>.

"Damn it!"

Yes, three << Mud Jaws >> he could deal with. But Drifter eyed the newly spawned fourth mob charging at him, and cursed. Four was a little bit too much.

The spearman blocked the attack with the shaft of his weapon, but a second tail swipe caught him on the side, and he staggered. He cut the mobs three times, dodged two attacks, and parried a third, but a << Mud Jaw >> managed to bite him in the leg.

"Huddle up, everybody! Vallerk, << Taunt >> as many of them as you can, I'll handle the rest! Asuna, mark a target and go wild! Yuuki, Silica, with her!"

Left with no other choice, Drifter used << Tornado >> again to send the mobs reeling back, and bellowed for his party to group up. They did so, and Vallerk managed to grab the attention of five of the << Mud Jaws >>, which was honestly more than Drifter was expecting. It might be too much for the clearer, but he had a shield and everyone else didn't, so that was that.

Yuna switched to << Rest >> - Drifter and Vallerk were quickly accumulating injuries - and the three girls made quick work of the first mob. Only seven left. And none more spawned.

Drifter looked around and did a quick mental count. Eighteen. Eighteen << Mud Jaws >> had attacked them without the party even moving from this spot. Was there something special about that number? On a whim, he used << Searching >>, and his eyes narrowed.

"Asuna, I'm picking up something to the northeast. 'Bout 30 meters. It looks like some kind of NPC."

Drifter couldn't actually see what it was, only the highlighted clues the skill showed him. But it had a distinct blue color which was normally associated with non-playable characters.

"You think whoever it is, they are behind the mobs?"

"Yup. Too much of a coincidence otherwise."

"Pity we don't have Sinon here. Looks like we just stumbled on a quest, everyone! Let's clear 'em up and see who that is!"