The coalition led by Heathcliff, Kirito, and Asuna defeats the boss, at the cost of fourteen lives. With 25 floors left, players wonder if they’ll really be able to clear the game. Then Kirito figures out that Heathcliff is really SAO’s creator, Kayaba Akihito, who confirms it, telling him he’d be the final boss. As a reward, he gives Kirito the chance to duel him right there, and Kirito accepts. When he’s about to get skewered, Asuna breaks her paralysis and takes the blow for him, and dies.
Kayaba then kills Kirito, who is able to bend the game laws to stick around long enough to kill Kayaba. Kirito is reunited with Asuna in the sky above Kayaba’s Ruby Castle as the game deletes itself. All players are logged out. A malnurished Kirigaya Kazuto wakes up in a hospital bed, removes his NerveGear, and gets up in search of his love, Yuuki Asuna.
Holy Flerking Schnit! We picked the wrong week to go on vacation…it should have been after this episode, which ends everything we knew only halfway through the series! The final boss is revealed. Asuna dies protecting Kirito. Kirito dies killing Kayaba. The game is over. The remaining episodes will be called Sword Art Offline, amirite? (Rimshot!) Seriously, we’re bowled over by what just happened, and haven’t a clue what’s to come. This was no cheap plot twist – to us it was a bold and risky move that changes everything – as long as it holds up.
As soon as Asuna died, we knew something fishy was going on. When Kirito died, well, duh, he was going to show up somewhere, not just end up in a void. But we weren’t prepared for the awesome beauty of the last scenes: SAO’s always excelled at backgrounds, but the vistas here take the cake. But perhaps most powerful is the feeling of enormous loss we felt right along with him both when Asuna died in SAO and when he wakes up, unsure of where the real Yuuki is. Such is the strength of his love, he’s able to stand up and walk looking for her. We’ll have what he’s having in his I.V.!
Rating: 9 (Superior)
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